This is the second post in my Lessons Learned series based on my most recent project, a module on alcohol for college students. The second lesson that I learned was more subtle that the first lesson, but more important on a personal level.
Lesson 2- Maintain a personal firewall
Maintaining a firewall between you and your work is important to maintaining your sanity while working on projects. Let me preface this by saying that I am still not totally convinced
that I wasn't already doing this, but it was a good lesson and good reminder to check
your ego at the door nonetheless. I will say, however, that there's a difference between defending your ego and defending the theoretical foundations of making decisions based on solid Instructional Design concepts and principles. Even with that said, I took that advice to heart and did some reflection on it and on myself.
I believe that anyone who is dedicated and believes in what she does at some point may end up looking as if she is being defensive when someone challenges or dislikes what she has done. All anyone can do sometimes is state the case and ask the person with the most authority to make the final decision if the two sides can't come to an agreement. Sometimes things go your way and sometimes, you just have agree to disagree. Any good Instructional Designer knows that everything comes out in the assessment, right? Sometimes you are vindicated and sometimes you find that everything worked out just fine. Time will tell what shakes out of this project.
Applying What I Learned
Since the day I had that conversation, I have really tried hard to pick my "battles" and think about what is motivating my decisions. Are they informed by theory or just personal preference? Is my ego getting in the way? If I find that it is more preference than theory, I have started letting a lot of things go. I only defend the ideas that may negatively impact student learning in some way.
I also make sure that I find theories or research to back-up my decisions. In a way, every decision I make is an informed decision because of my educational background and experience, but a lot of my decisions are based on an eclectic mix of various theories and practices that are sometimes hard to pin down. It can make defending a decision more difficult. You end in almost a "because I said so" situation, which is never good. I've noticed that the line between preference and theory is becoming more blurred as I have gained experience in the field. I think that's pretty common in Learning Design as well as other fields of study. This is one reason why professional development, keeping up-to-date with new research and refreshing my knowledge of the foundations, is so very important to me. Without it, defending sound decisions becomes more difficult and modules may become less theoretically sound as a result.
I can't believe it has been 6 months since I last blogged! I've been a little busy developing the new alcohol awareness module which monopolized (in a good way) my time. In my 10 years as an instructional designer, I have never only worked on one project all day every day for any length of time. Multitasking is kind of my thing. The whole idea of focusing on one project was exciting, but at the same time a bit overwhelming in a weird way. I am happy to say that the module is rolling out tomorrow to incoming summer students. I think that the entire team is holding their collective breath until that happens. With something this size (over 15,000 students hitting it between Friday and the end of the first week of fall classes), you just never know what might happen that is out of your control. We've tested and tested, so we are confident (cautiously) that the students won't experience any problems in the coming months.
On a personal level, I learned a lot in the last 6 months working on this project. I will be writing a series of blog posts over the next several weeks outlining what I learned and what I intend to do about it. Lessons aren't worth learning if you don't do anything with them, right?
Lesson 1-The BIG One
One of the most important lessons that I learned was that a more formal process for instructional design in my division is needed. The biggest part of this is the need to more clearly define the roles and responsibilities of the individuals involved in developing the module. I started developing the module thinking that these were fairly well defined. After all, this wasn't the first module that I developed in the Division. It was, however, the first very high profile module that I developed. I believe that difference between the two types of modules caused a lot of issues along the way. We managed to come up with a solution, but unfortunately not before both time and effort were lost. I'm sure other IDs and multimedia folks can relate.
Applying What I Learned
Since the development of the module ended, I started working on a new ID model and Memo of Understanding to help guide how the Division will develop modules in the future. I'm optimistic that the new documents will help inform everyone involved about the processes, roles, and responsibilities of developing modules to make the process a much more enjoyable and less stress provoking experience for everyone involved. Once they are done, I'll share what I came up with if anyone is interested.
We have been trying to get individuals to blog and or comment on a couple of different community hubs for over a year for one and just a few months for another. I never understood why it is so difficult to get some momentum, so I started asking. What I found was that there were mainly two reasons. The first is that blogging is just not on peoples radar. They haven't done it, so they really don't think to do it unless they are reminded and half the time not even then.
Those of use at a certain age can remember that the same was true years ago when email was introduced, people didn't think to email something, they continued to hold meetings or write and mail memos or to just pick up the phone a call. That has changed over the years as email has become easier and easier to use and more and more people came to rely on it. The same change might be true of blogging, if it wasn't for the second reason--having to remember the URL for the dashboard to create and the url for the blog itself to read. As of this week, that barrier has been lifted! Why email something that you are sending to lots of people and need to have a conversation about unless it's confidential of course?
