Trends & Issues

      1.  Chapters in Section V identify trends and issues in IDT in various contexts: business & industry; military; health care education; P-12 education; and post-secondary education. Select 2 of these 5 contexts and compare/contrast the IDT trends and issues. Then describe how knowledge of IDT trends and issues you captured from those two fields can better inform your work.

After reading the chapters, I decided to focus on the military and education environment, because both of these environments use instructional design for training and performance improvement. In education, we use instructional design to document, evaluate, and monitor student performance. The ‘how’ we do this is constantly changing, but I believe that we will always use instructional design to support our students. I enjoyed reading about the military instructional design, because I feel like I can really connect. Their design is focused on meeting a need. They do not waste time with training. They have ‘guiding documents’ that say what their objectives and goals are, which helps to direct their trainings. I think as teachers we can all relate to this, especially during evaluation season. The education field and military field share the same major concern, budgets. They both have procedures in place for how to order new and improved devices, but it is a rigorously long procedure. (In my district, you have to beg, plead, and get the principal to complain before your technology need is even noticed.) This is similar to the Marines, who struggle to get new technology in their department. As I’ve discussed in all my posts, I have been struggling with making trainings necessary, or seemingly necessary, and seeing that the military and education has to make sure to meet the needs of their trainees. This shows me I need to focus more on observations. What are teachers doing in class? What can I do to help? What will ‘lighten their load’? These questions can help direct my trainings, so that I can make sure I do not waste time.

      2.  Chapters in Section VI discuss global trends and issues in IDT. What have you learned from the selected chapter and how can/will it enhance your teaching? In a global and more connected society, we face unprecedented challenges that have implications for learning. How and can we prepare our youth to develop cultural sensitivity when working with people from the another (or your selected) region? Does our current education system, curriculum, and instructional practices help learners foster the skills necessary to tackle these issues? What can be done in your role?

The first thing that came to mind when I read about global trends, is that it is the teacher’s job to create 21^st century learners in his/her classroom. Through this, teachers are creating global citizens. I think we lose sight of that, because it’s not a tested TEKS, or because it’s not readily available. This is so sad, because students go without the necessary skill sets needed to be in a real world setting. Our teachers just aren’t prepared or given enough time to teach these necessary cultural skills. The first lesson that comes to mind when trying to develop cultural sensitivity through technology, would be to have students communicate with students around the world. This can be done through skype. Students could be connected to a classroom in China for example and discuss the different cultures, or students could just be email pen-pals to students all over the world and discuss the cultural differences. In my current role, I could address and research easy ways to create an environment of cultural sensitivity, as well as just being a role model in that field. Our students grasp a lot of what we teach, by just observing us.