roberto'sBlog

During the past week, I have had the opportunity to teach Wimba Live Classroom for the Summer Technology Academy. The latter was specifically designed around faculty’s need to infuse more technolgy in their classroom. Faculty bring course related projects and ideas they would like to use with technology, and during the course of the academy, they’ll develop a product that will become the starting point of what could be a brand new class, or a major revision to an existing course.

Last Thursday, I gave a day long lesson on how to use Live Classroom as a user and as a presenter. I started by going over the proper steps to creating a PowerPoint presentation for Wimba, and followed it with an actual demo of a Wimba presentation. Before Thursday, half the class was skeptical about using it. I have to say that by the end the day, I have made a believer out of everybody.

Below, I’m including links to both PowerPoint presentations. Please let me know what you think. Feedback is always appreciated…..

• Designing a Powerpoint Presentation for Wimba Live Classroom
• Using Wimba Live Classroom

In the past two classes, it has been confirmed to me by the book and Amy how important it is to know and involve stakeholders in HPI projects, and how critical continuos evaluations are to determine issues and changes to improve on the project.

I have always been a firm believer of developing positive relationships with department coworkers, and with Stockton faculty, staff and students. Of course, I also believe that the building of relationships has to start early and must continue for the life of the job. Knowing the right people at any position has made past projects easier and completion becomes much more attainable. It just makes sense to have this kind of support at all times and when you need it, you know is there.

One way I keep in contact with staff and faculty is by performing informal assessments of my training classes on a daily basis. I always make a point to call or email somebody to find out hoe they are progressing on a project using a software tool they learned in one of my classes, online demos or one-on-one sessions. Chapter 11 has showed me the business side of evaluation, the monetary value of results. As a matter of fact, I tried it with traditional training a delivered last year on a brand new system to the college. I wanted to compared this type of training with an online delivery, and I want to tell you that my eyes were opened.

It’s been fun, very fast, but fun and I’m definitely coming away from this class with lots of tips and new ideas. As busy as I am these days, I’m hoping to be able to keep applying what I have learned to better myself and to improve the delivery of my training classes (of course, when needed)

From the chapter on how to select an HPI project, I found that selecting the right client and drawing well thought out contracts are probably the most critical steps to a successful HPI project. No matter how focused and prepared on the project the performance consultant, without the proper support from the client, it will fail right from the start. I like the criteria listed on page 73. It does really give you a good description of what your client should, and more importantly, what he/she is willing to do to get the project done. Also, this chapter and last Wednesday’s class made me realized how important it is to have well written contracts that cover all aspects of the project. It also made me aware of how experience plays a big role in the creation of these contracts.

I have to say that Monday’s class delivered through Wimba Classroom went rather well. Yes, there were some static and noise issues, but I believe they can be resolved by having one mic on at the time, while everybody else listens. And when somebody wants to participate, indicate your desire with the raise hand button. We should give it another shot and possibly complement it with a PowerPoint presentation

Even though, I’m still a bit confused about what I need to do with my contract, I now have a clearer picture of what I want to accomplish in this class.So far, I have enjoyed our topics of discussions such as what makes a Performance Consultant and his/her responsibilities. Creating a job description really help me understand better the skills that a PC is required to mastered. Besides the obvious understanding of HPI and having a networking, relationship-building skill, it is critical for this person to have project management skills. Another point raised during class was the fact that a PC should also have a business knowledge to be able to understand, in general, how a company functions (when analyzing from the marketplace)

I’m still trying to absorb the next four chapters (especially 2 & 3) But, I now understand the importance of a business analysis prior to performing a GAP analysis. It is important to be in tune with the company’s goals and targets when going through the HPI process.

The Technology Boot Camp is a condensed and intensive training event where Computer and Telecommunication Services offers multiple classes a day during a one to two week time period. It was originally created with two purposes in mind: to bring faculty up to speed with the latest changes in technology prior to the beginning of the semester; and to create a much more flexible class schedule by offering classes before the semester starts and at the end.

 After nine years since the boot camp started, I’m happy to say that it has served the faculty well. We’ve been able to educate and prepare faculty prior to the starting of the semester on changes to our technology resources and facilities. At the same time, phone calls to our tech support (Help Desk) have gone down. I now feel that faculty truly come into the semester much better prepared and ready to use technology.

 This May boot camp has been particularly challenging because of the release of two major systems: The Stockton Portal and Blackboard CE6. I do feel more confident though that we offered the right classes and have targeted the right population of faculty, but we still have a lot of work to do.

Today is the last day and now I can relaxed until next Monday and my next big challenge….