lettyk

http://ideas.blogs.com/lo/2004/04/chapter_1_onlin.html

This article brought me back to my teaching days at Corps School while on active duty because of all the interaction we had with the students face to face. I felt they gained not just the knowledge but real world experience from the Instructors from their perspective in the health care field. Corps School teaches the fundamental basics of patient care that is the equivalent of a Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN), and first aid training in preparation for possible deployment overseas. The curriculum was based off of the standard nursing manual and the majority of information was provided in handouts with the use of technology media as in using a Smart Board that was interactive with the Instructors. I tried to keep the facilitating portion interactive and fun by asking more questions then redirecting them to other students for better initiative on their part. But in keeping up with the technological advances the facility purchased numerous laptops and set up a computer lab where everything is networked together. Now every student works independently on their studies and even take exams on them. The problem with this is there are actually more test failures than before when the material wasn’t readily available on their laptop. I found many students simply skimming through the lecture and just clicking at any answer they felt was appropriate. These students were reading but they weren’t comprehending the lessons outlined from the objectives that were provided. The students were ‘encouraged to work at their own pace’ yet they fell behind because they were also allowed to go online for additional information related to the lesson plans.  Many Instructors found it easier on them in not being too responsible to oversee the student’s progress while they supposedly ‘studied’ and utilized their laptops from other related sources off the internet. Who observed the students in determining whether their information was from a reliable source? How was an effective teaching principle considered if all the student’s just clicked whatever they thought was correct and not comprehended crucial information? There was supposedly a limit as to how many tests the students were allowed to fail which went from 3 to about 7! Not that I minded the new program capabilities offered by the new learning software, but I felt the students could benefit from the ‘old school’ way of learning by reading. Check out other chapters in this blog: 

http://ideas.blogs.com/

In Connie Malamed’s blog about the 10 qualities of the Ideal Instructional Designer, one commenter, Camille B. Price, contributed her point of view on the subject of whether ID’s needed to have a degree, and listing ideal knowledge and skills ID’s should possess. I do agree with her response as far as ID’s needing to have some form of knowledge and expertise with graphic tools like Adobe’s Master Suite that consists of Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign…etc. You do have to have the desire to exceed your learning needs, and I’m glad I have a Visual Communications background to help me in the right direction. The capabilities that a designer can possess are timeless and yes, I too have applied for designer jobs that required these required skills in order to even be considered for the job. Most jobs I’ve seen for ID’s require a bachelors, more so masters. Read the rest of Camille’s comments.

Camille B. Price

July 10, 2009 at 12:40 pm

http://theelearningcoach.com/elearning_design/10-qualities-of-the-ideal-instructional-designer/comment-page-1/#comment-3291

I like Cathy’s helpful hint in creating a mini-scenario to implement basic tools for instructions when you’re tasked with putting information into a course. This is especially crucial in medical settings when patient safety is involved and I’ve personally experienced mistakes that were made where both the provider and patient were almost at risk because all they received was a poster with rules stating what to do, and not solutions as to what they should do in case there’s a mishap.  Providing a person with simple graphics and informational slides allows the learner to visually engage with the important steps and stimulate their analysis of thought and behavior in selecting the right answer where it’s then committed to memory. I think we try to go overboard with too much knowledge and not enough images to create a mental map in order to get the point across. This wastes time with instruction especially when it is a safety issue. Take a look at Cathy’s blog for mini-scenarios made easy.

http://blog.cathy-moore.com/2011/10/how-to-create-a-memorable-mini-scenario/

Before I decided to go into the field of Instructional Design, I wasn’t quite sure what the field really consisted of. How information about designing principles and their relationship to teaching and learning was never an interest to me. As a matter of fact I wasn’t even considering going back to school for my Masters at all. Yet my experience with instruction and facilitating courses really accumulated after about 16 years while I served on active duty. I’ve seen how new technology allows better development for a students learning needs and using design models facilitates better and increased use of knowledge, skills and attitude to the student / audience. These innovative teaching methods will make any instructional design model more effective. Sometimes knowing what information to eliminate in order to make the learning content simpler which I feel takes practice and skill. I’ve had some experience with this and realized even with experience, mistakes can happen when you take out too much content that affects the concept of the designed curriculum. I’m hoping to at least master some good techniques to offer more assistance with designing the required curricula in my organization for classroom and online settings.

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