Kathy Zabel led the seminar this week for GMIT 650; let's see how it went!
Kathy's first question:
This question addresses the political dimension (the power) of the adult teacher-student relationship. Freire distinguished between two approaches to education, the banking approach and the problem-posing approach (see p. 173). Essentially, in the banking approach, the teacher maintains all the power. In the problem-posing approach, the learners determine goals and work with the facilitator to achieve the goals. Tennant states on p. 174 that power should be distributed evenly in community education, yet poses the question: "Can power be distributed evenly where there are institutional constraints linked to accreditation practices...?"
Many of the individual programs at the community college are accredited and have to follow certain curriculum guidelines. Does your curriculum constrain the nature of the relationship between the teacher-student? How far can instructors go in relinquishing power to students and still meet the programs' state or national requirements?
Here is Greg Burroughs' reply to Kathy:
The goals for the class are set in the course syllabus and the objectives of the class, when set up to prepare a student to meet a national professsional qualification standard, are not open to interpretation. This is especially true when you know what the state organization uses for testing. The power you are able to give to students is really limited, but Jessie is correct that an alternate project could be used to meet the same objectives if you had a student who put forth the idea, or if you had developed alternative assignments and let the student choose in what way they wished to achieve the goal. Additional suppporting material could be included if one had the time or if a student had the inclination to go above and beyond the requirements. The use of independent study can also allow a student to develop a fuller understanding of the concepts of an area of study as well, but requires the student to desire such and the instructor with the willingness to support such an academic endeavor.
Our vocational programs are often limited in their flexibility by the constraints of the professional standards and due to the fact that they are a practice-based program. Theoretically-based programs, or ones that work to expand the ability to practice, are more open to the student directing the goals. My own bachelors degree had the option for six specializations and one generalist option, which allowed for a degree focused on practice to allow the student to set their own goals for what they wanted the degree to do. At the community college level we are often limited by the time and the focused goal of our students to get the skills that they can use next Monday. Our students are practice-oriented and research is not what generally interests them.
My reflection:
Greg makes the point that vocational programs are practice-based, or focused on a specific career with needed technical skills. He says that there are constraints by professional standards, and also time constraints that limit the flexibility for research and power given to the students to create their own goals and objectives for learning.
I think this is a big problem because we limit the students' learning experience if we don't give them the chance to do more critical thinking and problem solving that prepare them for life experiences. We must do more than give them practical knowledge. We have to find ways to get them more involved, more interaction with their coursework to advance the field to levels much more productive.
I would suggest that Greg try to find a way to get students to work in groups that collaborate in their coursework to build upon the practical information they are provided. They should work together to go beyond practical knowledge to more theoretical learning. He could design exercises that have a blend of both practical and theoretical learning.
Kathy's question #2:
The author of our text, Tennant, developed a class exercise which asked adult educators to identify aspects of students/trainee/participant behavior that annoy or irritate you and to identify aspects of your role (as an educator), which you fear and or feel guilty about? See pp. 182-183 for results.
Since we're getting close to the end of our program and many of you will soon be out there as adult educators, I thought it was time to address what annoys us, and what our fears or guilts are. We all have a big fear or guilt whether we teach now or as we anticipate our role as a teacher. What is your biggest fear, or guilt when it comes to your students? Let’s hear about yours. Feel free to really express yourself here.
Then, I’d like you to tell us what your plan is if your big fear, annoyance, or guilt actually comes true. Perhaps if you’ve recognized your fears/guilts and have an advance plan to deal with it, then it will resolve itself quicker in real life. As you discuss your classmates’ fears, etc., please offer any suggestions to alleviate their concerns based on your teaching experiences.
Gina Ewing's reply to Kathy:
My biggest fear/guilt/annoyance: I have a preceved fear that I would run into a brilliant student who would embarrase me in front of the class by asking me questions that they already know the answers to and prove me to be an inadequate instructor to the other student. And even though I stick to my, "I'll have to get back to you with that answer", the student is persistant in making me look ridiculous in front of the class.
I wonder if any of my cohorts have experienced anything like this?
Plan: I plan on being knowledgeable about the topic that I teach and not become an instructor "just for the money". Perhaps in time and with gained experience I will know how to handle the know it all students and be able to instruct in any topic area that I feel comfortable, but perhaps not an expert in.
