Module 8 - Professional Reflection
Using the time audit as a guide, I taught a four-hour class on Career Decision Making. Typically, this is a four-part course in which each session lasts 4 hours. I used this opportunity to redesign and deliver a truncated version of the course into a four-hour seminar. I realized quickly that there were too many “activities” crammed into the session.
While the assessments are necessary for the learning objectives of the class, it would have better served the students to have them complete the assessments prior to the actually class session. Deducting the time allotted for the students to complete the assessments in class, would have been better spent on extending small group and whole class discussions. These were the times when I had the most difficult time cutting into in order to move on to the next segment. Though, we spent the allotted amount of time on each discussion, it did not seem like there was enough time given to the discussion segments.
I chose to focus on Item 10 of the Touchstones: I help students do something with their learning. While all of the parts of the class are important, they all ultimately lead to the overall objective of taking the information and applying it in order to find the career options best suited for the student. Below is a chart showing the amount of time spent on several of the points Goodwin and Hubbell (2013) outline as methods to help connect new knowledge with real-world applications.
Seeing that I was able to continuously help the students connect information to concrete decisions was satisfying. The students used the Web in several sections of the course to research the connections that could be made between their assessment results and possible careers. They also used the Web to assist in the completion of individual course work like the Choosing a Major worksheet. Prior to taking each assessment, I asked them to hypothesize their results and during the small group discussions they were asked to discuss how their hypotheses differed from their actual results and why. The class began with the me asking the overarching question, “What factors affect my own career decision making?” There were other questions asked as we proceeded through the course to help students focus on the learning objective for each teaching block. Finally, there were several 5-minute short journal writing opportunities to help students use critical thinking skills.
I believe several of the touchstones were easy to accomplish. Some were easy because I have been doing them already like Item 6: I interact meaningfully with every student, Item 1: I use standards to guide every learning opportunity and Item 2: I ensure students set personal learning objectives. The most challenging of the touchstones for this particular lesson was Item 9: I make the most of every minute. This was difficult because of the amount of time spent completing the assessments, realizing after personally assessing the class that I should have had the students complete the assessments prior to attending the class.