Archive for June, 2004
Assignment 7.
By Karen | Wednesday, June 30th, 2004 | No Comments »
Copyright Karen Clement, June 2004. Submitted 11:10pm CST, 587 words.
The classroom is not the only arena for learning. In fact, proponents of situated learning feel that learning in the classroom is the foundation for learning in the “real world” (Woolfolk, Winne & Perry, 2003). With the recent emphasis on continuing education in the workplace, it is not surprising that expert teachers–in the form of corporate instructors, Human Resources professionals, and management–are in high demand in the private sector.
Unlike a classroom, where students primarily focus on their own achievement, a modern-day work environment must achieve corporate goals through high degrees of collaboration. Implementations of cooperative learning would benefit both company and staff, with benefits manifesting in many ways: profits, employee empowerment, and efficiency are a few.
In the classroom and the workplace, cooperative learning exists when participation and learning occurs for each member of a group (Woolfolk et al, 2003). This learning is shaped by the degree of collaboration; the higher the collaboration, the greater or more positive the learning experience. There are five elements that generally exist in an atmosphere of cooperative learning: positive interdependence, face-to-face interaction, individual accountability, collaborative and cooperative skills, and group processing (Johnson & Johnson, 1989, cited in St. Edward’s University, 2003; Woolfolk et al, 2003). For a concrete application, this paper will discuss the following training program that I am facilitating at work in July.
Don’s Photo is a mid-sized corporation that manages eight retail locations and photofinishing labs throughout the Prairies. Due to high turnover in 2004, the six-person Digital Lab lost two expert staff and will be losing one more (myself). Consequent issues generated include: a highly understaffed environment; scarcity of free time for non-primary tasks; employees that lack confidence in their mastery of their primary workstations; employees that are not fully enculturated into a team-based environment. With only two expert employees remaining in the department, my secondary role as trainer has been stunted by the need to fulfill my primary role as a production worker. Another task has fallen to the Digital staff–training a new employee in the three weeks before my departure.
The existing team of four, over a series of group meetings with me as facilitator, formed a collaborative training program that accounts for the constraints listed above. Each team member will be responsible for the cognitive apprenticeship (Woolfolk et al, 2003) of the new employee on the workstation(s) under their jurisdiction. This ensures individual accountability and allows junior team members to learn by teaching (Woolfolk et al, 2003). Since each workstation is interdependent and can be operated by more than one team member, the team can switch training roles when time or workload frustrates the original schedule. Constant monitoring of progress is done over the day through normal channels of interaction, and if need be, in short full-team meetings at the beginning of the workday.
My responsibility is to ensure full participation and learning for all involved in the program. As the training expert, I must be a proper model for scaffolding and coaching (Woolfolk et al, 2003). As a motivator, I must instill confidence in my team member’s collaborative and cognitive skills. Finally, I must introduce cognitive conflict (Woolfolk et al, 2003) during team discussions to help change the departmental culture–from a team dependent on my decision-making into a team that is more autonomous and confident of their decision-making abilities. If we can stay on track with this ambitious but progressive training program, the impact that this year’s high turnover will have on the Digital Lab will be effectively mitigated.
REFERENCES
St. Edward’s University (2003). Cooperative Learning. Retrieved on June 30, 2004 from http://www.stedwards.edu/cte/resources/cooperative.htm.
Woolfolk, A. E., Winne, P. H., & Perry, N. E. (2003). Educational psychology (2nd. Canadian ed.). Scarborough: Allyn and Bacon Canada.
Yay, Kenora!
By Karen | Wednesday, June 30th, 2004 | 4 Comments »
We’re leaving tomorrow for Kurt’s cottage in Kenora, ON. I was fortunate enough to get Friday off, which also happens to be our three-year anniversary! Even though we’ll be in Kenora the whole time, and surrounded by his family, I’m hoping we could spend a few hours on Coney Beach just to ourselves, maybe have a little picnic. I can’t wait!
On another exciting note, Dave is in town meeting his girlfriend’s family so we got to hang out last night. It was really great to see him after more than a year’s absence, even if he did laugh at me when I was attacked by mosquitos and even after his guilt trip for me not getting in touch when I went back to Vancouver for my birthday. It’s Dave; he’s sadistic.
