Jay Hollowell

About me

Please allow me this opportunity to welcome everyone to The Lounge! As someone who has had the honor of being in career education and corporate training for thirty years (gee, it makes me feel much older!), I can honestly say that I am the happiest professionally when having the opportunity to interact with fellow career educators - whether it be a training event, webinar, or medium such as this where we can collaboratively share our thoughts.

Activity

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

Using Student Learning Groups

Hi David, thanks for your comments! To your point, setting the expectations and guidelines initially is crucial to effective student learning groups; I particularly like the idea of providing an outline and examples; a visual outline can help keep the group on course and examples certainly provide suggested ways that group members might approach tasks, roles and responsibilities. Jay Hollowell ED106 Facilitator

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

Refining Your Communication Skills

Excellent strategy, David, storytelling is an art and very effective teaching tool, particularly if it not only engages students and helps break up the lecture, but actually supplements the lesson. Thanks for your comments! Jay Hollowell ED106 Facilitator

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

Refining Your Communication Skills

Hi Douglas! Thanks for your question! Here are some ideas for your discretion; please let me encourage our other participants in the discussion forum to present their ideas as well: - Be sensitive to your own voice inflection/tone/body language...by having this awareness, you can speed up, slow down, change your tone and adjust accordingly -Try the "pulse and pace" concept - observe your students and how they are reacting; their body language will tell you whether or not you need to change the pace and/or the tone of your presentation -If you need to repetitively provide the same information at… >>>

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

Instructing Learners with Disabilities

Thanks, Manuel, yes tutoring definitely helps us further determine and relate to students' diverse learning styles, and more importantly, their challenges. Sometimes I have found that not only helping a challenged student with the topic at hand, but also with tips on how to actually assimilate, review and study material can be very valuable, but the tips have to be in concert with each student's most effective way of learning. Jay ED106 Facilitator

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

Using Student Learning Groups

Hi Benson! I really like your crab analogy!It's true, they usually work off of each other to both get out of the bucket! Thanks for providing excellent points about how you organize student learning groups. I too think it's a balance between letting students choose their own groups and ensuring that the group composite is conducive to learning outcomes. So often I hear that we should form groups randomly so that learners have a chance to work with different people, particularly since we usually cannot choose our groups in the workplace. This is true to a point, but sometimes, as… >>>

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

Refining Your Communication Skills

Thanks, Carlton! Great comment. Over the years I have learned so much from my students when I simply stopped and listened before jumping on a response. I think that, in turn, enabled me to be a better teacher. Jay Hollowell ED106 Facilitator

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

Instructing Learners with Disabilities

Hi Chris, thanks, yes repetition is a key teaching strategy, and talking one-on-one and tutoring are optimum. Students with learning disabilities, even undiagnosed, tend to know how best they can assimilate subject content and applications. If we can adapt to that without over-compensating or over-accomodating, then learning is enhanced. I think it's OK, for example, to read a question to a student who may be challenged with visual reading, or have a student demonstrate an activity or procedure if he or she cannot verbally explain it, yet at the same time realizing that the workplace may not be as understanding.… >>>

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

Using Student Learning Groups

Thanks, Timothy, you're right, smaller learning groups tend to be more productive in getting hesitant students to participate, yet sometimes even in a smaller group size, there may be a student who dominates the conversation and activities. In that case, the instructor may have to approach the student individually, appreciate the student's initiative and involvement, but at the same time encourage the student to pull back so that others have a chance to participate. Jay Hollowell ED106 Facilitator

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

The Diverse Learner

Hi John, excellent point! Sometimes when a student has scored poorly on a test, I go over the missed questions with them and get their perception of the what the question was asking - it may be completely different from the intended meaning. I even have had students negotiate, or "argue back" their answers and why they chose them - if it's logical and they thought through the process, they might receive credit. The bottom-line though is that if an answer is just out and out incorrect regarding a term, definition, procedure, etc., then we have to make sure the… >>>

Jay Hollowell

Discussion Comment

The Challenge of Learning Disabilities

Thanks, John, valuable comments, varying your delivery style and tutoring are both excellent approaches; Surely, getting students with learning disabilities as actively engaged in the learning process as possible, like you suggest, is crucial to their success and it may have little to do with simply delivering content to them through a lecture. Jay ED106 Facilitator

End of Content