I am waiting patiently to see if blogging on these two hubs increases after the change is made and announced which will happen on Monday. This could be the tipping point that we've been waiting for than might change an existing habit and build a community. I don't think it ever will be a ubiquitous as email, especially in a high-touch organization like Student Affairs, but a girl can hope for some progress.
This morning, I talked to a colleague who attended the Summer Camp. She'd not a learning designer, but does support what I do with graphics, web design, and her positive outlook and friendship. The one thing that she said that stood out was that she was thrilled to see people really excited about what they do and I couldn't agree more. So many people take their jobs for granted or see it as a paycheck, a means to an end. At times, I'll admit that I have felt that way too and feel really guilty even admitting it because I am generally a positive person. But problems collecting content, issues finding support for programs, blockades to implementing programs, etc. can really get a girl down some days! The energy and support from the TLT Symposium and the LDSC somehow always rejuvenate and refocuses me. It is so refreshing to see what faculty are doing, hearing about the risks they take to benefit their students, hearing the feedback from the students that they like it, sympathizing over war stories with other IDs, making partnerships happen, learning what's next, and being reminded that there's hope that things do progress even if it is at a slower pace than some of us like. We are lucky to be at Penn State to partake in these event. I feel blessed to be reminded of that every now and then.
I'm not the expert. I just know how to get things done. I was in a meeting yesterday with a bunch of people at the Green Teams luncheon and was asked to talk about the group blog that I set up for our Sustainability Team in Student Affairs. I am pretty proud of it because I believe that it will be useful some day, but I had help to go get to that point. After I gave a run down on the blog, the person running the meeting said something like "So if you have any questions about setting up a group blog, ask April, she's the expert." Philip, my boss, was sitting next to me looked at me and said with raised eyebrows, "That's new." I just nodded wide-eyed back at him and said "Yes, it is." I hadn't agreed to help the 10-12 Green Teams from all across the University nor do I have the authority to speak for ETS which is the organization that actually has the experts and would need to do some "Blog Magic" to make it happen. Before I could say anything, the leader of the meeting moved on and I sat a little stunned. Chances are that none of the folks in the room will ask for my help, so it's probably a moot point. If they do, however, I will most likely have to give them some information, point them to the resources that I used, and pass them off to the real experts.
Having knowledge about how to do something successfully and being an expert are very different things to me. How about to you?
I realized on Saturday that I have been to all of the TLT Symposiums throughout the years, at least I think so. Over the years the program and the conference itself have both changed for the better each year. One of the main changes that I've noticed is the increased number of faculty that are coming from not only University Park campus, but other campuses as well. For many of us who have been with the University for a long time, it's a sort of homecoming. We get to see peers we haven't seen in a few years to catch up, make new connections and see how different areas in the University have changed. The feeling of community is just amazing to me. Smiles and hugs all around.
Michael Wesch's presentation was as informative as it was entertaining. I took a lot away from the talk he gave as far as what students expect and what students know and what as educators we expect them to know that they might or might not know. The project that he had his class work on together was fantastic. It goes to show how a sense of community can makes students feel and work to a higher level even with distractions. His talk was streamed and recorded. If you get a chance to watch it, it's worth the 45 minutes of you day.
The lunchtime faculty panel was very interesting. The four panel members discussed how they used various Web 2.0 technologies within their teaching. I think that any other faculty member that was in the audience would certainly benefit from hearing all of their advice.
I thought the program this year was very good. I image that selecting the sessions was a very difficult task this year. I've been on that committee in years past and it was difficult to evaluate one project over another because they are all worth hearing more about. It was difficult to select just one for each slot. I am hoping to catch some of the others that were recorded later.
I attended two sessions on Digital Story Telling (one by Kira Baker-Doye, a Berks faculty member and one by Ellysa Cahoy and Chris Millet) mainly because a few of the new modules that I am develop could benefit from it and because story telling interests me personally. Both sessions were interesting and packed with nuggets of information that will be valuable as I begin to develop modules on Ethics and Leadership.
Sam Richards session on large enrollment classes was entertaining and eye opening. Some of the statistics he shared were not at all what I suspected as far as what student think of large enrollment classes versus small enrollment classes. This session was recorded, if you get the change to watch it once it is posted, you should. Good stuff.
The last session that I attended was on eportfolios. It was a interesting story of how Gabriela Alpirez, the Humphrey Fellow, took an idea that she first used in a small high school and has developed it over the years to incorporate open source and government resources. It will be interesting to see how she is able to integrate the feature from her previous eportfolio systems into Moveable Type. She was very hopeful that MT will be able to do what she needs it to do. Maybe next year, she'll present again about the results.
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