PJ 'Corporate' Funky - a working title
Thursday, December 18, 2003
Musical accompaniment
good article, not just for e-learning but a range of things (ie theatre)
http://www.learningcircuits.com/2003/jan2003/millbower.htm
Friday, November 28, 2003
Reverse Discrimination?
Wow, women are classified as requiring "special needs" (not like that, sicko!), including extra help from the Maths Learning Centre or female mentors, to increase the number of women enrolled in certain courses (ie science and engineering). hmmm....
University Policy
University of Sydney Good Practice Guidelines brings you...
Two tests that Macquarie University regularly, spectacularly fails:
Good Practice means that prospective students should have:
- Easy access to information points at University, Faculty and Department level, staffed by knowledgeable and friendly persons.
- Prompt and effective responses to requests for information and assistance.
Interesting...
Working with the Director of Teaching and Learning, I have come across some interesting ideas and views. In fact, i'd say that this last week has sparked my interest in learning far more than anything else in my 5 1/2 years at the "innovative" University.
Thoughts:
The first week of Uni always deals with the administrative side of courses - ie the first lecture consists of the lecturer bitching about how small the theatre is, then handing out and reading verbatim the course outline. In our two-hour law lectures, they would then give us a break, and then proceed with an hour of a lecture which no-one really wanted to be there for.
The first tutorial would often be the tutor introducing themselves (about 4 times by the time the late people came in), telling us that the tutes were over-full and some of us would have to bugger off, and then handing out and reading verbatim the course study guide. Then they'd fill in time by asking us general questions like what we think the subject will be about.
I found in Mark's blog a website (www.mindtools.com) which has information on things like stress and time management, memory improvement, study skills. This stuff fascinates me - I've started reading de Bono's Six Hats method of decision making, and the website covers that and a number of other decision-making and memory techniques. By giving out a handbook, showing an overhead, or even discussing things like this, the first week of semester would nt be a total waste. Even if each student only took away one skill from it, that would be one extra skill on the path of study and then life, and one less wasted week.
The skills could be given out (or sold at cost) in a hand book (copyright issues permitting) and tailored to suit students. For example: Memory improvement. Tell the kids that they can learn information better and do better in exams and they might be momentarily interested (ah, the enthusiasm of first-year... how quickly it wanes). But if you give them a practical application - impress a girl by remembering her phone number / middle name / favourite food; amuse people by reciting movie quotes - then they might put them into practice. From there they can apply these skills to other things in life, maybe even studying.
Another thought:
I was reading UoS's policy on assessment and exams. The policy defines two types of assessment: Summative, which is what students would call "assessable" ie they count towards your grade; and Formative, which is just to help see how you're going. I thought it was interesting, because I can't remember one instance where I had a formative assessment in Uni, except maybe practical things like singing.
The blog has snippets of articles which show that formative assessments - in the form of online self-tests - are probably highly beneficial to students. I say probably because, although the results said that students who didn't do the tests were failing while those who did were passing, it didn't specify whether they were students in the same group or separate groups. If they were in the same group then it's likely that the students who did the self-tests were those who ordinarily apply themselves and do well, while those who couldn't be bothered to do the tests would likely not bother much overall.
So I ask myself: Why are these tests not more common? And the answer is found in other articles on the blog. There is little emphasis on Problem Based Learning these days. Students have to soak up knowledge so that they can get their degree and get a job. Academics are told to get their courses online, without the support, time or funding to make it worthwhile. I've kind of lost my train of thought here, but no matter... it just bothers me that everyone is so caught up in the idea of success - gotta work hard in school so you can go to uni and get a good job, gotta work hard in uni so you can get a good job, gotta work hard in your job so you can get a better job, gotta work hard in that job so you can retire a millionaire aged 45. When do people get to stop and live? Life wasn't meant to be like that. Money is just a means to an end, not the end in itself. Contrastly, knowledge and education should be an end, not just a means to a miserable but financially-secure existence.
Also, found a great perspective on school vs the real world. There is an argument in defense of cheating in school, which basically says that in school if you ask someone for help with something, or get the answer from someone else, it's called cheating. Whereas in the real world, networking and communicating and cooperating is the way things are done. I like it.
Anyway, back to work...
Monday, November 24, 2003
Spent the afternoon reading up on various policies and procedures of the IT and Finance departments. All fairly straight forward and no juicy loopholes to exploit...
Day One comes to a close and it was a fairly timid affair. Still, it's work and it will get my mind working soon, no doubt. Now it's off to battle the evil Sydney traffic...
wrote a first draft of PC Ownership debate, sent it to Mark for his thoughts.
looked into reimbursements - need to chase up an invoice for meal and credit card statement for hotel.
had very average teriyaki chicken for lunch.
A New Beginning...
So, as a welcome back to Sydney i spent an hour and a half in traffic and arrived late. Hooray! Anyway, i'm writing this on company time so i'll log in later and do a proper introduction.
Had a meeting with Mark Freeman, think we can work together.
Got settled and sorted. Well, a bit.
Wrote thankyou note to Nerida Jarkey and padded across to the library stacks to return her folder. It's kinda creepy down there!
About to look into reimbursements for Mark.
Don't have email yet. But soon...
Also, i think my phone extension is 15554.
Excellent.