My reflection:
Gina is expressing a fear that most new instructors or teachers have, that of a student making fun of them for not knowing the course material to its fullest. That is a very disrespectful thing for a student to do and should not be tolerated. If Gina were to make it clear upfront that she expects the students to respect her while she shows constant respect for them, this disrespectful action should not occur.
I replied to Gina, suggesting to her that she had the right to excuse the student from class if he or she did not relent. There is enough pressure in delivering learning to students without having to deal with this type of nonsense.
I think Gina will find that if she starts right away with ice breaker exercises that get students to know one another and find trust with each other, as well as with her, she probably won't have this problem.
Kathy did a great job again leading this seminar; she kept the discussions going with good questions building on previous thoughts and ideas. There was good participation and sharing by the cohorts. I did a good job participating myself, commenting and sharing my own experiences in the classroom. We all continue to learn from our experiences; if we didn't have that mindset we wouldn't be improving and giving our students the best learning experience possible.
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Monday, July 2, 2007
GMIT 660--Week Eight--Community Colleges
Jessie La Cross and I led the GMIT 66o Seminar this week--lots of work participating in two seminars and getting material ready to lead one!
Let's see what happened!
Jessie--Question 1:
Because there are so many shorter readings, please do not feel you have to respond to each article. But if there was a journal article (or two) from this week that particularly caught your interest, please share your thoughts on it:
Which article interested you the most?
What did you find most interesting about the ideas presented?
Did you agree or disagree with the strategy used? Why?
What do you feel are the specific strengths or weaknesses of the strategy used?
Do you feel this strategy could be relevant to SCC?
For reaction to Jessie's first question I'm going to choose Gina DeFreece's main reply posting and reflect on it:
I know everyone is busy and no one has extra time, but the article from Butler County was really interesting!!!!!! If you want a different take on assessment, this would be a good article choice!
Which article interested you the most? I choose the Butler Community College article on their PACT Individualized Assessment program.
What did you find most interesting about the ideas presented? - I liked the idea of creating assessments that truly are individualized and indicated individual growth and development over time. Butler County developed a program by which they evaluated students on 4 areas P- Personal Develpment Skills (including everything from self-concept to teamwork) A- Analytical Skills (critical thinking, analyzing) C- Communication (listening, speaking, etc.) and T- Technological Skills (Computer/technology)
Did you agree or disagree with the strategy used? I did agree, because I thought the use of rubrics to determine whether or not the compentencies were met, but then formulating another rubric based on the PACT info was a true indicator of the students personal development within their perspective field was a more useful assessment of their learning. I thought this was a much more comprehensive approach to assessment rather than the traditional letter grade.
Do you feel this strategy could be relevant to SCC? I LOVED this idea! Of course, I think we should try it in our program, and Butler County had an actual Assessment team that converted the findings from the rubrics into the information that they would be using for Assessment, (and we don't have that at SCC so this would create more work for us) but it was really a good tool so I want to talk with my team about how we could integrate this into our Graduation Seminar class. I think it could be used as a pilot program in maybe ECED or Human Services a bit more, but the article indicated how different programs were interpreting how to use the PACT tool.
My reflection:
Gina is genuinely excited about what this article had to offer in the PACT method of assessment!
P--Personal Development Skills: self-concept/teamwork. Don't we all need more personal development skills?! I am so impressed by where Gina is at with her career and her skills as an instructor, not to mention a wonderful cohort! I've gotten to know her so much in the past year or so; I never would have had that opportunity if not for this program! I feel so far behind everyone else in education since I have been around academics on a large scale for only three years now, but I have grown leaps and bounds in the past year or so! My self-concept has improved immensely, as well as my skills to work on a team! I hope for years to come that I can continue to share and learn in such a wonderful community. We owe it to our students to continue to improve on our own skills so we can pass them on to them so they can be the best they can be. Teamwork and community are so important in this day and age of self-agrandizement. We have become such an individualistic society in our culture and that does not bode well in the long run. We were not meant to be that way!
A--Analytical Skills: from critical thinking to analyzing. I am hearing more and more each day about the importance of critical thinking! Problem-solving is such a crucial skill that is in high demand with today's rapid growth in technology, and critical thinking is the main element! We take other's thoughts and ideas about a topic, really think hard about them and what they mean to us, and share all we can about how they can affect each of us......and, when we do it as a team it can be that much better!
