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Cognitive: Performance Analysis (EDTEC 540, individual project)
Context
During our very first course in the Masters program, Introduction to Educational Technology, we learned the performance analysis process by coming up with a scenario of our own to analyze. My middle school students were engaged in a "Works Cited Scavenger Hunt" project, which many of them struggle to complete flawlessly, so I chose to approach this problem to see if I could get some ideas to a solution. I knew my students had difficulty citing sources and correctly formatting a Works Cited, but what I learned during my analysis was that simply locating the sources was the hardest part for most of the students.
Standard -- Cognitive: Analyze, synthesize, use inductive and deductive reasoning, solve problems effectively and creatively.
I began by informally interviewing twelve of my students who had finished the project early. I expected to hear that they had trouble with creating the citations and documents. However, when early indications seemed to point to locating sources to use for the project as being a major hurdle for them, I immediately needed to change my approach. I created a survey using a Google Form and had all of my 130 middle school students respond. As a result, I learned which specific types of sources were hardest for the students to locate, and I got confirmation that locating the different types of research sources was harder for the students than citing them. Since I planned to use this analysis to guide my creation of a job aid later in the course, this really altered the direction of my efforts.
Opportunities Disguised as Problems
After doing this same project with my students for several years, I thought I already knew it so well that I had begun planning the job aid I would create. But right there in the first semester of graduate school, I was put in my place. Not only had I missed a crucial obstacle my students faced, the solution I had in mind would be more work for them to use than it would be worth. Once I got over my surprise at having completely missed what should have been obvious, I reset my thinking and decided to let my analysis guide my decisions. I learned, in my first project for my first class, that educational technology involves conducting analyses and then acting on what the analyses tell us. It's rare that we ever really know the solution before analyzing the problem objectively.
My Strengths
I'm flexible. Once I allowed myself to consider what the students were telling me through the survey, and I could believe that my initial ideas were off the mark, I quickly began coming up with new ideas that would address the true underlying problem. I'm not easily offended. Once I realized that my students struggled while using the materials I had already provided, and that my explanations during class were not enough to help them truly understand what to do, I could objectively look at my materials and my past instruction and find ways to improve them.
What I Learned About Myself in Educational Technology
As I mentioned earlier, this experience enabled me to discover the value of analysis. I'm glad I found this out early in my graduate school career, as I have used analysis many times since this initial project to determine if a solution I might have recommended in the past would even address the true problems. I am more apt now to spend more time looking deeply into the causes for gaps between optimals and actuals before acting solely on what my gut tells me.
Link to Artifact: Performance Analysis (PDF file)
Mager, R.F., & Pipe, P. (1997). Analyzing performance problems. Atlanta, GA: The Center for Effective Performance, Inc.
Mager, R.F. (1997). Goal analysis. Atlanta, GA: The Center for Effective Performance, Inc.
During our very first course in the Masters program, Introduction to Educational Technology, we learned the performance analysis process by coming up with a scenario of our own to analyze. My middle school students were engaged in a "Works Cited Scavenger Hunt" project, which many of them struggle to complete flawlessly, so I chose to approach this problem to see if I could get some ideas to a solution. I knew my students had difficulty citing sources and correctly formatting a Works Cited, but what I learned during my analysis was that simply locating the sources was the hardest part for most of the students.
Standard -- Cognitive: Analyze, synthesize, use inductive and deductive reasoning, solve problems effectively and creatively.
I began by informally interviewing twelve of my students who had finished the project early. I expected to hear that they had trouble with creating the citations and documents. However, when early indications seemed to point to locating sources to use for the project as being a major hurdle for them, I immediately needed to change my approach. I created a survey using a Google Form and had all of my 130 middle school students respond. As a result, I learned which specific types of sources were hardest for the students to locate, and I got confirmation that locating the different types of research sources was harder for the students than citing them. Since I planned to use this analysis to guide my creation of a job aid later in the course, this really altered the direction of my efforts.
Opportunities Disguised as Problems
After doing this same project with my students for several years, I thought I already knew it so well that I had begun planning the job aid I would create. But right there in the first semester of graduate school, I was put in my place. Not only had I missed a crucial obstacle my students faced, the solution I had in mind would be more work for them to use than it would be worth. Once I got over my surprise at having completely missed what should have been obvious, I reset my thinking and decided to let my analysis guide my decisions. I learned, in my first project for my first class, that educational technology involves conducting analyses and then acting on what the analyses tell us. It's rare that we ever really know the solution before analyzing the problem objectively.
My Strengths
I'm flexible. Once I allowed myself to consider what the students were telling me through the survey, and I could believe that my initial ideas were off the mark, I quickly began coming up with new ideas that would address the true underlying problem. I'm not easily offended. Once I realized that my students struggled while using the materials I had already provided, and that my explanations during class were not enough to help them truly understand what to do, I could objectively look at my materials and my past instruction and find ways to improve them.
What I Learned About Myself in Educational Technology
As I mentioned earlier, this experience enabled me to discover the value of analysis. I'm glad I found this out early in my graduate school career, as I have used analysis many times since this initial project to determine if a solution I might have recommended in the past would even address the true problems. I am more apt now to spend more time looking deeply into the causes for gaps between optimals and actuals before acting solely on what my gut tells me.
Link to Artifact: Performance Analysis (PDF file)
Mager, R.F., & Pipe, P. (1997). Analyzing performance problems. Atlanta, GA: The Center for Effective Performance, Inc.
Mager, R.F. (1997). Goal analysis. Atlanta, GA: The Center for Effective Performance, Inc.
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Copyright ©2010 Diane Main. All rights reserved.
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