Neal's Development Plan

I can say I have always thought about what more I can do, but always wondered, what can I do and what do I want to do?  When I worked with autistic individuals my goal was to open up my own version of Kennedy Krieger program.  Kennedy Krieger Institute is a program that accepts only the worst of the worst on behavioral individuals with developmental disabilities.  The program has the individual for 24 hours 7 days a week for one year.  The institute has a great track record with modifying the maladaptive behaviors to acceptable behaviors.  This is the type of program I thought I would working for, but as time went on, assessment of me, changes in student population, I started to modify my future.  Now I can see myself working to be a Director of Technology for a school district.  By not knowing who I am, it may seem this is a huge difference in goals, but to me they are very similar.  Let’s see why.

First I assessed if I had the right personality of being a leader.  While using the Myers-Briggs Personality Assessment, I was able to see that I am Introvert, Sensing, Thinking, and Perceiving.  But as I also mixed my personality assessment with 360- Degree Feedback System, I was able to compare my assessment with others view of me.  Other viewed me as Extrovert, Sensing, Thinking, and Judging.  Then I thought about my confidence levels.  When I worked with autistic individuals, I was very confident that I would figure out the function of the behavior, but when I changed districts and the population type my confidence started to lower.  I ended up second guessing my actions.  Then I thought what if I mix education with technology which led to my formal education.

In Formal education I decided to enroll in the Masters of Instructional & Design with a specialization of Training and Performance Improvement.  With my past experience in technology, learning of the master’s degree and then merging with my student population behaviors have gain me the confidence I was missing.  My enjoyment with technology became the key of building my confidence back.  Now I need to build on my work experience.

Enlarging my current job will show how me and others the devotion I have on completing my goal.  I still need to learn more things before considering a job of the director of technology.  This past year I have been training teachers on utilizing Moodle, on top of dealing with student’s inappropriate behaviors, and tutoring students in Math.  Definitely I will need to know how to write coding and create web-servers and the infrastructure of network servers.  I know these benchmarks will allow me to continue to better myself and get ahead for the director position. 

    Taking Out the Negativity of Tenure Teachers

High-Tech Training

For best results of the implementation of technology in the classroom is making connections between curriculum and technology (Guzman, 2009).  Other factors are also important for technology integration; evaluation, methodological, personal elements, and communication (Guzman, 2009).

Types of technology used for training that I have used in the past with success are; Learning Management System, Webcasting, Intelligent Tutoring System, and Mobile Technology (Noe, 2010).    In the past and present I had the opportunity to use Sakai and Moodle as an LMS.  Links below can show you examples of these types of technologies.

LMS: Moodle
http://demo.moodle.net/ 

Webcasting:  Live broadcasting
http://www.streamingmediahosting.com/live_streaming.htm?gclid=CJLQ567ZvbACFeU7OgodQHWLmQ

Intelligent Tutoring System: Spicynodes

 http://www.spicynodes.org/

Mobile Technology: Asus Padphone

 http://www.asus.com/Mobile/PadFone/

There is a site in the past that I have talked about that I truly believe will be the future in training with the use of all 4 technologies that I talked about above and adding Simulation (Noe, 2010). 

The Pranav Mistry

http://www.pranavmistry.com/projects/sixthsense/

You can use Raspberry pi as the minicomputer needed to make Pranav device, on top of Microvision mini projector, any laptop web camera, mirror, a Wifi card or a tether connection to a smartphone to have access to the internet.  This device is unique because instead of adapting our lives to technology, technology is adapted to exist in the human life.

Imagine being under a car needing to change the catalytic converter, by looking at the area an image will take place to then project labels to what you are looking at, then to show you the steps to remove the catalytic converter, by positioning your hand a certain way, when to pull or push motion, and replacing the converter, while all this imaging everything you are doing to be able to tell you what you are doing wrong and what would be the correct procedure.  This is true technology training.

References

Guzman, A (2009). Teaching competencies for technology integration in the classroom. Journal of Computer

Assisted Learning Vol:25, 453-469

 

Noe, R. A. (2010). Employee Training and Development. New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Planning for Needs Assessment

Planning for Needs Assessment

I was given an assignment to figure out how to approach the needs assessments on a specific website by choice or what was given.  I have chosen my own website, because I was given a similar assignment from work to check out a group that trains staff on how to do deal with behaviors and build the students moral character leading to leadership skills.  The website is http://www.flippengroup.com/ and they broadcast their training for the corporate, sports, education and government world.   My boss had asked me what I think about this program coming to our school to be part of our behavior curriculum.  I respond with I would need to see data to prove to me with what they say does work for our type of students.  Before I started to look for data, I put together a task analysis (Noe, 2010) to see on what points I would want to look for:

1.       How much experience do they have, how long have they been doing this?

2.       What type of population this group has worked with?

3.       What type of learning theory are they basing on their curriculum?

4.       Do they modify their procedures by the population?

5.       How do they go about their training?

6.       If possible has there been an external research done to determine the validity of this program?

As I search the web and found M.B. Flip Flippen is the founder and Susan Flippen is the co-founder of this group.  The group can be found in multiple social networks like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.  The Flippen group has won entrepreneur of the year in 2011. The Dallas cowboys a national football team in Dallas, TX, brought the Flippen group in to train their staff on how to assess their players better.  The Dallas Cowboys wanted to know how to assess which players are leaders within the organization and also for future players. 