C--Communication: listening and speaking, etc. Being a good listener is vitally important. There has to be a good blend of listening and speaking in conversation for it to be fruitful. If it is too one-sided there is a decline in the power of the message to be shared by both parties. You have to give and take equally. If you are too busy thinking about what you are going to say next you may miss something that can make the conversation really fruitful.
T--Technological Skills: computers/technology. It wasn't that long ago that I was very afraid that I was too far behind in this area so I made a mental challenge to myself that I had to catch up or I would paid dearly for it! I caught up to a good degree and I am very thankful that I did. I do, however, have a way to go before I can comfortably say that I have great technological skills!
Jessie--Question 2:
Please feel free to choose to respond to only one of the following:
a) Both the Glimpse of Community and Technical College Students’ Perceptions and the Butler County Community College article seemed to address the role of students and community college assessments.
The first article, “A Glimpse of Community and Technical College Students’ Perceptions of Student Engagement” explores how 48 Community Colleges participated in an assessment strategy that examined educational practices that are related to student success from the perspective of their students.
At the end of the article, based on information from the survey used, several suggestions are made to help increase student engagement, two of which are:
How to optimize the use of classroom time to help students actively engage more with one another, with faculty, and with the subject matter.
How to find ways students can communicate substantively with their peers and faculty outside the classroom setting.
I was curious how important our cohorts feel out-of-class collaborative activities are in community college courses? To what extent do you feel it is important to have students working together outside of class on class-related activities? The practical logistics of having students try to find common times to communicate and or work together, in addition to juggling work and family responsibilities, seems almost overwhelming. If a student doesn’t have a home computer, or reliable transportation, or does have heavy work and family commitments, is it reasonable to expect collaborative out-of-class activities of them? Are there outside collaborative activities that teachers are currently using, or that they could use in the future, that work in spite of these complications? What else did you think was of value (or concern) in this article?
In the second article, Butler County Community College discussed a strategy in which students’ personal development skills, broken down in 10 different areas, were included in their assessment processes. Faculty were directly involved in devising the assessment strategies, created rubrics for measuring performance, informed students that these assessments would be integrated with their coursework, and they went so far as to give participating students individualized results from the assessment process.
If we are going to engage in collecting assessment data from our students, does it seem reasonable to you that students should also get individual feedback on their performance? Would this strategy require that much more work to administer? Would it be worth the extra effort? What else did you think was of value (or concern) in this article?
b) Both the Wisconsin Technical College System and the Colorado Community College and Occupational Education System articles seemed to look at some state wide issues and Community College assessment strategies.
What impressed me about the Wisconsin Technical College System strategy was their insistence on consensus as critical to decisions being adopted. Being familiar with Quakers, who move only by consensus, I know fully well how long even the simplest decisions can take using consensus building. But the article states “buy-in and consensus building take time and were recognized to be essential for the model to be credible and viable.” Do you agree with this statement? Why or why not?
If one of the primary missions of community colleges involves meeting the needs of the local community, community colleges could conceivably have some very different priorities and programs. Just thinking about Nebraska, with large urban areas like Omaha, or smaller rural areas further out west, seems like state-wide decisions would be incredibly hard to agree on. But then I looked at the thirteen core indicators chosen for Colorado’s 12 community colleges, and I was totally impressed with the list. The list seemed both broad and fair in reflecting ways that many community colleges could be accountable at a state wide level. What do you think of this list? What are the advantages and disadvantages of applying state-wide assessment strategies in community colleges? What else did you think was of value (or concern) in this article?
Please remember, you only have to respond to a) or b) if you wish.
For this question I am going to choose Kelly Findley's response:
How important are out-of-class collaborative activities in community college courses? To what extent do you feel it is important to have students working together outside of class on class-related activities? Is it reasonable to expect collaborative out-of-class activities of them? Are there outside collaborative activities that teachers are currently using, or that they could use in the future, that work in spite of these complications?
Students have to learn to interact as a team and be a functional, responsible member of that team. Therefore, it is very important that there be some out-of-class collaborative activity to promote this ideal. What I do is try to divide them according to clinical sites (students spend approximately 21 hours per week performing hands-on exams at a hospital site consequently they see each other a lot!) so they have time to discuss/plan/interact OR I divide them randomly and give them portions of class time to strategize. At the end of the activity, I often have students do a peer review of each other’s performance and in that I include an area pertaining to contributions and functioning as a member of the team.
