FM4 Chris Payne

1. What did you think of the syllabus?  Was it helpful?

I love the syllabus as it lets me know exactly what is due and what is expected of me by a certain date.

2. What did you think of the Textbook? Recommended reading books?  Were they helpful?

Its a good book, but I wish we spent more time discussing the content.  The recommended reading in the assignments is super helpful as it helps me grasp some of the concepts that we cover very briefly.

3. What did you think of the how-to videos?  Were they helpful?

The how-to videos are a Godsend.  They help me understand the assignments to get the basic correct, and then I add my own touches to them.

4. What do you think of Plectica?

I love it.  But I love it because we use it all the time.  I could see myself using this in my workplace to create excellent presentations.

5. What are your expectations for Tableau?

I don’t know that I actually have any expectations for it, as I really don’t use it.

6.  What do you think of Rationaleonline.com

This is probably my favorite software of all that we’ve used, as it helps me gather my thoughts.  I’m normally pretty scattered, so this is awesome.

7.  Did you use Thinkquiry?  Is it helpful?

I like that that it challenges us to identify the systems in the circumstance that we’re observing.

8. What do you think of ST v2.0?

I’m not sure how its different than ST, but those are excellent methods of looking at systems by looking at distinctions, systems, relationships and perspectives.

9. What do you think of the new concepts introduced?

I can absolutely see where they have value, but I’m struggling to connect some of them to administration in Health Care.

10. What are your thoughts on Lean Six Sigma?  Is it a career path you would be interested in pursuing?

I worked at a manufacturer with lots of people trained in Six Sigma and so I have a basic understanding of it and what it produces, but I’m not entirely certain how Lean functions alongside it.  I would absolutely love to be a Six Sigma blackbelt and I’m researching ways to do it apart from an organization.

11. What did you think of the pyramid principle?

I really like the pyramid principle as its another tool that helps me not only organize my thoughts and ideas, but it also helps boil down the conversation to what the main point actually is.  I could think I know what the main point is, but it may actually lead to another, great question which encompasses my question or concept.

12. What did you think of Knowledge Transfer?

After going through my prior assignments, I’m not sure I know what this means.

13. What are your initial thoughts on SWARM learning?

I like the idea of what I think I know of it.  As I go back and look at our early assignments, the idea of it is still fuzzy, but maybe I missed something.

14. What did you think of the barriers to learning?

John Maxwell talks a bit about this.  He starts with “You don’t know what you don’t know”, then moves on to “You know what you don’t know”, then to You know what you know so you go, and finally to you know what you know so you show others.

15.  What did you think of the stable datum?

This makes sense.  As someone who works to juggle a lot of things to make an event happen every weekend, I have to nail down what I can know, and then connect with people who may know things from other areas to make sense of the whole event.

16. What did you think of the first assignment?  (CM1)

It was a fun assignment to familiarize myself with the application, and I got to use memes, so that always makes for satisfactory work.

17. What did you think of CM2?

This is probably my favorite as it tied directly into our textbook reading.  It felt like what I was reading was tying into the work I was doing.

18. What did you think of EM3?

This was also fun, as I really like the Rationaleonline software.

19. Does it help knowing that students from this class (and others) have published blogs?

Sure.  Its always nice to know other people have gone before and completed a task so that you know its doable.  I used to have a blog called itsagoodship.com where I talked about the topic of discipleship.

20. What do you think of this assignment (FM4)?  What are your thoughts on students providing feedback that can change a class in progress?  Have you ever been asked this from an instructor before (throughout the class, not just at the end) ?

I love the concept of being flexible, as long as the deadline in which I’m asked to do assignments is flexible and achievable as well.  I have never been asked for feedback in the middle of the class, so this is unique.

21. What are your thoughts on the extra credit opportunities (blog, facebook and first to post) ?

I love extra credit, and I feel like it encourages creativity.

22.  Are you a member of the Facebook group?  Why or why not?

Yes, because I still can’t seem to drag myself away from social media.  But seriously, Its a great way to communicate with you and classmates.  I get a notification on my phone and I can respond almost immediately.

23.  Do you think the Facebook group is useful?  Why or why not?

Yes, specifically because communication is fairly immediate.

24.  What do you think of the wordpress learning community?  Is it better than Blackboard?  Why or why not?

It’s cool, but I don’t really know if it provides anything that Blackboard doesn’t.  I mean, its just another thing I have to check, and right now, I’ve got like 15 tabs open for this class alone.  It kind of gives me anxiety because I’m afraid I’ll miss something, so I’m constantly checking the syllabus.

25.  Take me through your thoughts and emotions on this course…Where are you now?

was a little intimidated when I first read the syllabus, and I’m not feeling like I have firm grasp of the topics we’ve already covered, but I just take it one assignment at a time and hope I get it right.

26.  What are your thoughts on the instructor using Tableau to grade and sharing the student dashboard?

personally don’t mind sharing the student dashboard, but I’m not a competitive person.  Even if someone is doing better than I am, I’m okay with that, as I try to do my best, not someone else’s.  As for Tableau, I don’t really pay attention to it much, as I’ve got all these other programs that I’m using to complete assignments for this and my other class.

27.  What are your expectations moving foward?

I manage my expectations based upon the syllabus and past experiences, so my goal is to research content for my blog, read my book and nail down assignments before they’re due.

28.  What would you like to see change?

Honestly, my struggle with this class is that there seem to be 10 different apps that are shared for very specific tasks and most of them are simply introduced and then I never use them again.  Is there a good way to access most of what we need from a central resource?  I mean, the WordPress site is good, but is there a way to search keywords better and have all the apps in one place?

29.  What is one thing you love?

Rationaleonline.  It’s awesome and helps me organize my thoughts.  As someone who’s usually scattered, its a Godsend.

30.  What is one thing you hate?

The amount of different tabs and applications I need to have open gives me anxiety.  For instance, one of our assignments suggested we open up a site called Piazza.  I asked a question on it early on and it never got answered.  Also, isn’t that what the Facebook group is for?

31.  What can the instructor do immediately to make the class better?

That’s a great question.  Perhaps tying all of these different methods of thinking and learning to the text that we’re ready a little more closely.  Right now, save for CM2, it all feels a bit disconnected.

Here’s a link to my Plectica map:

https://www.plectica.com/maps/Q6TDJU9KT