Making Progress at last

Last Wednesday was the second theory lesson and I began with a small piece of paper with 3 questions:

1. How's Canvas? Why?
2. How did you feel when you finished your homework this week?
3. What did you do for your directed study hours?

Answers were clear.
Many in the class were feeling confused about Canvas - difficulty navigation, or uploading files and a few other issues, which we clarified immediately.
Those who did homework felt good of course. Others were worried they couldn't get it done in time and were worried about what to do next.
The directed study responses became interesting. The whole point was to get students working together on their group work and begin their collaborations, and about half did other stuff,so we went back to what directed study entails.

It feels like a good way to get feedback and I think I might do this more often as it's easy and quick to do. It's not personal as there are no names required and I can react on the spot if there is something getting out of control.

We went through a few more things to put the class at their ease and already the response was a lot more positive. 

Next I got some feedback on how they felt about the groups I had allocated for the Shops and this was quite cool. One group had reconfigured some of the pairings to suit their skills better and who they knew better (not quite my intention but I'll have to see how that develops). I think a combination of what I say and what the group members need to function is a fair solution. Both groups displayed  clear automatic leader and follower sets, and the discussions from both seemed to be quite effective despite having to work in a crowded computer lab. In all, though they felt confident that they knew what was expected of them and they were happy with the set up and information given to them last week. I was interested to hear comments that this Shop felt to be easier to plan than their last one, even though there is more work and input expected in this course.

Perhaps the fact that they don't have to choose groups and and allocate all tasks, but can get on with it, coupled with the preparation we did last week about working together and solving problem, is paying off already.
I'd like to think so!

Next week I'm asking the same questions on the same format and I'll see what difference there is in general with the few changes and explanations. In all, I'd say a positive start to a new way of presenting this Shop Group Assignment.

As a result we went straight to Kahoot!

and it was a massive success! It's been quite  while since I used it in class myself and it was such a buzz to see them so enthusiastic!

Goals for next week are:
1. keep the reflection up to date
2. monitor the group progress and feeling moving forward
3. trouble shooting the spreadsheet progress as planned now that this is also clearer

Reflection on Action

In conversation about this week's progress it's coming to me that I am working backwards to find the way forward. This is fine because it was the act of looking back that gave me the idea to improve my group work so that our Shops can be planned more effectively by the students.

What has bothered me this week is the fact I am having difficulty figuring out how to consciously recognise any progress in my professional development.

As I was talking to Des (lecturer Diploma Culinary) this morning it came to me that conversation is where I articulate a lot of what is going on in my mind.

I know that I think better out loud and that through conversation a lot of good ideas come up. Then I go away and work them out, which is exactly how it went this week.

By spending time looking, talking and thinking about what, how and why I needed to change things, when I finally sat down to work on those changes, they really did flow fairly fluidly onto the screen.

This allowed me to achieve some of last week's goals
1.  I am finding activities to help introduce and hopefully motivate solid group work next Trimester. The Shop assignment is updated and I have completed both a production plan and a task list for the students to work from.
2. Adding milestones is kind of done - just need to add in the class dates - the lesson schedule will be confirmed this week which will help with that.I'll put into the class calendar as well so there is complete clarity.
3. the story board made way for Canvas, I spent a frustrating Sunday afternoon working on it - I don't enjoy learning new systems especially when I'm told it's so easy! I have such clear visions of what I want I get on my own way when I don't see how to achieve that straight away.However, by yesterday morning I was a whole lot happier about what I had accomplished. After a night's sleep I saw that it will be quite good. Now to work out how I want to do the group and individual collaboration files.

So what am I learning about my teaching practise? Looking further back at my action plan I realised a lot of points were covered by the end of the day's work, and that once I organise some good tactics to introduce improvements to group work. Above all I want to avoid this!:

I think then with this hindsight, part of my plan would be to be more mindful of the impact of our expectations on our students. While talking with Des I realised that a lot of the time as lecturers, we are 70% there in our heads and don't reflect enough on how it will look to the student - where do they start from and where will they end. I know I wrote about this in my reflections on the Special Topic and Research, but I still have more to do getting this to be a part of me so I think back in better detail and get the consequences in front of me ore effectively. This meta-cognition takes time and effort, unfortunately I don't always want to listen to those voices that tell me (they can be very quiet and I can be good at putting them aside until the consequences SCREAM at me - by which time I have to RUN!) to make improvements.

