How did your interpretation of the message change from one modality to the next?
No matter which version of the three I viewed I was sadly unenthusiastic because for me none of them did a good job of getting the message across. Whoever was attempting to communicate with other group members in this manner has failed miserably. It was best simply as written text. I felt that the video did not really do anything to convey the message that the text version had not already covered. The audio version could have added much to either of the other two, but I was sadly unimpressed with this version as well.
This communication could have certainly been done in a better way, whether it involved mixing several of the methods which were attempted here or not. But the bottom line is that there are certainly better means of communication than the ones used here.
What factors influenced how you perceived the message? Each of us certainly looks at material in different ways. Much of communication is the way that the sender of the message chooses to convey it to their audience. For me personally text along with sound makes for the perfect learning experience, but when we separate the two into one or the other, it can make it a bit more difficult for an audience or student to get the gist of what is being communicated.
As far as video goes, when one is done well this can be the pinnacle of communication; at least one can understand every example etc. when it's done with a video with an audio component as well.
In this case there was not much difference, for me, in the way that the info was given to us as the audience. Once again the text component was the best of three for me personally.
Which form of communication best conveyed the true meaning and intent of the message?
I feel that the text component got across the gist of the exercise because I found both of the others kind of busy as I tried to view and listen to them. The text mode laid out the message and got its point across; whereas, the other two means did more distracting than conveying, in my opinion.
What are the implications of what you learned from this exercise for communicating effectively with members of a project team?
I go back to what I have learned from this, as well as other experiences, in saying the simplest means of communication can be the best. This way your point gets across, the team members know what to do, and everything runs along the way it is intended to. When we try to blend too much audio, video, technology into sending a simple message a lot of times this can skew our message because other team members can get caught up in what they're seeing that we added to supplement our message and in a lot of ways this can distract our team members and thus detract from our message as a whole.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Monday, November 8, 2010
Week 2-6145
What processes, project artifacts, or activities did you include in the project that contributed to its success?
Originally, before we chose to revamp our English curriculum for developmental into ENG 85 and 95 we considered merely expanding the four courses-Reading 80 and 90 and English 80 and 90- that the two new ones replaced. The numbering for these courses would have been ENG 85 and 95 and Reading 85 and 95. In retrospect, this pilot program was doomed from its inception. We had six team members as part of the group to whom this task was assigned. This seemed like a good number because we are all competent in our given areas, but in the end this number proved to be our first fatal flaw. In our SOW we broke up the work amongst the group, but due yop our numbers it could not be split up equally, in any way. Next we ran into the problem of redundancy. Because all the courses had a very similar set of goals and such, we soon were faced with the type of overkill that pushed us to want to make a change initially. The software was yet another challenge because we were charged with adding a technology component to these new courses by the college. Due to our different goals and ideas for this program we could never really agree on much of anything, except in the end to scrap this effort and start again fresh with the new ENG 85 and 95 format that we now use regularly.
There was not a lot that could be deemed successful about this initial attempt, but we did narrow it down to two classes and discovered suitable software that could be used for each of those. Also we decided to limit our team members and to install Project Managers for each course. Those were really the only bright spots in this endeavor.
What processes, project artifacts, or activities did you not include in the project that might have made the project more successful?
To have made this offering more successful we could have structured our hierarchy of leadership better, as we did with the second offering. Also we set a schedule with firm deadlines for the completion of modules during this second attempt and this would have helped us a lot in the first offering. Also using a PM for each course seemed to give us a bit more structure and thus more cohesion as we got closer to launching our efforts for our students.
As far as activities go we chose these through our small groups and each of us had an equal vote with the PM as the tie-breaker in that case. This worked well and soon we had completed our task.
If we had chosen to operate in this manner in the first place we could have finished our task of on deadline, but it is probably best that we went through the growing pains of revamping a curriculum because now it will be that much easier if we are ever faced with this obstacle again.
Originally, before we chose to revamp our English curriculum for developmental into ENG 85 and 95 we considered merely expanding the four courses-Reading 80 and 90 and English 80 and 90- that the two new ones replaced. The numbering for these courses would have been ENG 85 and 95 and Reading 85 and 95. In retrospect, this pilot program was doomed from its inception. We had six team members as part of the group to whom this task was assigned. This seemed like a good number because we are all competent in our given areas, but in the end this number proved to be our first fatal flaw. In our SOW we broke up the work amongst the group, but due yop our numbers it could not be split up equally, in any way. Next we ran into the problem of redundancy. Because all the courses had a very similar set of goals and such, we soon were faced with the type of overkill that pushed us to want to make a change initially. The software was yet another challenge because we were charged with adding a technology component to these new courses by the college. Due to our different goals and ideas for this program we could never really agree on much of anything, except in the end to scrap this effort and start again fresh with the new ENG 85 and 95 format that we now use regularly.
There was not a lot that could be deemed successful about this initial attempt, but we did narrow it down to two classes and discovered suitable software that could be used for each of those. Also we decided to limit our team members and to install Project Managers for each course. Those were really the only bright spots in this endeavor.
What processes, project artifacts, or activities did you not include in the project that might have made the project more successful?
To have made this offering more successful we could have structured our hierarchy of leadership better, as we did with the second offering. Also we set a schedule with firm deadlines for the completion of modules during this second attempt and this would have helped us a lot in the first offering. Also using a PM for each course seemed to give us a bit more structure and thus more cohesion as we got closer to launching our efforts for our students.
As far as activities go we chose these through our small groups and each of us had an equal vote with the PM as the tie-breaker in that case. This worked well and soon we had completed our task.
If we had chosen to operate in this manner in the first place we could have finished our task of on deadline, but it is probably best that we went through the growing pains of revamping a curriculum because now it will be that much easier if we are ever faced with this obstacle again.
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