Reflections...

Reflections...

The past few weeks have been very interesting for me. This class has opened my eyes to part of teaching that I never really fully understood. The idea of Instructional Design seems like a fairly simple prospect until you really start to dissect it and understand all of it's parts and pieces.

Like the ice forming in the brook behind my house (picture to the right) Instructional Design is never the same from course to course (year to year in the case of the brook). The ideas of Fink, DC&C, IEEE, and Tomlinson & McTighe are all different, yet they are all Instructional Design. Each educator has the ability to use methods in whatever way they want to achieve their end goal - which may just be to create an educational classroom for their students where the students walk away with knowledge they didn't have before.

A revelation for me over the past few weeks is how much work really goes into preparing a successful course. While I'm sure, over time, the process becomes easier, there are lots of parts and pieces that seemed easy for me to integrate in (such as projects, readings, etc)...but now that I see there is a balance in Instructional Design, I realize how important it is to carefully choose the parts and pieces that go into the course.

The ideas of Evaluation and Assessment are the pieces of Instructional Design that still baffle me to this point. I don't really think I will truly understand the difference between the two of them until I am faced with making evaluations and assessments in my own classroom. While I still am a little "gray" about which is which, I do believe that they are both important parts of the Instructional Design process. I see them as checks and balances...to make sure that both you the instructor and the student are maintaining some grasp of what has been achieved and what goals need to be met.

The hardest thing for me the past few weeks has been the fact that I'm not an educator (yet) as some of my classmates are. The only experience that I have teaching is as a TA my senior year of college. I have learned SO MUCH from those who are educators in the class, but feel a little disconnected at times. I don't feel that I have a lot to bring to the table conversation wise because of that inexperience. While I know that it's good to have a mix in the room of educators and non-educators, I sometimes wish I was at the same level as those with years of experience.

I am looking forward to the weeks ahead...as I'm sure they will fill some of the holes in the Instructional Design process. This class has been nothing but informative...and I look forward to diving in deeper and learning more.

Assessment and Evaluation - Some Thoughts

Assessment...as I assess the past few weeks of class, I can see that thus far, I have reached my goals for the course. I have really wanted to have a greater grasp on what Instructional Design is and how I can be a better educator by using it effectively. I am now starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. This weeks readings really left the area of differentiating between Assessment and Evaluation a little gray. However...with the help of my peers (thanks to all of you!) I have a feeling that over the next few weeks I will better understand where one fits over the other.

What really threw me was how many different types of Assessment there are, and where each one comes into play. Tomlinson and McTighe made it really clear for me when they discussed the 6 Facets of Understanding (Figure 5.2, pg. 67). The concepts of explain, interpret, apply, perspective, empathy, and self knowledge were the concepts that I could relate to the best. Those 6 facets are great indicators to both a student and a teacher to know whether they are grasping the subject at hand. By going through each six of those facets, they can assess whether they are grasping concepts.

As for Evaluation, I still view this as something the teacher predominately does. I really see this time as a time for the teacher to look back on everything that has happened at the end of a course and make a mental checklist of all the things that were and weren't accomplished in terms of goals and objectives. While it's important to remember that each class is going to be different from year to year or semester to semester, I think it's important to at least go back and make sure that you have achieved what you wanted to achieve. It's a way to keep yourself in check.

Checks and balances...that's what assessment and evaluation are in my brain. Each comes at a certain point in the instructional design process...and each achieves something at the point they are conducted. When you as a teacher assess your students you are making sure that the material you give them is not going to be too much or too little for them...and when you're the student...it's making sure that you are keeping up with the material presented. Making sure that you are getting out of the material presented what you need to. And as a teacher, when you evaluate the end process, it's almost as though you are checking to make sure that goals were met, that material that needed to be relayed was relayed, and making sure that you were able to give your students a stimulating environment that they all got something from in the end. Good Instructional Design has these two concept, Assessment and Evaluation, naturally built into it.

Thoughts after 02-10-07 Class

I must say, the class this past weekend was one of the most engaging for me thus far this trimester. I'm really starting to get a handle on what I will be able to apply to my life outside of Marlboro when it really comes into fruition...and I'm really excited about it all. The discussion this past weekend in class began to center around the ideas of Assessment and Evaluation. What interested me the most is that prior to really diving into the conversation I didn't really think there were a whole lot of differences between the two. BUT...here's what the class came up with as a whole:

ASSESSMENT:
-Looking to see if the course is on course (teacher)
-Objective Measurement (teacher, and possibly student as well)
-It's something that the teacher really does a lot of
-Tool used to discover the students learning (teacher)
-A time to ask: Is the student grasping concepts? (teacher)
-It's a student oriented activity

EVALUATION:
-This could be a time for the students to evaluate of the course (how is the course going? Are they enjoying what they learn? Are there any problems that need to be addressed).
-Teacher/Student Performance, followed by the course
-A time for the teacher to assess whether they reached their goals/objectives

From the conversation in class, I got the feeling that Evaluation was the time where both students and teachers could reflect, where as Assessment is geared more towards the teachers so that they can check in on themselves throughout the course.

As I continue to read the readings for this week I am sure I will make deeper connections. It's a part of Instructional Design that I really haven't gotten into at all, and I hope that after I read more about the topic that I will have a deeper understanding of the differences between the two.

Reaction: Bloom's Taxonomy

This week, the reading that I seemed to connect with the most was the article talking about Bloom's Taxonomy. I think the reason it resonated with me the way it did was because I was able to see connections between the terms that they were using and the classroom itself.

Take this picture to the left for example. (Courtesy: http://www.coe.uga.edu/epltt/bloom.htm) This is the "new" Bloom diagram...as talked about in the article. The words used in this diagram are words that just about everyone can relate to...whether they be educators or students. And the other neat part is that each of them can interpret the diagram as they want. Those words can mean something different to each person, but in the end the goal is achieved by all parties.

I think the part about Bloom's Taxonomy that really helped me connect was the idea that "Learning, teaching, identifying, educational goals, and thinking are all complicated concepts interwoven in an intricate web." There isn't an easy answer to teaching. Different things work for different people. And there is no *right* way of doing things - just suggestions that help you learn and teach.

That takes me to the other thing that all of these Educational Design articles have hit home about...GOALS. I'm a believer that if you don't have goals, you don't know what you can achieve or what you want to walk away from a course with. You would think that most everyone in the classroom has a desire to gain something from a course. I love the concept that Karen mentioned - Goals are just dreams with deadlines. A firm concept that everyone can relate to in one way or another. Goals have been important to me as a student over the past 4+ years because without them I'm not sure that I would have experienced the things I have thus far.