 For the education sector the Flippen group has done more than 2,000 training seminars each year, across the nation.  Teachers get to learn to create a positive environment, inspire and motivate students to learn, and build on self-managing classrooms “http://www.sbnonline.com/2011/07/how-the-flippen-group-uses-multiple-avenues-to-help-people-reach-their-potential/”.  I was able to find a training model that was placed out the internet for a district out in Colorado, and they have set up a training schedule that meets every month of the 2011-2012 school year  with more heavy meetings from August to November.   I am unsure for how long the Flippen group meets the staff per day.  In their meetings I was able to see their core principles, how their data sheets are set up, the rubrics, assessment used, building of a 5 year growth plan with staff and a logic model.  I even was able to find a study that was put in place to see if the Flippen group does build moral character on high school students, their curriculum is based on the social theory. 

I was able to find a research study on the practice of the Flippen group, click here to view the research study http://jsc.montana.edu/articles/v6n27.pdf  .  This study was based on a school district on the south end of Texas.  The population of this study is very similar to our students, at risk youth who drop out by the age of 16 and lead into the life of crime.  In this study they worked with seventh and eighth graders and found out that because of their immaturity the Flippen group was not effective on changing the students behaviors because the Flippen group tried to instill self- evaluation. The study concluded if tried with older students like tenth and eleventh graders then it could be possible.  If I were to compare with my students I can see a handful of our students being able to learn from this group but the rest would not.  With the rest of the procedures with training staff, our school already was able to assess our students and form a positive learning environment and been able to motivate students to learn.  The issue we were facing was the students were able to make a behavioral changes by depending on the external stimuli, the school, after they graduate, our success story diminishes, and the reason because the students no longer have the support of the school, and most of them go back to their criminal acts.  With this we were trying to find a way to build on the student’s moral character.

               With this information I can now make a phone call and compare with what I found and the answer they give me from my questions on the task analysis.  After my phone call I was convinced this program will not give our district any knew information, because their curriculum is based on the students already having internal locus of control and they only need to build on it.  Most of my students do not have internal locus of control.  I gave my thorough report to my boss, the principle of the school, the director of curriculum and instruction, and the superintendent of our district.  The techniques I used were interview, with my phone call to the group and documentation that I found out on the internet (Noe, 2010).

References:

Castro, V. Retrieved by May 10, 2012: http://jsc.montana.edu/articles/v6n27.pdf

Noe, R. A. (2010). Employee training and development (5th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill.

Smart Business, 2011 Retrieved by May 10, 2012: http://www.sbnonline.com/2011/07/how-the-flippen-group-uses-multiple-avenues-to-help-people-reach-their-potential/

Elevator Speech on True Training

“Elevator Speech” regarding the truth about training;

Do you remember those seminars when we had to go to every year to keep our licenses, and when we would hear a new style or strategy about dealing with our students?  We would get this great lecture that promised us how this would change all of the problems we encounter in class.  Once the seminar was over we would be pumped up on wanting to practice the methods they just showed us, but then realizing, how are we going to do this?  How can I modify what they talked about to the issues I am dealing with in my class? I even received this certificate stating I am an expert from this training.  How can I be an expert if I have no idea how to implement the lecture?  Real training is not only a lecture; it’s getting the practice to be fluent on the implementation and also the ability to generalize to new issues when they arise.   A true training will prepare the client to be able to adapt to the changes one would face, becoming an improved person in the field for themselves and their organization.  Here’s my card, call me when you want our team to prepare your next seminar and/or workshop. Thank you for meeting with me.

How to avoid Scope Creep?

There are 2 main goals that you as the project manager would need to think about when dealing with scope creep.

1. When planning always plan as close to detail as possible.  Project control is very important, this would lead to reconfirming the plan, assessing performance, taking corrective action and keeping people informed (Portny, 2008).

     2.       Best approach to change.  Changes will occur during the project time, so during the planning time make sure there is a section that allows modification to occur with less agony as possible and communicate to your team about the changes (Portny, 2008).