Time for some story boards - I seem to be avoiding it yet I am fairly sure it will help to keep my focus so off I pop!

Action Plan and Learning Outcome

The action plan is complete, and I'm happy to say it was for 80% acceptable. As far as what my students need, is concerned, not a problem. As far as my own goals - that needed to be stated more clearly and explained throughout the action plan. Without that then there is not a lot for my own professional development, that after all was the point of this whole exercise. I think I under estimated how much harder is it so see what you need to do for yourself and to write that in clear terms. 

I need to bring the learning outcome for the Mobile course.

I came up with this:

Here is the outline of what I plan to do.

1. The context.  Where will the learning fit in the big picture? It might be a lesson or a link between lessons.  It might be a 'must know' topic that can be deepened in class.

Students in Level 4 Baking participate in 2 shop days. They plan for and carry out the preparation of baked goods for sale, which they sell themselves through our shop outlet.

2 What is the intended learning outcome?

'Calculate the ingredients require and the cost of that food for Shop Day using the Excel template provided.'

As a part of this process they have to work together to produce the food order based on the product list while also states how much of each will be made.

In level 3, students have learned how to calculate the cost of a recipe do they know how to calculate the cost of ingredients.

Using the excel temple provided will give student the opportunity to complete the recipes and product specifications as a part of the shop exercise. The template will also calculate an estimated selling price per unit, as long as the recipe and yells are put in correctly.

3. R2D2. How can the learning outcome/s be achieved and fulfill all 4 parts of this model.

The main part of this task will be 2-3 short video clips explaining step by step what students have to do to complete the order 

Part 1 will be a short video of how an excel sheet works.

Part 2 will show how to put in the recipes and yields.

Part 3 will describe how to link the ingredients to get the cost of each recipe

Part 4 will show how to refine the costs by deleting information such as the way eggs are sold per unit but the excel sheet says per 1000. This changes the cost and makes it unrealistic.

Part 5 will teach students to gather the ingredients and sort them into the final order format ready for processing.                   

Looking at the R2D2 model, what do the students need to do?

• Reading - locating resources find the videos and the file to work in
• Writing – communicating the process - filling in the required field communicating how that went - if the numbers are making sense or not and why that may be
• Doing - diagnosing needs, locating resources - who needs further assistance - who can give that from the group?
• Displaying - evaluating learning - 

Here are two really useful blogs relating to adult learning and engagement:
http://dynamind-elearning.com/2013/11/can-we-develop-e-learning-that-respects-adult-learning-principles/

http://blog.cathy-moore.com/

This week's goals:
Once the goals and action plan are set then WORK on them!!!!!! Time is marching on and it's a matter of getting on with it now. In 4 week's time we will have a whole lot of new students that I can try out my revamped learning event on.

Developing a teaching philosophy and Teaching Action Plan

Not much to report on the Mobile Learning this week apart from the fact that I have a great looking microphone and a good desktop stand for it. Very happily I received good feedback in last week's reflection for Mobile Learning, that I had written clear deep reflections giving me a firm foundation on which to build my Mobile learning activity. This gave me a great deal of satisfaction particularly since while reading it over, I began making notes to myself where I thought I needed to be more specific about what I was trying to get across. I think this is that thing called meta-reflection. I haven't even tried the microphone out yet, as it has been all about developing my teaching philosophy and writing an action plan for professional development. Both sound a lot easier than they seem at first sight...

