Movin' on Up!

Since August is more than half way over it was way past time for me to compose another post! I finally finished graduate school and for the first time in nine years I will be starting this school year in a new district. I have moved from a rural school to a suburban school. The student body population went from 300 students (where I was) to 2000 just at the high school where I will serve now. (This doesn't even take into account the other huge high school) I went from knowing every single student to - "there is no way on earth I can know them all."

Convocation for the district was on Monday and I must say that I was impressed. I have stepped into the most energetic, positive, and affirming district I have ever seen. This is really exciting for me. I already have the restless, can't sleep well jitters that always happen right before a new year begins but this year is worse than usual because of the great unknown that lies before me and the fact that the school is almost 10, yes 10, times the size of the school I left.

The principal told the staff that membership in the F.A.T. club was not allowed at our school. (Frustrated, Angry, Teachers) I had to laugh. No problem for me because I love high school students and enjoy what I do. Sometimes it is hard to believe that I get paid for this job.

My first training video has posted!

Today I posted my first ever training video to youtube! I had so much fun doing this. If only you could see me smiling :) You may wonder why it has taken me so long to post something, but honestly, I have not really wanted to post a video with me in it! Guess what? I'm still not "in" it. I used a tool called screencastomatic with my desktop providing the visual. My voice-over provides the instructions. Look out!

The technology was not cooperating with me at first so I had to try several different methods before I finally got it to look like I wanted it to look. Here is my training video for any of you who might be interested in constructing your own website or perhaps just a single webpage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1x8OXLXNPw


So, what was the impetus behind this project, you may ask? Graduate school. As part of my last two courses for my degree in global eLearning I learned to work with moodle, a well known LMS (learning management system). I designed a college level course (see my course in progress here: smckinney.gnomio.com) If you want to check out my course you can log in as a guest and use the password 12345. I can't wait to tackle Blackboard and Canvas, among others. Now if I can only find someone who will give me administrative privileges....

Only two and one-half weeks and I will be finished. Finished with graduate school - but not finished learning. Not ever.

One more set to go!

     It has been a whirlwind year for me as I have worked full time as a high school teacher and taken online graduate courses. The master's program in which I am enrolled has compressed a 36 hour program into one year. I will finish after the next set of courses and I am beyond thrilled! That puts graduation for me at the end of June 2015...a short 2 1/2 months away.
     It has been a terrific growth experience for me and I can now create my own learning programs using various types of online learning management systems. I can also work more effectively with various ages and cultures, and have learned some new leadership skills. It has been interesting and eye-opening to work in an asynchronous environment with people across the world. I have worked with individuals in Korea, Costa Rica, and many states within the USA.
     I believe that this experience has been a sample of what is in store for learning in the future. Yes, there were many situations that required advance planning and patience, but as I have learned to work in the online environment I have discovered that I really enjoy using it as a place for learning. I can scarcely wait to have the twenty hours per week I used for completing this degree back so that I can put to practice what I have learned!

Theories on Adult Learning

Class four is complete! Theories on Adult Learning was a great class and totally applicable to what I do for a living. However, I am a little apprehensive about the next block of courses - Research Methodologies (ugh) & Intercultural Education (sounds interesting)

Today was really weird and everything felt off since the majority of my day was not taken up with class work. I am so accustomed to getting home from work and hitting the computer to work on these graduate classes that I felt somewhat lost! - not that I'm complaining!!!

3 down and 9 to go

Summer is winding down and I have officially wrapped up my first 3 graduate classes. I feel so accomplished! Taking classes during the summer has been one of the most productive uses of a vacation I have ever experienced. The graduate elearning program at TAMUC is ideal for any student who is interested in accelerated learning. Granted, organization and motivation are key components for success and if you lack either you are TOAST. Finishing in one year is the carrot on a stick that keeps me focused and on-task. By Christmas I will be half way done - and that is only after starting in July!

My students are in for a surprise when it comes to me providing a sympathetic ear for all their deadlines for written assignments. I would venture to say that I have written close to 30,000 words this summer - all in APA formatting, mind you, and with plenty of reference material to back up any conclusions I might have drawn. I am very excited about the content for the grad courses yet to come - I have already learned how to use several different tools that will be of benefit to my students this next year.

