Art of Communication

This week we were asked to reflect on “The Art of Effective Communication”.  While watching this video program, we were able to observe three a single individual message delivered by three different types of communication; audio, video, and written text.  Through this program, we were able to see that the way in which we  deliver a message can have implications on the ways in which our message is received.

The first way we looked at the message was through a company email.  In this email, Jane is asking for an ETA on when “the missing report” was going to be finished.  Jane makes sure that Mark understands that her own work can not be completed without his input, so they are both under the gun at this point.  After reading this email as if I was Mark, I felt a little more pressured to get my work done.  The tone of the email is kind of condescending to a point, where it feels like Jane makes an attempt to give an excuse for why my portion isn’t done.  Plus she makes it feel like her part is really the only important part, but she can’t finish hers without the data from mine.  Since I don’t have a really tone or inflection from her, I don’t know what she really thinks but it feels like she is talking down to me.

The second way we looked at the message was through voice mail.  It was the exact same message but delivered through voice mail.  After listening to is as if I was Mark, I had clear understanding that her work was dependent on mine, that without the data from my report, she would not be able to finish hers.  Since this was a voice mail, I could hear the caring tone in her voice, as if she was almost as worried about my project as she is with hers.  I still had a feeling of her talking down to me, like I don’t understand what are roles are and how they are dependent of each other.  I did however feel like she had an understanding tone when she delivered the last part of the message and asked for the data separately, letting me know that my job was still important and she could finish hers if I supplied her with the data.

The final way the delivered the message was in a face to face communication, Jane visits my cubicle asking me for her needed data.  In this message, her tone is still a little condescending, with the feeling that her job is more important than mine, but by making the trip to my desk, it showed me just how important my job is to hers.  She is able to cheerfully ask for my work, let me know that she why she needs it and even gives me another way in order to help her, all with a smile on her face.  By visiting me face to face, I left the conversation with a more positive feel, and much more likely to try and hurry up and finish or at minimum, email her that data that is needed.

When looking back at the three examples of interactions, the results are very close to what I thought. I went from being nervous, upset, and not willing to help after reading the email, to not feeling as threatened but still not willing to help after the voice mail, to understanding Jane’s frustration, and because she came to my cubicle and smiled at me I was willing to help. The lack of tone of voice and even visual communication lead people to supplement those pieces of the communications with ideas in there head which then leads to misunderstanding and even mistrust. For me personally, I need face to face communication.  Without the addition of verbal and visual communication, my mind starts to add parts that are not already there.  I find this to happen a lot when I am texting with friends.  I normally leave long, well thought out messages, doing my best not to leave any stone unturned.  When some replies back with a short non descript message, I start to freak out, what did he mean by that, is he mad at me.  This not only frustrates me, but it shuts me down, I don’t feel comfortable in the conversation and thus no longer participate.  

As a project lead, I think it is very important that you are as visible as possible during the creation process.  Misunderstandings can very easily lead to having to recreate parts of the project, just because the PM wasn’t clear in what they wanted and the project team members didn’t share their confusion or lack of understanding  during a given point in project.

My Experience as a Project Manager

As a teacher at Totem Middle School, I have seen a lot of change over the last couple of years.  Four years ago, TMS was named a priority school, meaning that our state test scores fell into the bottom 5% of the state.  As a priority school, the school received a grant that was intended to help turn the school around.  Through the grant, the school was able to extend the learning day, provide after school tutoring for those in need, and bring in programs that provided teachers with data about their students and help students improve academically.  

My group was asked to document this transition by creating a video presentation that showed the transformation of the school, what new programs were implemented and how they improved students’ ability to grow as learners.  We were asked to create several short 2 to 4 minute videos in which we interviewed both teachers and students, learning about each program and discussing how each of them improved the educational experiences of the students.  

As the teacher and project manager of this group, I broke up the videos between 3 different groups of students.  I place an individual student to be in charge of each group and allowed them to schedule and interview the teachers and students on their own.

