Saturday, April 5, 2014

Lots of reading and inventories in ADED 6487

Hopefully, we had our last snowfall last Sunday. I have no idea how +Richard Byrne lives in weather colder and more snowier than I prefer and still finds time to write. I am glad he finds the time, passion, and energy for his blogs and teachings.

Back in January 2014, I started ADED 6487 Instructional Strategies in Adult Learning with +East Carolina University with two text books. Our professor provides supplemental reading assignments in our module challenges. The supplemental readings have lengthy bibliographies, so I bookmark a few of the referenced articles for my own additional reading. I have a Google bookshelf for this class.

So what have I been reading/doing since January? (last blog post was January 2014) 

We took the Philosophy of Adult Education Inventory (PAEI) and the Teaching Perspectives Inventory early in the course with the option to take them again at the end of the course or at any other time since the tools are available online.

In no particular order and in text format so you can convert to your required format for your own references, APA, MLA, Chicago, Turabian, and more. Asterisks indicate the required readings from the textbooks or supplemental readings.

  1. *Dick, W., Carey, L., & Carey, J. O. (2009). The systematic design of instruction. Upper Saddle River, N.J: Merrill/Pearson.
  2. *Svinicki, M. D., McKeachie, W. J., & McKeachie, W. J. (2014). McKeachie's teaching tips: Strategies, research, and theory for college and university teachers. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.
  3. *Booth, M., & Schwartz, H. L. (2012). We're all adults here: Clarifying and maintaining boundaries with adult learners. New Directions for Teaching and Learning, 2012(131), 43-55.
  4. *May, G. L., & Short, D. (2003). Gardening in cyberspace: A metaphor to enhance online teaching and learning. Journal of Management Education, 27(6), 673-693.
  5. McWilliam, E. L. (2005). Unlearning pedagogy. Journal of Learning Design, 1(1), 1-11.
  6. Trilling, B., & Fadel, C. (2009). 21st century skills: Learning for life in our times. John Wiley & Sons.
  7. *Galbraith, M. (2004). Adult learning methods: A guide to effective instruction, 3rd ed, Malabar, FL: Krieger Publishing 
  8. *Palmer, P. (2007).  The courage to teach: Exploring the inner landscape of a teacher's life. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
  9. *Pratt, D., & Collins, J. (2014). Teaching perspectives inventory. Retrieved from http://www.teachingperspectives.com/drupal/
  10. *Pratt, D. D. (2005). Five perspectives on teaching in adult and higher education. Malabar, Fla: Krieger Pub. Co.
  11. *Zinn, L. (1994). The philosophy of adult education inventory. Retrieved from http://www25.brinkster.com/educ605/paei_howtouse.htm
  12. *Blumberg, P. (2009). Maximizing learning through course alignment and experience with different types of knowledge. Innovative Higher Education 34, p. 93 - 103.
  13. *Weinstein, C. E., Acee, T. W., & Jung, J. (2011). Self‐regulation and learning strategies. New Directions for Teaching and Learning, 2011(126), 45-53.
  14. Swan, K., Shea, P., Fredericksen, E., Pickett, A., Pelz,W.,& Maher, G. (2000). Building knowledge building communities: Consistency, contact and communication in the virtual classroom. Journal of Education Computing Research, 23(4), 359-383.
  15. Coppola, N.W., Hiltz, S. R., & Rotter, N. G. (2002). Becoming a virtual professor: Pedagogical roles and asynchronous learning networks. Journal of Management Information Systems, 18(4), 169-189.
  16. Gardner, S., Dean, C., and McKaig, D. “Responding to D in the Classroom: The Politics of Knowledge, Class, and Sexuality.” Sociology of Education, 1989, 62, 64–74.
  17. Buck, G. A., Mast, C. M., Latta, M.A.M., and Kaftan, J. M. “Fostering a Theoretical and Practical Understanding of Teaching as a Relational Process: A Feminist Participatory Study of Mentoring a Doctoral Student.” Educational Action Research, 2009, 17(4), 505–521.
  18. Boyd, D. (2014). It's Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens. New Haven: Yale University Press. http://www.danah.org/
  19. Hattie, J., Biggs, J., and Purdie, N. Effects of learning skills interventions on student learning: A meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research, 1996, 66(2), 99–136.
  20. Hofer, B. K., and Yu, S. L. Teaching self-regulated learning through a “learning-to-learn” course. Teaching of Psychology, 2003, 30(1), 30–33.
It seems that every time I went to write a blog post or even jot down my ideas, other priorities took precedence from shoveling snow, prep for a colonoscopy, the colonoscopy, a root canal, to cleaning up after a potty accident, trips to the playground, shoveling snow, completing th Making Sense of Data course, career, family....well you know how life has priorities. I am reminded while taking this course and integrating into my life that I still do not have time to return to my doctoral studies. Hat tip to all my fellow doctoral students who stayed on target and completed their research and defended their dissertation. 