Let's see what happened!
Jessie--Question 1:
Because there are so many shorter readings, please do not feel you have to respond to each article. But if there was a journal article (or two) from this week that particularly caught your interest, please share your thoughts on it:
Which article interested you the most?
What did you find most interesting about the ideas presented?
Did you agree or disagree with the strategy used? Why?
What do you feel are the specific strengths or weaknesses of the strategy used?
Do you feel this strategy could be relevant to SCC?
For reaction to Jessie's first question I'm going to choose Gina DeFreece's main reply posting and reflect on it:
I know everyone is busy and no one has extra time, but the article from Butler County was really interesting!!!!!! If you want a different take on assessment, this would be a good article choice!
Which article interested you the most? I choose the Butler Community College article on their PACT Individualized Assessment program.
What did you find most interesting about the ideas presented? - I liked the idea of creating assessments that truly are individualized and indicated individual growth and development over time. Butler County developed a program by which they evaluated students on 4 areas P- Personal Develpment Skills (including everything from self-concept to teamwork) A- Analytical Skills (critical thinking, analyzing) C- Communication (listening, speaking, etc.) and T- Technological Skills (Computer/technology)
Did you agree or disagree with the strategy used? I did agree, because I thought the use of rubrics to determine whether or not the compentencies were met, but then formulating another rubric based on the PACT info was a true indicator of the students personal development within their perspective field was a more useful assessment of their learning. I thought this was a much more comprehensive approach to assessment rather than the traditional letter grade.
Do you feel this strategy could be relevant to SCC? I LOVED this idea! Of course, I think we should try it in our program, and Butler County had an actual Assessment team that converted the findings from the rubrics into the information that they would be using for Assessment, (and we don't have that at SCC so this would create more work for us) but it was really a good tool so I want to talk with my team about how we could integrate this into our Graduation Seminar class. I think it could be used as a pilot program in maybe ECED or Human Services a bit more, but the article indicated how different programs were interpreting how to use the PACT tool.
My reflection:
Gina is genuinely excited about what this article had to offer in the PACT method of assessment!
P--Personal Development Skills: self-concept/teamwork. Don't we all need more personal development skills?! I am so impressed by where Gina is at with her career and her skills as an instructor, not to mention a wonderful cohort! I've gotten to know her so much in the past year or so; I never would have had that opportunity if not for this program! I feel so far behind everyone else in education since I have been around academics on a large scale for only three years now, but I have grown leaps and bounds in the past year or so! My self-concept has improved immensely, as well as my skills to work on a team! I hope for years to come that I can continue to share and learn in such a wonderful community. We owe it to our students to continue to improve on our own skills so we can pass them on to them so they can be the best they can be. Teamwork and community are so important in this day and age of self-agrandizement. We have become such an individualistic society in our culture and that does not bode well in the long run. We were not meant to be that way!
A--Analytical Skills: from critical thinking to analyzing. I am hearing more and more each day about the importance of critical thinking! Problem-solving is such a crucial skill that is in high demand with today's rapid growth in technology, and critical thinking is the main element! We take other's thoughts and ideas about a topic, really think hard about them and what they mean to us, and share all we can about how they can affect each of us......and, when we do it as a team it can be that much better!
C--Communication: listening and speaking, etc. Being a good listener is vitally important. There has to be a good blend of listening and speaking in conversation for it to be fruitful. If it is too one-sided there is a decline in the power of the message to be shared by both parties. You have to give and take equally. If you are too busy thinking about what you are going to say next you may miss something that can make the conversation really fruitful.
T--Technological Skills: computers/technology. It wasn't that long ago that I was very afraid that I was too far behind in this area so I made a mental challenge to myself that I had to catch up or I would paid dearly for it! I caught up to a good degree and I am very thankful that I did. I do, however, have a way to go before I can comfortably say that I have great technological skills!
Jessie--Question 2:
Please feel free to choose to respond to only one of the following:
a) Both the Glimpse of Community and Technical College Students’ Perceptions and the Butler County Community College article seemed to address the role of students and community college assessments.
The first article, “A Glimpse of Community and Technical College Students’ Perceptions of Student Engagement” explores how 48 Community Colleges participated in an assessment strategy that examined educational practices that are related to student success from the perspective of their students.
