Intention
As ideas began percolating in my head regarding this e-portfolio, I was faced with a dilemma. Did I want to present a professional-oriented, academic-savvy version that could be utilized for career growth purposes? Or did I want to put myself out there, warts and all, in a portfolio that would be incredibly meaningful to me, but might not be useful in a professional capacity?
Turns out it wasn’t such a conundrum after all. I decided pretty quickly that complete honesty -- to the point of baring my soul and all my insecurities -- was the direction I wanted for this project. The intended audience is basically myself and any other candidates who may not think they have what it takes to complete a master’s program..
So you may be asking how this attitude will manifest itself in the portfolio. For starters, the information will be presented in a conversational style. The amount of ‘academic-eze’ (my word for the elevated language we all use in our papers) will be kept to a minimum. My casual writing may cost me points in the rubric; that’s OK. This project is for me, not for a grade, potential employer or a PhD application committee. Oh, how freeing that is for a self-proclaimed grade perfectionist who has come into this penultimate class with a 4.0 GPA. But if I receive a B (gasp!) or even a C (unheard of!), I will know being true to myself earned me an A+ on my life grade roster.
In the Beginning …
I decided to pursue my master’s degree when I turned 50 years old, mostly as a bucket list item. Being diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis when I was 30 years old had definitely put my career aspirations on hold, so I initially wasn’t planning to use the degree for career advancement. I chose Adult Education because I always enjoyed the training and presentation components of the Human Resources jobs throughout my career. And as proof of my commitment to honesty, this major also appealed to me because I didn’t have to take the GRE due to my undergraduate GPA being high enough.
My Strengths, Weaknesses and Values: The Good, Bad and the Ugly
(Not Necessarily in that Order)
As I think about my strengths and weaknesses, both have affected my career and attitude toward this master’s program (at least in the beginning). Strengths include my ability to communicate with all levels of employees (in fact, talking with press operators at the printing company I worked at was much more enjoyable than a pow-wow with the CEO). I’m a very good listener, listening much more than I talk. My husband is grateful for this trait. I also consider myself a very open-minded person; I don’t tend to form opinions until I know both sides of an issue.
Insecurity is my primary weakness, which makes me question everything I wrote in the previous paragraph. Someone once told me that if I saw myself the way other people see me, I would need an introduction. Insecurity and low self-esteem are personality traits that have plagued me my whole life. Self-esteem, according to Lemme (2006), “represents the individual’s feelings toward and evaluation of the self,” (p. 84). But there is a separate determinant, self-efficacy, that moves beyond self-esteem and is a measure of “one’s beliefs and expectations about whether one has the ability to successfully complete or accomplish a particular task,” (Lemme, 2006, p. 85).
Luckily for me, belief in my ability to accomplish a goal usually overrides my struggling self-esteem. I wouldn’t be here today if this were not the case. Since women have been proven to have lower rates of self-efficacy than men (Lemme, 2006), studying the effects of gender roles on this personality determinant is something I would like to learn more about after degree completion.
Another dragon I have successfully slayed several times during this program is my fear of technology. In fact, I delayed taking D525, Introduction to Distance Education Systems in Adult Learning, simply because I was scared to death that I wouldn’t be able to keep up with my fellow students and assignments. But I succeeded every time, thanks to a lot of support from Dr. Marje, and my self-efficacy won out over my fears yet again.
In terms of values, a happy life is at the top of my list, much more than money or status. Work-life balance is now of the utmost importance, and spending time with my family is on the top of my to-do list most days.
Can You Get to the Point?
The majority of this portfolio will allow readers to see my emotional growth while earning this degree: from someone who doubted her ability to complete the program, due to age and illness, to a woman who gradually found her voice and now believes she can succeed, regardless of any obstacles.
During the course of the program, I even developed the idea for a business that may or may not happen in the future. Since my Multiple Sclerosis diagnosis, I have become extremely interested in the power of the mind in healing and the many benefits of mindfulness for dealing with life’s stressors. With my advisor’s blessing, I focused a great deal on mindfulness in final class projects, my practicum and research opportunities. I believe I have developed several modules that would be extremely effective in a face-to-face or online course. So in addition to my personal evolution, readers will also see a focus on mindfulness instruction and how the theories and philosophies studied in this program influenced that development.
The presented artifacts reflect my overall growth, sometimes in obviously substantial ways, and sometimes in seemingly small ways that influenced me greatly on a personal level.
Artifact #1 is the very first paper I wrote in my very first class, D500-- Introduction to Adult Education Theory. You will see how my insecurities almost got the best of me before I even started; but my self-efficacy (and my husband) came to the rescue to give me a happy ending.