So much writing!!!

I knew that graduate school would involve some writing. I had no idea! Yikes. Thankfully I do not struggle with writing too much. I am usually forced to cut back rather than add more when it comes to writing and have to go back for many revisions. Can anyone say superfluous? Good writing is a challenge and I admire those who can make difficult content seem simple. A well turned phrase earns immediate respect in my book. I have a new appreciation for authors and poets.

Content Area Objects and Tools

I chose to investigate content area objects and tools because I want to make the best use of my time in this course. If I cannot use it in my classes I find it hard to justify the amount of time required to learn about it. Content defines who you are when you teach at the high school level. If I were not intensely interested in what I teach I would get another job. I love sharing my passion with my career and tech students. I think my excitement must rub off on them because they are often showing me pictures of their culinary experiments at home. 

The first question I asked myself was, "what kinds of intellectual tasks would my students perform that might be better accomplished with the use of technology?" To begin with, technology has been in the commercial restaurant for years and its use has expanded with POS (point of sales) systems that most businesses use today. More than ever before a technology system must be utilized to help food service businesses effectively track orders, inventory items, create schedules, make customer orders, manage (customers and employees), and train. Virtually no hospitality business can operate without one of these systems. By exposing students to how these systems operate while they were still in high school, I would be helping them transition. The kicker is: these systems are tens of thousands of dollars to purchase. Since I teach at a small 3A rural school this is not an option for me. Not to be deterred, I contacted several representatives of these companies: POSitouch, KitchenBrain, and Aloha to find out if a less expensive, pared down version might be available for my school. (I did this last year and hit a brick wall.)

In the meantime, I also checked out some ipad tools that are for system management (just not with commercial applications in mind) - How to Cook Everything, All Recipes Dinner Spinner and Epicurious. I determined that all three would be worth investigating so I downloaded them to take them for a trail run. Epicurious has a nice feature that allows a person to sync recipes from anywhere on the web for free and it also has a voice activated command mode. This is very important to me because of food safety issues and the danger of hands cross contaminating food and equipment. 

How to Cook Everything looked good originally and I loved the graphics, but it has a very limited number of recipes to access (compared to Dinner Spinner, which has about 15 times as many.) Bottom line: I will have to play with them some more to figure out all the applications that I might use them for in class. Off the top of my head, I can see using the tutorial component of How to Cook Everything to demonstrate techniques before heading to the kitchen labs. I can also see using the nutrition feature that Dinner Spinner offers when we analyze recipe ingredients to calculate fat, carbohydrate, and protein percentages. 

If I hear back from a POS sales representative I will post the gist of my conversation with them on this blog. If a system is not available for students to use for free or very low cost I will be back at square one for now...  

The second question I asked was "how does this help me meet the TEKs in my classes?" Certainly a POS system would help me meet the TEKS for Culinary I:

(7) The student uses technology and computer applications to manage food service operations. The student is expected to:

(A) use technology tools appropriate for the industry;

(B) operate technology applications to perform workplace tasks;

(C) explain the use of point-of-sale systems;

(D) demonstrate knowledge in computer programs used for food production;

As it stands now, I have been meeting these requirements by showing visuals on how they work, demonstrating how the school cafeteria system works, and pointing out how where the system is located, connected, and used when we go on field trips! Fortunately a few of my students see these systems already at their part time jobs, so they are familiar with them. As you can see, it has been difficult to meet these requirements...I hope those reps have good news for me!

Ultimately if we had our own POS system it would really bring to life all the aspects of a full scale restaurant operation. It would immerse them into the hospitality industry's use of technology. The apps I uploaded were nice, but they aren't a POS and they never will be. Their purpose is different. There are so many areas of the hospitality field that a real POS systems manages that it would help the students see the usefulness of the tools available (and there are many such systems to choose from.) My students would be able to manage our micro-business much easier than the spreadsheet system we have been using for ordering, calculating costs, managing product loss, and predicting profit. They would be learning by using a real world tool and "doing" what a culinary professional would do in the real world... Always a bonus in my book.