At the end of the article, based on information from the survey used, several suggestions are made to help increase student engagement, two of which are:
How to optimize the use of classroom time to help students actively engage more with one another, with faculty, and with the subject matter.
How to find ways students can communicate substantively with their peers and faculty outside the classroom setting.
I was curious how important our cohorts feel out-of-class collaborative activities are in community college courses? To what extent do you feel it is important to have students working together outside of class on class-related activities? The practical logistics of having students try to find common times to communicate and or work together, in addition to juggling work and family responsibilities, seems almost overwhelming. If a student doesn’t have a home computer, or reliable transportation, or does have heavy work and family commitments, is it reasonable to expect collaborative out-of-class activities of them? Are there outside collaborative activities that teachers are currently using, or that they could use in the future, that work in spite of these complications? What else did you think was of value (or concern) in this article?
In the second article, Butler County Community College discussed a strategy in which students’ personal development skills, broken down in 10 different areas, were included in their assessment processes. Faculty were directly involved in devising the assessment strategies, created rubrics for measuring performance, informed students that these assessments would be integrated with their coursework, and they went so far as to give participating students individualized results from the assessment process.
If we are going to engage in collecting assessment data from our students, does it seem reasonable to you that students should also get individual feedback on their performance? Would this strategy require that much more work to administer? Would it be worth the extra effort? What else did you think was of value (or concern) in this article?
b) Both the Wisconsin Technical College System and the Colorado Community College and Occupational Education System articles seemed to look at some state wide issues and Community College assessment strategies.
What impressed me about the Wisconsin Technical College System strategy was their insistence on consensus as critical to decisions being adopted. Being familiar with Quakers, who move only by consensus, I know fully well how long even the simplest decisions can take using consensus building. But the article states “buy-in and consensus building take time and were recognized to be essential for the model to be credible and viable.” Do you agree with this statement? Why or why not?
If one of the primary missions of community colleges involves meeting the needs of the local community, community colleges could conceivably have some very different priorities and programs. Just thinking about Nebraska, with large urban areas like Omaha, or smaller rural areas further out west, seems like state-wide decisions would be incredibly hard to agree on. But then I looked at the thirteen core indicators chosen for Colorado’s 12 community colleges, and I was totally impressed with the list. The list seemed both broad and fair in reflecting ways that many community colleges could be accountable at a state wide level. What do you think of this list? What are the advantages and disadvantages of applying state-wide assessment strategies in community colleges? What else did you think was of value (or concern) in this article?
Please remember, you only have to respond to a) or b) if you wish.
For this question I am going to choose Kelly Findley's response:
How important are out-of-class collaborative activities in community college courses? To what extent do you feel it is important to have students working together outside of class on class-related activities? Is it reasonable to expect collaborative out-of-class activities of them? Are there outside collaborative activities that teachers are currently using, or that they could use in the future, that work in spite of these complications?
Students have to learn to interact as a team and be a functional, responsible member of that team. Therefore, it is very important that there be some out-of-class collaborative activity to promote this ideal. What I do is try to divide them according to clinical sites (students spend approximately 21 hours per week performing hands-on exams at a hospital site consequently they see each other a lot!) so they have time to discuss/plan/interact OR I divide them randomly and give them portions of class time to strategize. At the end of the activity, I often have students do a peer review of each other’s performance and in that I include an area pertaining to contributions and functioning as a member of the team.
My reflection:
I think Kelly has a great plan for her students! She divides them into groups that head to hospital sites for hands on experiences and testing. She makes sure they do plenty of collaborating in their teams before and after the experience which is very important. That way they can have feedback from each other on both ends to create the best possible learning experience.
Imagine where technologies would be today without group collaboration. Ideas spark ideas; problem solving creates new questions; new questions lead to more problem solving; the cycle then repeats itself. If we don't have critical thinking and problem solving technology stands still.
Students have to learn to be partners in education; they have to know that each of them has a small ownership in the forward movement in all education. Getting them to buy into this can be challenging, but letting them know that you are learning right along with them will definitely help!
Jessie and I had very good resources provided by our instructor that were very relevant to our coursework theme. We presented them well and we had good participation by our cohorts. We have learned a lot from each other, yet we will never stop learning. We have to have the mindset that we are lifelong learners!
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