If you have any recommended readings for me, feel free to comment. At least I can take the a mobile device and read when I am waiting.

Thanks,



Saturday, January 18, 2014

Instructional Strategies in Adult Education textbooks and readings

I shared previous textbooks and readings from other courses I took over the years using Google Books. The most read section is in the Instructional Design Basics bookshelf.

Every now and then funding becomes available for careerists in my field (CP 32) to participate in college courses with East Carolina University. While many careerists have some type of degree, this opportunity allows one to connect with a college in this century, hone their distance/distributive learning skills, and if they desire go through the process to pursue another degree with their own funds.

The last course I took was in the Summer 2012 session. There were no textbooks associated with EDTC 7030, Web Teaching: Design and Developmentbut I did share some homework adventures through the blog and Google+.

With ADED 6487 Instructional Strategies in Adult Education there are two required textbooks and two optional textbooks and some additional readings from designated texts selected by our professor.

So here is another shared Google Bookshelf for ADED 6487.


How are you using your Google bookshelves?
Here is to another fun learning adventure.

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Don't forget the little things and RAOKs are OK


Merry Chrismahanukwanzakah!
Last night on the way home, a car became disabled in front of me on a busy highway. The easy thing to do would have been just to go around them...but I didn't. A young man jumped out of the driver's side, went to the passenger side and took out a baby carrier and a young lady got out of the passenger side. For a brief minute I thought it was a joke. I turned on my flashers and asked the young lady if I could call anyone. Both of them busy on the phones trying to reach someone for help. She said they were calling friends.
I called family to let them know that I was staying on the road until some type of help arrived. I called the non emergency RCSO number. The dispatcher asked was I behind the described car (apparently someone called and reported a disabled vehicle). The dispatcher said a deputy is trying to get there. As you can see, traffic was backed up for miles.

They were a young couple with a one year old. People had comments and criticism as they drove by and I wished them "Happy Holidays, hope you never have an incident". I put the young lady and the baby in the back seat to stay warm. The deputy arrived and assessed the situation, jumped the car battery but it did not stay running. He stopped an 18 wheeler to block the traffic so we could push the car off the road. I waited with the young couple until the tow truck arrived to tow the car. The baby had been great the whole time, not a whimper, just mesmerized by his surroundings and probably wondering WTF. Of course with all of the phone calls for help phone batteries died. I let them use my car charger while we waited.

Of course, with the car incident, the young lady had to call off her job for the evening. The young man said he would ride with the tow truck driver. I volunteered to drive the young lady and her child home. On the way to take them home, the baby decides to exercise his lungs. We stopped at a convenience store and picked up some juice for the baby. I said this was the least I could do since over 100,000 cars passed us and not one person offered to stop and assist. I said I wish I could do something like Ellen does for people, but I am not that well off, so a juice it will be. 

I know it is that crazy time of year, but take a minute to pay it forward. It is the little things that matter whether you say, "Thank You" or ask (and mean it) if someone is OK. They asked why did I do what I did and I told them I would hope someone would do this for my daughter, mother, or myself if our vehicles became disabled. I took the picture and told them I would do a blog post about this event. Southern hospitality? Didn't see any of it last night. Even mentioned it to the deputy and he said he is not surprised.