Here is a real life example:

The location of my job, there are two major buildings that consist of 6 different alternative school programs.  Our school has one building all to ourselves the other building has the remaining 5 programs.  The plans of building an expansion to the other building has begun 3 weeks ago.  As the project began the crew closed off certain parts of the building still giving us access to specific sections of the building.  The all of a sudden we were told the section where we would use to walk through to get to the gym we would not be able to use because the project it a little bit of a snag.  The gas line needed to be changed before construction began, and this was in the original plan, but in the plans it was stated as contacting PSE&G and they will come in and make the changes before construction, well PSE&G is stating no one has called them and that they will have to wait their turn, this delay could take several weeks before PSE&G cones out to change the gas line.  Well this makes a big issue in the projects plan because they have a specific timeline and if they finish before a certain date, the construction company gets an incentive bonus.  Well the person who planned this project thought of the scope creep very well because of instead of waiting they will work on the expansion side they thought about doing at the end of the project and work backwards to give time for the PSE&G to come in and do their part.  The project manager met with all of the school’s principals and the head of the maintenance department to inform them of the changes that need to occur and apologized for the changes.  So now our school and another will be taking a detour for next 6 months when walking up to the gym, but at least we know we will only be dealing with this at the beginning of the project and not at the end.  The project manger did a great job of making the changes needed for the project to continue as planned.
  
Portny, S.E., Mantel, S.J., Meredith, J.R., Shafer, S. M., Sutton, M.M., & Kramer, B. E., (2008). Project management: Planning, scheduling, and controlling projects. Hoboken. NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Tools for Project Management

For my project management class I needed to post two resource tools that would be useful in estimating the costs, effort, and/or activity durations associated with ID projects.  Below I have found two tools I like the first one is a directly below. Click on link to get insights on improving the decision process and the paradox world of bad decisions. I found this tool interesting because it gave some ideas to thin about and the meaning behind the mathematical calculations.  Since I have a back ground in Math, I found this tool fairly easy to follow.  If Math is not your strong suit then the next tool would be better for your liking.

http://www.visionarytools.com/decision-making/3-point-estimating.htm

The other tool is below for you to click on.  In this website “pptmagic.com” gives ideas on Project Management, but mostly are already developed calculations tools.   

http://www.pptmagic.com/projectmgm.htm

Here you have two tools that both will lead to the same result for your project management, the difference one helps you understand the meaning behind the calculations and how to produce your own calculation tool, the other tool also can give you the meaning but also the formulas are already made for you so all you have to do is plug in the numbers and the tool will produce the figures and even graph the solutions, to help you get out more data solutions. 

Which tool do you find helpful?

Effective Communication

Today’s blog I needed to give my thoughts after I finished going over each modality.  There are 3 modalities one an email message, second a voicemail message, and last a face to face video.  All of my thoughts are below.  Click on link below to see the modalities for yourself.  And let’s see if you agree with my analysis.

http://mym.cdn.laureate-media.com/2dett4d/Walden/EDUC/6145/03/mm/aoc/index.html

Let's Begin

Email message: If I were the one receiving this email I get the feeling that the work I had to do was urgent.  Mark’s report needs to be done as soon as possible because Jane cannot move on her report without it, and her deadline is coming soon, so now Mark will have to find a way to rearrange his schedule to finish his end to help her out, wondering why she didn’t tell Mark any sooner.

Voicemail message:   With this message Jane might of made Mark feel she needs his help to finish with Mark’s data, even though her tone was neutral she seemed a bit stressed out.  She obviously does not want to miss her own deadline. 

Face to Face: When I saw the video her, she looked to causal, but her body language gave me a passive aggressive attitude.  The flicker of her eyes looking in a different direction when talking, pointing her finger out, not directly to me but she does have a pointed finger.  Even the smile at the end was too much to be making the situation seem friendly but in her mind she must be saying I need your data now, and I’m not taking it anymore. 

After finishing the 3 modalities I would say the voicemail was the most honest and better delivered message of the three.  The email message seemed too harsh, where the face to face showed too much body posturing.  I would probably have gotten annoyed from the email message; because it is insinuating that I did not do the work as well as the face to face video.  Related to f2f, Jane came off as she was tired of asking for Mark’s data, and wants it as soon as possible.  The smile at the end definitely shows she is trying to hide her frustration.  Jane’s tone of voice is at the same level but her body language relays the opposite sending an ambiguous message.  Dr. Stolovitch suggested the two best ways for effective solution is avoid unclear statements and document everything.  Jane needed to be clear in delivering her message not sending mix signals, and if she was having issues with Mark then she should have document all the times she tried to communicate with Mark about getting his part done for her.

References:

Stolovich (n.d.), Communicating with Stakeholders [Video]. Laureate Education. Retrieved from http://sylvan.live.ecollege.com.