I'll share all of this when I have my marks back. Suffice to say after having done the teaching perspective inventory in the past fortnight I am quite comfortable with the fact that I seem to be sailing on an even keel. It's nice to think I have found a certain equilibrium within my teaching self. That allows me to see what I want to improve based on student successes and struggles, without feeling the need to chastise myself over my 'failings' as it is not necessarily anything I have done wrong rather than that I would see things needing to be changed. The action plan began writing itself purely with what I wanted to achieve from the student's perspective. At some point today I realised that there needed to be a lot more about what I want to achieve as a practitioner so another hunt for teaching action plan templates ensued. With a bit of tweaking I now feel as if I am developing a plan that will improve my delivery as well as the student experience. The background work will be the most demanding. I have a busy month ahead of me getting the templates all organised and using the screen casting software - that also needs to be storyboarded so I have a good guide for what needs to be accomplished. Formulating what needs to be improved from two perspectives has been quite useful in that I have a more clear idea of what work needs to be done and how much will need to be rewritten - that I will try to minimise since there is limited time and I want to spend more on developing the screen casts. Suddenly I have more than one in mind - I knew that would happen but was hoping that the ideas would wait a bit longer - perhaps a few static screen shots via a website will be a good substitute? Does that mean I have to develop a Wix website as well now?

Let's keep it simple. Start with a storyboard and go from there.

There are some great visuals and concepts forming both in my head and on paper, yet also a lot of empty spaces around them that need to be filled in to complete the whole scenario. With time and thought that will happen.

Goals for next week:

1. assignment to be submitted on Monday
2. prioritise what needs to be worked on next - the action plan will help with that. There will be a fair amount of tandem projects 
3. refine this journal and write a new summary for Teaching in Action for next Saturday's class. This week's blog post will help me out.

Let's see how the reflective writing comes along - shall I make a new wordle again? I guess it depends on what terms and concepts I come across in the next few days. Oooh, I could put this into a Word Sift and see how that turns out.

Referencing and Citations

2/5 - 7/5
I've had an interesting week in my Special Topic. We've been told we are in effect, doing a literature review, so I went back to Gina Wisker's Post Graduate Research Handbook, and looked that up. Here she tells me to consider using a referencing machine that can help sort out the pdf files I've been gathering which sounded good to me. Happy to search that out.
I settled on Mendeley which is super easy to use and copies references into a Word doc without any fuss, unlike End Note which can cause formatting issues. It also lets me save my reading notes on a couple of formats which are transferable to my word doc as well. Feeling excited!
Then I found these 2 websites which gave me a good idea of what a Lit Review can look like, and recognised them in some of my sources, so proceeded to make one of my own like that. Feeling quite pleased and clever.
So far so good....

http://www.literaturereviewhq.com/guest-post-how-to-get-your-literature-review-to-write-itself/

http://phdtalk.totallyvidya.net/academic/the-four-cs-of-literature-review/

I even looked at a writing tool!!!!! but Scrivener costs US$40.00 after the first 30 days so not really an option at this point. What I am needing to do as these 2 blog posts suggest, is more active note taking. I made a good start with the Mendeley programme for referencing and I will use those notes on the side to be a part of my Literature review. If I'm right I can drag and drop this notes which are attached to the highlights in the PDFs I have stored in there. Not feeling smug yet, but getting close....

8/5
Upon going back to the criteria (a day later!) I see that I have not been critical AT ALL and need to address that, so go and look for examples of how to go about that as well. Feeling worried I wasted time.

9/5
BUT NOW!!!!! oh dear I think I am getting bogged down in the idea of a proper Critical Literature Review! And I am sure that is not the intention! There's still time to unstick myself, and I have heaps of notes - I just need to opinionise and sort them into more coherence for my topic. At least there is plenty of evidence to be found for my topic!!!! Still feeling worried, started an email to Linda. Time to re read the criteria with more attention, I think.
Saving the mail as a draft - I seem to be answering my own question - but a second opinion is always a help. Feeling a bit confused.

Sent the email, feeling better about that.

Wondering if I should be feeling sheepish or can I just not see the woods for the trees!!!!

Goals for this week:

1. Get the critiques sorted!!
2. get stuck into the Research Essay by Wednesday since that one also needs to be tended to sooner than later.
3. Keep this blog going, I am finding it useful to keep setting down my thoughts, but concentrate on writing how it helps me learn - still struggling with that.