Hopefully he and his girlfriend can stop by in Kenora while we’re there and hang out. Then he can meet Kurt’s crazy (but lovable) family and be at a loss for words, for once!
Assignment 6.
By Karen | Wednesday, June 23rd, 2004 | No Comments »
Copyright Karen Clement, June 2004. Submitted 11:40pm CST, 544 words.
As a self-regulated learner, I strive not only to acquire knowledge but to find ways to motivate and discipline my learning (Woolfolk, Winne & Perry, 2003). As one with a “deep-processing approach to learning” (Woolfolk et al, 2003, p127), I also search for different ways to attach meaning to any knowledge gained. This brief learning profile may demonstrate why many learning strategies and tactics already comprise my exam preparation methodology. Highlighting text, integrating external resources, and applying theory into practice are some of the learning strategies that have become habit over the years. Two more learning strategies will be added to this repertoire to help prepare for the final exam: mnemonic strategies and summation.
The constraints of time and workload often make it difficult for students to rely soley on deep-processing techniques. For learning domain-specific terms, one can make use of rote learning and mnemonic devices, or techniques for remembering, which can be quite effective in enhancing retention and recall (Woolfolk et al). An example of rote and mnemonic tactics, loosely based on the keyword method, would be the use of flash cards to remember chapter terminology.
Flash cards as a hybrid mnemonic/rote device would give me the ability to process the concepts of many terms in a shorter amount of time. Contiguity (Woolfolk et al) is another benefit of this form of study. Terms that appear in multiple-choice questions can be quickly associated with the proper definitions, thus making the question easier to understand. Exemplars (Woolfolk et al) could be added to the flash cards over time, in order to elaborate the from-text definitions with long-term memories. To increase retention, processing depth, and speed of recall, distributed practice could be implemented via frequent, regular drills. Technology could even be used to facilitate distributed practice: I use a PDA device to carry flash cards with me and drill myself during work breaks and bus commutes.
Still, for full understanding of course concepts, it is not enough to remember definitions. Summation (Woolfolk et al) would be my strategy of choice to increase depth of understanding. By paraphrasing each chapter’s content, summarizing techniques filter out irrelevant information and focus my attention on key ideas. Creating chapter outlines is only one application of summation; creating summaries of topics that span multiple chapters, such as useful teaching practices, would help me form an integrated, high-level view of course concepts that could be used to answer a myriad of short-answer essay questions.
It seems obvious from the examples seen here that summarizing and mnemonic techniques are useful in other areas of life that require learning. Use of mnemonic devices would be handy for learning technical jargon in a new workplace. Knowing how to summarize complex topics into laymen’s terms could be crucial to selling a business proposal or training new staff. This high-road transfer (Woolfolk et al) of these strategies to real-life situations must be encouraged. By using mindful abstraction (Woolfolk et al), one could find new ways to apply these learning strategies to situations that are dissimilar to an academic learning environment. Evolving technologies can make it easier to apply learning strategies or practice it more frequently. By being creative and resourceful, general transfer of these learning strategies will occur, and will benefit both academic and real-world endeavours.
REFERENCES
Woolfolk, A. E., Winne, P. H., & Perry, N. E. (2003). Educational psychology (2nd. Canadian ed.). Scarborough: Allyn and Bacon Canada.
Please bear with me — moving is a b*tch.
By Karen | Tuesday, June 22nd, 2004 | 2 Comments »
After reviewing our financial picture, I’ve decided to part ways with my beloved web host, LFC Hosting, and return to my piddly (but free) webhost called Simon Fraser University. It’s too much a luxury to have a $30 web host, as much as it is capable of handling all the programming languages I need to play around with.
As I really haven’t had the time to do all the programming I’d wanted to do, it’s a waste of money and resources. So for a while, you’ll wonder why my website is a little quirky, as I move http://www.karenclement.ca to point to my SFU server. So if you can’t read my blog for a few days, don’t fret…the sordid (or bland) details of my life will still be here for your perusal.
If you wish to leave comments in the meantime, do so at my temporary URL: http://www.sfu.ca/~kclement/blog. In a few days’ time, you should be able to use karenclement.ca/blog to find my site, as normal.
Weird cognitive games.
