Components of a Learning Strategy

In Chapter 28 of Lee and Owens, there are four components of a learning strategy outlined. The largest component is the learning strategy itself, which is an organizations overall philosophy of goals it wants to achieve through learning. The second component is the e-learning strategy; this defines any technology needed to deliver training. This is include the KSA's neede to develop and implement this technology as well. Thirdly, the evaluation strategy defines how the previous two strategies will be measured. Lastly, the evaluation plan is something that is developed for each individual plan. This chapter focuses primarily on the evaluation strategy. In order to produce an evaluation strategy, you must write an introduction, determine evaluation requirements, and determine a complete list of sources that everyone must be knowledgeable about . Creating an evaluation strategy is critically important in the last phases of a training plan. Evaluation will help many organizations determine whether or not the training that was implemented was worth the investment.

Breeze...Breeze...Breeze

After the presenations on last Tuesday, I found out some interesting things about a technology called Breeze. Leading up to the presentation I was very skeptical of the feasability of our presentations because I wasn't sure if our class could handle it. Also, I worried a lot about technical errors. Breeze offers it's users a video/voice conferencing option where people can talk in real time, with the addition of uploading files and sharing their desktop. There are not many applications available that offer this much functionality. As we found with our presentations, the chat feature was very handy, and proved to be reliable. My issue though is that if the chat feature is the only 100% reliable feature, I don't see Breeze as that much of an advantage over less functional applications. I do feel however that this technology is useful and I would most certainly use it again. I believe it was a positive experience and I would recommend it for other teachers.

Summative Evaluation

In Chapter 26 of Lee & Owens, the topic of evaluation is brought to light in that 'evaluation is typically what we do worst.' The book states that causes of poor management include lack of knowledge and attention. The four levels of evaluation, as identified by Donald Kirkpatrick, include (Level 1) reaction, or the participants response to the activity in the form of impressions. This can include impressions about activities that might be relevant to a job. Level 2 is knowledge, which is defined as a measure of the level of achievement of the content and skills intended. Level 3 is performance which is a measure of the change in behavior or attitude as a result of using skills gained. Level 4 is impact, measured on the business in the form of return on investment. These levels are highly interdependent, meaning that each level should be performed before the next one has begun.
If evaluation is so important, why don't more organizations use evaluation? It could be detrimental to an entire training program if the company or business doesn't do some type of follow up to see how the training has affected the employees who utilized it. Performing evaluations means that smaller details will not go overlooked, and any holes in the training process will be identified.

Wikispaces Coming to a Close

I first want to say that the wiki project this year was enjoyable. I felt as if there was a lot more freedom to post many different things and opportunity to learn more about different topics in training. Some pros of using the wiki for moderated discussions were that we were able to pick a topic of our choice and research it to the best of our ability. Some people devoted a lot of time and effort to their wiki space and others did not. You could tell by some of the summary articles that were written initially. I think it was important to write a good summary to get the ball rolling so that we had something to talk about in our discussions. The second pro to using the wiki was the ability to create formulated opinions based on the topic summaries and also draw from personal experience. Some cons of this years wiki were that it was hard to keep up with any one discussion/topic. I found it difficult to keep the same person on one discussion. It is hard to continue a discussion when the person posts a response one time and never revisits the page. One suggestion I have for the future is to let everyone choose a limited number of discussions to participate in, and let everyone choose based on what they are interested in. It's great that everyone gets to participate but it can become overwhelming trying to respond in so many discussions. This will also ensure that every topic has participants, unlike some of the spaces on this years' wiki. Some people had 25 responses while others only had 7. While it is up to the person to provide discussion questions and keep the flow of information up, it is unfair that no one chooses to participate in another's discussion. The wiki was a great idea and I learned a lot, and I hope other classes get to have the same experience.

Interactive Distance Broadcast Environments

In Chapter 25 of Lee & Owens, distance learning is defined as any training that is delivered from one central location to multiple remote sites simultaneously. This can include anything from satellite to telephone lines being utilized to distribute learning. The book also states that use of distance learning is under utilized and the potential has not been met. I agree wholly. As a student at the University of South Carolina, I have taken a distance education course with Dr. Daniel Norris, in which 7 other campus classrooms were being broadcast. Joining this group of people for one night a week through distance learning allowed what seemed like a class of 20 to actually be a class of 50, and it crossed all geographical boundaries. I have to say that I definitely enjoy live broadcasts as opposed to recorded lectures that are put online. I've found that just listening to a person's voice without them being there is difficult for me. One issue I have is that in live broadcasts, people tend to be hesitant to participate when they are aware of so many people listening. Also, when my instructor was in one classroom across the state and I was viewing and listening in another location, I tended to pay less attention than I normally would, maybe because I thought I wouldn't get caught! IDB is quite literally under utilized and the process of broadcasting learning has some time before it reaches it's full potential. Cost may be a factor as to why more companies aren't using it, but all technology eventually comes down in price, which is why I foresee more and more distance education being used.

OpenOffice Base Intro

What can I say? In my experience with OpenOffice Base over the past couple weeks, I have grown to not like it at all. I understand that its new and its open source, so it will probably get better. I just feel that maybe a little more time could have been spent on making sure it had more functionality than it does right now. While creating the modules, I noticed that you can't copy and paste records successfully, which is a huge problem when you have multiple records that may need to be moved. Also, no matter what order I enter my records, every time I open a table they come back different. Also, changing the primary key in a table proved to be way more of a hassle than ever, often resulting in having to drop an entire table and start from scratch. Maybe its just my version of the software that acting like this? Or maybe there wasn't enough time spent on developing this application so that it could accomplish basic tasks. I am finding it increasingly difficult to help somebody learn how to use this program when I don't want to use it myself! I know that may sound bad; however, I do understand that the software is open source, and I understand that it will get better as more and more developers add to the overall OpenOffice Suite. I never really knew or cared much about open source apps, but I now have the opinion that this software was probably released prematurely, simply to jump on the open source apps bandwagon and make the product known.