Tuesday's 7.0 magnitude earthquake that struck a little more than six miles deep just outside of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and the 40+ aftershocks measuring 4.5 to 5.3 on the Richter scale have devastated much of the concrete and stone structures throughout the area.
Tonight initial estimates of 50,000 dead are just guesses. Because the roads have been broken up, it's even harder to move supplies and materials to where they are needed. People on the ground are out of supplies and much is needed.
The American Red Cross (and the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies) are active in response to disasters around the world. I had Red Cross disaster training and volunteered with the Red Cross for more than 33 years. I know first hand the good they do in disasters.
I also know that, in these initial days, the most important way to make a difference is to make a monetary donation--even as little as ten dollars by credit card. If you are tempted to buy food or water or medical supplies, just donate the money you would have spent. The American Red Cross has already earmarked $10 million dollars for Haiti and some funds are needed to create that amount. Logistics of getting disaster supplies collected and in place quickly requires money and small amounts can be pooled quickly and can make an enormous difference.
You want to make sure that your donations go to what you want them to go to and that your credit card information will not be compromised. The best way to do that is to go through existing organizations that you know are authentic. I'm providing links for donations to the American Red Cross and Doctors without Borders--two which I know deliver and who we can believe in.
I donated to the American Red Cross International Response Fund yesterday and the Red Cross has now established a Haiti Relief and Development Fund. You can donate to either or both of these funds or more by following this link or the link to the title of this post.
Doctors Without Borders is another organization which does good work throughout the world. They are already actively operating in Haiti and have a way of directing donations to that effort. Take a look at a video released in December that documents some of the work they are doing in Haiti.
This is a second post for the day (Thursday, January 14th, 2010). I didn't want another day to go by without posting about the need to respond to this international disaster.
By the way, I felt that is a great app available from the iTunes store for the iPod Touch and the iPhone. It gives world-wide earthquake data and is always up-to-date. I highly recommend it for anyone interested in tracking earthquake activity.
Port-au-Prince, Haiti is on the same time as New York City. The temperature during the night is about 70 degrees F. The temperature tomorrow during the day will be up to 92 degrees F.
Amazingly, Skype, Twitter, and cell phones with solar batteries are the ways people are communicating.
Showing posts with label American Red Cross. Show all posts
Showing posts with label American Red Cross. Show all posts
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Three Aspects of Learning: Building Skills, Applying Knowledge, Transferring Knowledge
Each of these three activities requires a different skill set. I began my professional teaching career at the age of 17 as a volunteer water safety instructor with the American Red Cross. Their training gave me some insight into these three aspects of learning.
My first exposure to the American Red Cross water safety program was when I graduated from high school and had to pass the American Red Cross test to be certified as a life guard. I could swim and took the American Red Cross lifesaving course and passed the test. One of the instructors spoke to me at the end of the course and invited me to become a water safety instructor—then I would be teaching the course and be one of the testers rather than someone trying to pass the test. I thought that was a great idea and became a water safety instructor, building my own swimming skills in the nine styles of swimming as well as skills in all aspects of life saving.
Once I had developed my own skills and had completed the training to be an instructor, I could apply my knowledge as a coach and a trainer. I knew what to look for when someone was learning to swim or to be a lifeguard and could coach them to improve. I knew to break down the swimming strokes to their components, improve the components, then put the entire stroke back together again in an improved swimming style. This was an entirely new set of skills beyond those of the person learning how to swim well.
After I had been an instructor for some time, I was invited to become an Instructor Trainer. This, too, involved developing an entirely new set of skills. I could perform and coach and now I had to learn how to assist someone else to develop the instructor (coaching) ability and to make sure that their performance as an instructor matched the standards established by the American Red Cross. Water Safety Instructors teach children and adults and need to know how to work well with both groups. I repeated this entire learning process when I also became an American Red Cross First Aid, then CPR instructor and instructor-trainer. I was a volunteer instructor for the Red Cross for 33 years and what I learned as a volunteer led me to pursue a doctorate degree in education and has helped me in my consulting and teaching careers.
