Manitoba Liquor & Lotteries As referenced in assignment 2, Manitoba Liquor & Lotteries (MBLL) Organizational Development team launched a leadership development training initiative. Management and leadership training programs were purchased and others programs were developed in- house. The Coaching As A Leader training program has become one of the core courses and foundational learning of the companys initiative.
Coaching As A Leader focuses on personal awareness, individual
communication preferences and acknowledging the emotional states of our co-workers. These are progressive and modern themes in the corporate world. This is training that would benefit greatly from educational technology that is equally as progressive and modern. As mentioned in assignment 2, the technology currently being used during the classroom facilitation is primarily the basic tools; PowerPoint, flip charts, white boards and printed material complimented with occasional YouTube video. There are certainly opportunities for educational technology to increase the effectiveness and impact of this program. Two types of educational technology could be:
1. Social media 2. Cloud-based application
It is important to remember that all the participants are or will be in
management and leadership positions. To achieve positive results and buy-in from learners any tech used would need to be focused, efficient and confidential.
1. Social media:
One of the strength of the Coaching As A Leader program is overall
timeframe of delivery. That timeframe however also creates risks and challenges. The program spans seven-month and is comprised of seven half-day courses, each delivered approximately a month apart. This length of program allows for trust to develop among participants. It also gives the participants time to reflect on the learning, put into practice the concepts and techniques being taught. One of the risks however is that the students might note stay closely connected to the material during many weeks between classes. The University of New South Wales webpage Selecting Technologies (2016) listed social bookmarks a potential tool for attaining the learning of co-learning and reflective practice. These would be excellent was for the cohort to be able to share related content from the web with each other in the weeks between classes. Another potentially useful social media tool would be a messaging service like Class Messenger as described in The Practical Ed Tech Handbook (Byrne, 2016). This would allow the facilitators to send reminders and answer questions between classes.
2. Cloud-based Applications
One of the exercises completed by the participants between classes
is journaling. Participants are asked to reflect multiple times between classes on their learning, potential applications and pitfalls they might be experiencing. It is important that participation in this exercise be tracked, but it equally as important that those journals remain private to each individual. A simple cloud-based applications that could achieve both these goals without being overly complex or time- consuming would be ideal.
Another useful application to keep participants active in the content
between classes could be Padlet, also described in The Practical Ed Tech Handbook (Byrne, 2016). This could be used to create a password-protected, efficient forum for participants to share quick success stories, learn from each others experiences or simply stay connected to the content.
Word count: 513
References:
The University of New South Wales (2016). Selecting Technologies.
Retrieved from https://teaching.unsw.edu.au/selecting-technologies