The client for this project was actually the school district.  Most visibly the school’s principal was the lead client who had the final say of what was to be shot and how it was presented., But he of course still had to answer to the school district and was expected to share this with them, so that they could show it to the school board and state and national educational associations to show the growth found at the middle school over the last couple of years.

When meeting with the client, the principal, I discussed the expectation of the project and asked for a detailed description for what he wanted.  The principal was very lackadaisical and said that he was sure that with my background in video, I would be able to come up with something he liked.  Not entirely pleased with this response, I asked for more information about each program and tried to develop a plan for the videos and how they would look.

Each group produced, high quality videos that showed the students growth through the programs provided by the school, but also showed the growth of my students  over the long year of video production class.  The videos were visibly pleasant, had quality audio plus a music bed, and included graphics that helped support the information that was being shared.

As I’m sure you could guess, with unclear direction from the client, it was going to be difficult to surely meet the needs of the client and produce a video that would make the client happy.  

Some of the most glaring issues of the videos where actually the interviews themselves.  Since the questions were developed my middle schoolers, they did not have the academic feeling that the client was expecting and thus did not get the indepth answers that he was looking for.  Secondly, since I have had different groups creating different videos and I didn’t set parameters that they would have to meet, the videos did not have a similar feel because they were shot and edited in different ways.  With all of these, issues, I found myself having to rework nearly all of the project, allowing the videos to have a common feel to them.

If I was to do the project again I would definitely had done a number different things that could have kept us from having to rework the project.  First of I all I would have demanded that the client be more decisive when it came to the project itself.  I would have had him develop his own questions for the interviews so that they received the answers he was looking for.  Secondly, I would have grouped my workers differently.  Having one group shoot the interviews, one group shoot the b-roll, and another group edit the videos.  This would allow more continuity between the videos, thus giving them a similar look and feel and making them easier to watch from video to video.  By following these steps, the project could have been finished on time and presented to the school board before the end of the school year.

Perception of Distance Learning

With how quickly technology has advanced over the last half century, for instance the computer system in my cellphone is more powerful than a whole room full of computers from the 1960’s , no one can know what technology will bring us over the next 10 to 20 years but what we do know is that  “Distance education will play a central role in that future, as technology-delivered curricula will be offered by educational institutions and private corporations on a global basis to anyone, anywhere, at anytime” (Simonson).  Over the next 20 years, distance education will begin to become more of the norm than the weird off shoot of standard educational practices.   Students are being raised in a world full of technology and in order for schools to continue to be effective they will need to find a way to use this technology and meet the needs of our students and Distance learning course will be a way to do this.

As an instructional designer, it is important to create course that can effectively meet the needs of the students, by doing this, students leave the educational experience with a positive outlook, and thus are more likely to spread the good word of distance education.  One way to do this is to provide the students with clear map of what they are going to learn over the course, for instance supplying them with a detailed syllabus.  “Instructors of online course must make the course organization calendar, activities, and expectations as clear as possible.  Students need this kind of structure and detail to help them stay organized and on task” (Simonson).  

I can really see blended learning classes building in popularity as well. In a blended learning environment, the instructor is asked to create a learning environment where students have a possibility to actively participate in their learning, while feeling safe to share their thoughts and ideas. “Learners who are engaged in learning are actively participating in their own understanding of the content.” (Simonson)

After reading this week’s discussion, one negative heard about online distance learning was the delayed nature of the online class discussions and the ability to question the instructor directly.  One way that I might look to address this issue is through use of more online video discussions.  In this and many others courses, our instructors have used skype in order to answer the needs and questions students, but normally these are only one one one.  My idea is to add an semi-optional discussion forum using a technology like Google Hangouts, this would be an live online discussion, lead by the instructor, students can share their thoughts and receive immediate feedback on their thinking.  I would call it semi-optional because one of the positives of online learning is working at your own time and pace, but this would require students to meet online at a given time and place.  By making it semi-optional, you can ask students to participate at least one discussion through out the class so that they could still work at their own pace.

Simonson, M., Smaldino, S., Albright, M., & Zvacek, S. (2012). Teaching and learning at a distance: Foundations of distance education (5th ed.) Boston, MA: Pearson.