So take a minute this season and practice a random act of kindness (RAOK), check on a neighbor, stop and check on the young couple broke down in the middle of traffic, or choose an idea from the Random Acts of Kindness site.

Remember there's no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end. Scott Adams Creator Of Dilbert Comic Strip

Merry Chrismahanukwanzakah!

Sunday, November 3, 2013

Turned the old smart phone into a child friendly device for the GBaby

After reading a diverse group of articles on "Reuse/Repurpose your old smart phone," I decided to repurpose the old S2 for the 3 year old GBaby. She tinkers with the iPad, Kindle, Chromebook, and our phones as I support her being platform agnostic...but this is her device. 

So what did I do?

First, I read many articles on the topic, good, bad, historical, recent, and indifferent. Tech Radar has a good read on, "How to make Android child friendly". But if you are looking to make that old device a webcam  a video monitor, or a kitchen aid, just Google, "reuse or repurpose old cell phone". The search produces so many choices and there so little time to read all 92,000 of them. Then I decided on a plan of action and the functional steps I did are:

1. Hard reset on the device, not a factory reset. How you do this is on your device is different based on the device. We opted for the option described in this Android forum that explains the factory and the hard resets. 

2. Synced it with my account. This might be a good time to create that other Google account to associate all of those games, books, and shows for kids.

3. Downloaded Kids Place from Google Play. As you can see the search for parental controls in Google Play produces many results. So tinker with a few, see what other techie parents/Gparents/guardians are using, and review the ToS (Terms of Service).



4. Download AppLock. Again, lots of choices, ask around, ask why and why not, and review ToS and make the selection on your preferences.



Even if you employ network defense tools, you still want to protect the device and the user, so you will want to download and install some type of antivirus app or add your device to your existing program. Because the ratings change month to month, check out the AV Test site with monthly reports, for mobile, home, and corporate users.

Then download/transfer all the child apps to the device. Kids Place lets you select the apps that the child will access and you can see screen shots and the video in Google Play. The only way out is with a PIN. So it works great with a toddler, not so much for the tinkering tweens and teens. By then you can do the family contract on using the device and accessing the home network.

Before you set the Kids Place as the default launch, adjust the settings for email, phone, Internet access, based on your parental control preferences. While this doesn't give her a free ticket to ride I have a little more peace about her using the device without her accidentally deleting my stuff or accessing something she shouldn't in her current mindset.

Of course, recycling and reselling are always options, but with the furloughs this year and the need to hone some tinkering skills and feed the autodidacticism in the family, why not repurpose that old device? What best practices and/or parental controls are you using with the gadget toddlers of today? Any recommended favorite apps?


Sunday, August 25, 2013

Add your favorite sports team schedule to your Google Calendar

If you use Google Calendar, you can add your favorite Sports team schedule to your calendar. Other calendar add on options exist such as Holidays, Contacts' birthdays and events, Day of the Year, Phases of the Moon, Stardates, Week Numbers, Sunrise and Sunset, Hebrew Calendar.  But Sports fans have options to add their favorite Baseball, Basketball, Cricket, Football, Hockey, Rugby, and Soccer schedules.

Don't forget to add those back to school team schedules to your calendar. Great opportunity for family collaboration with the gadgets headed back to classes this year.

NOTE: It is not possible to sync sports calendars with other calendar applications at this time.



Open your Google Calendar, select Other Calendars, then Browse Interesting Calendars. Then make your selection (s) and subscribe.

Football options include NFL, CFL, and NCAAF.

Basketball options include NBA, WNBA, TBL, SBL, PBA, PFC, NCAAWB, NCAAB, NBDL, ACB, ITLA1, MFIBA_CHAMP, CBA, ULEB, and WNBL


Even if you added your favorite sports team schedule to your calendar, revisit the options to see how many more are available today then when you made your first selection.

You can also add a friend's shared calendar, add a calendar by URL, import a calendar, create and manage your calendars.

What else are you adding to your calendars?