The “Learning Target Matrix” and the “Personal Performance Change Curve” (see http://joelmonty.wikispaces.com/file/view/Meta-Learning+Models.PDF [pages 7 and 8) describe some of what goes on in the skill and knowledge building process. It is important to remember that, depending on the target outcomes—skill building, applying knowledge, or transferring knowledge--these will need to be repeated tree times, each time focused on one of the three levels.
The American Red Cross makes a distinction for each of these three levels and I believe that, in most cases, that distinction needs to be followed to avoid confusion and a desire to “oversimplify” or to skip something that is really an essential piece of skill or knowledge.
Another aspect of this understanding of learning (and included on the “Personal Performance Change Curve”) is the concept of conscious and unconscious competence. We may become skilled swimmers, not thinking about what we are doing in the water, just swimming wonderfully well. We may be wonderful coaches to help others develop swimming skills, not realizing what we are doing and intervening at just the right time and in just the right way to make a difference. We may be wonderful facilitators and instructor-trainers, intervening in just the right times and ways to bring out the coaching skills of the people coming to us to learn. To achieve the unconscious competence in each level at some point we had to be conscious and to think about what we were doing. We need to break things down and to slow down again as we learn to step what we are doing up to a new level. Knowledge transfer is considered one of the highest levels of learning support for a reason. It requires lots of scaffolding and experience to do it well.
My first exposure to the American Red Cross water safety program was when I graduated from high school and had to pass the American Red Cross test to be certified as a life guard. I could swim and took the American Red Cross lifesaving course and passed the test. One of the instructors spoke to me at the end of the course and invited me to become a water safety instructor—then I would be teaching the course and be one of the testers rather than someone trying to pass the test. I thought that was a great idea and became a water safety instructor, building my own swimming skills in the nine styles of swimming as well as skills in all aspects of life saving.
Once I had developed my own skills and had completed the training to be an instructor, I could apply my knowledge as a coach and a trainer. I knew what to look for when someone was learning to swim or to be a lifeguard and could coach them to improve. I knew to break down the swimming strokes to their components, improve the components, then put the entire stroke back together again in an improved swimming style. This was an entirely new set of skills beyond those of the person learning how to swim well.
After I had been an instructor for some time, I was invited to become an Instructor Trainer. This, too, involved developing an entirely new set of skills. I could perform and coach and now I had to learn how to assist someone else to develop the instructor (coaching) ability and to make sure that their performance as an instructor matched the standards established by the American Red Cross. Water Safety Instructors teach children and adults and need to know how to work well with both groups. I repeated this entire learning process when I also became an American Red Cross First Aid, then CPR instructor and instructor-trainer. I was a volunteer instructor for the Red Cross for 33 years and what I learned as a volunteer led me to pursue a doctorate degree in education and has helped me in my consulting and teaching careers.
The “Learning Target Matrix” and the “Personal Performance Change Curve” (see http://joelmonty.wikispaces.com/file/view/Meta-Learning+Models.PDF [pages 7 and 8) describe some of what goes on in the skill and knowledge building process. It is important to remember that, depending on the target outcomes—skill building, applying knowledge, or transferring knowledge--these will need to be repeated tree times, each time focused on one of the three levels.
The American Red Cross makes a distinction for each of these three levels and I believe that, in most cases, that distinction needs to be followed to avoid confusion and a desire to “oversimplify” or to skip something that is really an essential piece of skill or knowledge.
Another aspect of this understanding of learning (and included on the “Personal Performance Change Curve”) is the concept of conscious and unconscious competence. We may become skilled swimmers, not thinking about what we are doing in the water, just swimming wonderfully well. We may be wonderful coaches to help others develop swimming skills, not realizing what we are doing and intervening at just the right time and in just the right way to make a difference. We may be wonderful facilitators and instructor-trainers, intervening in just the right times and ways to bring out the coaching skills of the people coming to us to learn. To achieve the unconscious competence in each level at some point we had to be conscious and to think about what we were doing. We need to break things down and to slow down again as we learn to step what we are doing up to a new level. Knowledge transfer is considered one of the highest levels of learning support for a reason. It requires lots of scaffolding and experience to do it well.
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