By Karen | Friday, June 18th, 2004 | 4 Comments »
I am currently fascinated by things that I can somewhat explain with my educational psychology mumbo-jumbo. The games from EYEZMAZE are what I am trying to comprehend this week. Because the programmer uses a translator to communicate in English, he creates his games with minimal written instruction. You have to rely on your problem-solving skills and pattern recognition to figure out a) what to do and b) how to do it well enough to win the game.
Tontie (aka Kill the Teletubbies)
Grow v3.0
Vanilla vBeta
Ebay update.
By Karen | Tuesday, June 15th, 2004 | 1 Comment »
I successfully re-won my shiny, compact Belkin wireless keyboard. It should arrive by Friday into my greedy sniper hands.
Ebay and marbles.
By Karen | Tuesday, June 15th, 2004 | 1 Comment »
Glad to see that some of you enjoyed that game from Ebaum. How come I can do this game and not a freakin’ Rubix cube? I should be good at it, I’ve taken discrete math!
Ebay has been pissing me off lately; actually, it’s more that ebay “snipers” are pissing me off. If you’re not an ebayer, sniper is a term used for people that wait until the very last moment to outbid you, then laugh at you menacingly from their evil chair in front of their evil monitor. Well, maybe I’m making some assumptions here.
I’ve been trying to buy a wireless keyboard for my Palm m125 for the past week and have been outsniped by 3 people already. I’m one of the law-abiding, ethical (ie: screwed) ebayers that actually put in a reasonable maximum bid, instead of inflating prices by always bidding in the smallest increments possible. Attempt 1: max bid $10 USD. Outsniped by: $0.50 with 5 mins left. Attempt 2: max bid $8 USD. Outsniped by: $0.09 with 10 seconds left.
Attempt 3: max bid $10.50 USD. Outbid by $0.50. This auction is over in less than 3 hours so I will see if it goes any higher, and if it doesn’t, I’ll try to snipe for a change. I’ll be paying over $11 USD, but the keyboard retails at $89.99CAD + taxes anyhow, so I’m getting a deal regardless.
If my sniping switcheroo doesn’t work, there’s always the other auctions this seller churns out after 1 or 2 days. (sigh)
Forgot about my webcam until today.
By Karen | Sunday, June 13th, 2004 | No Comments »
My dad has been pestering me to get my webcam up and running again. I bought it a couple years ago when Kurt and I were long-distance dating. Still have to create a better looking web page, but for now I’m using my software’s auto-layout.
I added a new link on the sidebar called “View my web cam page”. It’s a new window that takes images every 30 mins during the times we’re home, usually 6pm-midnight. Here it is! Enjoy.
Funny what you can find on the net.
By Karen | Saturday, June 12th, 2004 | 15 Comments »
I should be studying for my midterm on Wednesday but instead I went to Google and typed “I’m bored”. This is what came up.
Good ones from EBaum’s World:
- Addictive game
- Do it in under 200 moves
- Boy faints in spelling bee but finishes word (you may be asked to download an extra decoder)
- Bow Man
- Kill the Teletubbies
- Duck Hunt!
Eureka!
By Karen | Friday, June 11th, 2004 | 7 Comments »
I finally figured it out: I’m lactose intolerant.
You may wonder why I’m so happy about this finding, but trust me, knowing the problem is a lot better than feeling generally bad after each meal. When I first moved to Winnipeg, I always felt bad that I had to excuse myself from the Hamilton dinner table after the meal (sometimes during the meal). I though I just wasn’t used to “white food”. But now I see I had been drinking a tall glass of milk with my food, just like all the other Hamilton kids. Before Winnipeg life, it wasn’t a big deal, because I didn’t drink much milk growing up, and didn’t have a taste for a lot of lactose rich products (cheese, ice cream, yogurt, etc).
So it became clear today, hours after downing a tall glass of strawberry Milk 2 Go. By noon, I had been sick more than twice and needed “alone time”. This happened a couple days go, also after drinking milk in the morning. A coworker suggested that maybe I was lactose intolerant, like she is, so I Googled the symptoms and found that I was experiencing all of them in exactly the time period it predicted.
So there you have it, folks! I fit the Asian stereotype; I’m lactose intolerant!