Hamsters and Guinea Pigs

Before the Easter break this past week, I asked my students what self directed learning means to them, and the Learning Tree I made up from their concept ideas is something inspiring. I can certainly take a leaf (or a few) from this! It shouldn't surprise me anymore that even though as their lecturer I know exactly what I want from my students, as a student myself I make the same missteps and neglect the full circle - what is the topic and what are the criteria? My 'consciousness' knows what to do, I have a 'direction', yet my 'preparation' does not always see me making sure I have actually covered all of the ground needed for the next class as I found out pretty quickly for the Special Topic class on March 19th. Certainly I have an 'interest',and most definitely a 'goal', so that's all right then.

I thought I was well prepared, I had my wordle in the shape of this hand below all ready, and had printed off my last blog to share with everyone. So far so good, right? Well, yes, but for two small factors:

1. I didn't specifically share what my actual topic would be
2. I didn't make clear how I felt about my learning journey up till then 

Sort of the whole point, which I didn't quite twig, until Linda's feedback asking me exactly those 2 points. Felt a bit sheepish and kind of clicked that I had sort of felt that but liking what I had written, left it as it was. Hmm.

Lesson learned? I hope so! Instructions are there to help as I am so good at letting my own students know - why do we revert to exactly that as students ourselves?

Another contemporary issue worth exploring I think?

But I AM going to stick to my original thoughts and so here is my Special Topic Question after some input form Linda and my own process of deciding what the question will be:

How can students be encouraged to engage in deep learning during a more compressed time frame?

I am keeping the compression as that is the whole point - yes deep learning is important, and we will get that  - but HOW do we get earlier and sustain it,when the Certificate and Diploma programme I deliver is now finished  within 4 trimesters, not 4 semesters? This is a 5 month difference overall, and that will show somehow, I would say. 

I've also got my Research question:

Why is reflective writing helpful in a practical course?

Actually, I think the two are clearly linked but I wont go into that, there will be a time for that at a later stage I think. I'm really pleased that I left the class 2 weeks ago feeling much more clear about how to find the questions and formulate them more clearly, and was even more pleased to feel I had got a much better grasp on what the terminology means. Ontology, epistemology, methodology and paradigm now actually have meaning and don't confuse me so much. I spent 5 hours critically reading a 700 page book in Research in Education, (thanks to Mona from MIT Student Support who taught my class how to read effectively - it works!!) and I could actually understand it!!! Progress has been made!
Today I set up my assessment work and tidied up my research notes - what a mess! but now it all makes sense and I can get down to the business of more reading (about 6 books to go through for both courses) and getting my introductions written.
Another useful day under my belt, so feeling ok about things again!

Getting back to my learning journey so far, I want to acknowledge my classmates and Linda too, for their feedback on my presentations. I was blown away by the recognition from a lot of people about my scattered thinking and the need to find my focus - the footprints resonated well here, starting off alone and expecting that soon more would join me on the learning journey.
I did not realise how powerful the image of the hand with words would be let alone the impact of the colours - high five, hands on, heaps to carry with me...
I felt inspired, uplifted, humbled and really touched by how peer feedback has the power to set you thinking even further on what you have just shared - so I did that while we were giving each other feedback.
I found the act of giving feedback on everyone else's summaries very powerful as well, as it helped me to see the variety of interest among 8 people, and hopefully I can take some of that with me to enrich my own journey. Just looking at the hand and reflecting on the words there actually helps me to focus on what they mean both singly and collectively to me at this stage. The hand is not trying to be confrontational, but to invite you to 'stop' and 'think' about what the words themselves mean to you. The colours were also meant to 'pop' and stand out, the dark background helps with that I think- we can find light by learning.
The blog I am happy with, I love the staircase representing my learning journey, and the fade into the distance gives me the same feeling as the footprints - this was the beginning, and there is so much out there!

Goals this week:

• Read the books and get the relevant extracts
• Start on the introductions for my essays and put my subject matter into context
• SAVE the blog as I write - I nearly lost it all, thank goodness for the history button! Google Drive is great, but teaches me VERY BAD HABITS! 

Hamsters - saving up my thoughts and words to share them on my blog for further perusal
Guinea Pigs - finding out how I want to continue is always somewhat experimental - as long as I keep the goal in mind it will be all right