Two interesting things occurred to me this week; why do I
assume trainees have a certain level of knowledge when they come to us, and am
I a good instructor? I will touch upon
the first question in this post, and in the future I’ll collect my thoughts on
the latter.
As I search for things to better my work environment and
strengthen the learning experience that trainees who come to us are searching
for, I have encountered some interesting points that I fear I have taken for
granted. Specifically, I am referencing
the subject matter that I (we) believe students come to us already possessing. If I am to teach, to instruct them; should I
not know a good foundation of where they are coming from? The resounding answer would be yes, yet I
have not reached into that undetermined grey area of knowledge. Instead, our training is designed with an
understanding that they already come to us with a certain set of fundamental
knowledge. This is a mistake and a
miscue in the sincerest form.
If teachers often start their semesters off with students as
a review of what they have already learned then perhaps I should take
note. This is made difficult for us, as
we have learners who come from disparate backgrounds. Assessing the knowledge base (history) of
students that come to us is a difficult thing to quantify when you are
designing and instructing an advanced course.
Due to the complexity of the subject material, it has come to my attention
now that I should add a ‘back to basics’
or ‘fundamentals 101’ module to our
curriculum. If incorporated, such a module would provide a more solid standing
with which to build the course and aide with demands on students. A course-within-a-course.
With this in mind I am hoping to offer a primer of knowledge
for some as well as a review for others so that the rest of our course will
have a solid base. In addition, it will
offer familiarity with some new vocabulary for them to gain an early
understanding of.
As I am reading the program books from all the strands I am
constantly coming up with ideas for work and AR specifically. I find myself looking for my AR notebook to
take a little bit of time and record the thoughts as they come up. This has been fun so far.
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