The second artifact is my final project in D506, Adult Education Planning and Development. It was the first mindfulness workshop I designed. This was during my first semester, so I didn’t yet have a firm understanding of the learning philosophies I would come to know and embrace. But I hope the reader can see the seeds of a mindfulness instructional designer planted on the pages.
My practicum is Artifact #3. I was lucky enough to spend a semester with an organization that combines mindfulness with leadership training. I was given the opportunity to co-design and co-facilitate mindfulness workshops for local city and county government, as well as programs for seniors, Indiana University graduate students and recent graduates, as well as various for-profit organizations.
Artifact #4 was the first project assigned in D525, the Distance Education course. It may seem a rudimentary choice for tech-savvy readers, but for someone who fears technology as much as I sometimes do, my History of Distance Education timeline is the equivalent of the first smart phone designed by Steve Jobs. I still smile when I look at it.
My fifth artifact is a literature review I completed for a summer research project. After the enjoyable experience working with seniors during my practicum, I became very interested in designing mindfulness instruction for this age group. Knowing that I needed to understand how older adults learned best, I reviewed various academic and other articles and wrote a beginner’s meta-analysis on how best to facilitate mindfulness instruction in a senior living environment.
My sixth artifact is from the class I took on active listening. The course, one of my favorites in the entire program, focused on the work of Jane Vella, a world-renowned adult educator. This class added so much to my knowledge of transforming theory into practice; and my final project, a mindfulness course utilizing the ideas and theories described by Vella, is one of which I am especially proud.
My seventh artifact is the final project from Career Counseling, an elective course I took, intended for educators in the K-12, college and adult realms. Utilizing all my knowledge of adult education, I designed a five-week program for mothers returning to the work world after staying home with their children for several years. The idea that I could design an effective and very usable curriculum about an entirely new subject speaks volumes about the applicability of the knowledge learned in this program.
My eighth artifact is one of the final papers I wrote in the program. It's actually from an elective course, Introduction to University Administration. For me, it represents a true evolution from the start of the program to the end. I hope you agree.
A Theme Emerges
Working towards this degree has allowed me to grow in ways I had never imagined and has helped me outgrow some of the insecurities that have shadowed me for years. I am also extremely proud to be completing this degree over the age of 50. So I feel the theme, Old Dog, Super New Tricks! accurately reflects my journey. It certainly covers my woman-of-a-certain-age learning about herself, and it also mirrors how I’ve grown in the Adult Education field of study. I came into this program knowing only the Behaviorist theory of learning (although I didn’t know the name). In my Human Resources career, I developed learning objectives and worked to meet them with trainees. I thought that was the only way to teach. So I was very surprised that I came to see myself as a Humanist and embraced the tenets of Humanism, including student-centered learning, the instructor serving as facilitator and the intrinsic motivation of learners (Elias & Merriman, 2005). This philosophy of instruction certainly mirrors the teaching of mindfulness, in which learners determine their own objectives, based on individual circumstances.
So I cordially invite you to come on this e-journey with me. I think you’ll find my thematic metaphor accurately reflects what I’ve gained from every artifact and lesson learned in this program and life.
Let’s Get Started!!
Lemme, B. H. (2006). Development in adulthood. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.
Elias, J.L. & Merriam, S.B. (2005). Philosophical foundations of adult education. Malabar, Florida: Kreiger.
In the Beginning …
I decided to pursue my master’s degree when I turned 50 years old, mostly as a bucket list item. Being diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis when I was 30 years old had definitely put my career aspirations on hold, so I initially wasn’t planning to use the degree for career advancement. I chose Adult Education because I always enjoyed the training and presentation components of the Human Resources jobs throughout my career. And as proof of my commitment to honesty, this major also appealed to me because I didn’t have to take the GRE due to my undergraduate GPA being high enough.
My Strengths, Weaknesses and Values: The Good, Bad and the Ugly
(Not Necessarily in that Order)
As I think about my strengths and weaknesses, both have affected my career and attitude toward this master’s program (at least in the beginning). Strengths include my ability to communicate with all levels of employees (in fact, talking with press operators at the printing company I worked at was much more enjoyable than a pow-wow with the CEO). I’m a very good listener, listening much more than I talk. My husband is grateful for this trait. I also consider myself a very open-minded person; I don’t tend to form opinions until I know both sides of an issue.
Insecurity is my primary weakness, which makes me question everything I wrote in the previous paragraph. Someone once told me that if I saw myself the way other people see me, I would need an introduction. Insecurity and low self-esteem are personality traits that have plagued me my whole life. Self-esteem, according to Lemme (2006), “represents the individual’s feelings toward and evaluation of the self,” (p. 84). But there is a separate determinant, self-efficacy, that moves beyond self-esteem and is a measure of “one’s beliefs and expectations about whether one has the ability to successfully complete or accomplish a particular task,” (Lemme, 2006, p. 85).
Luckily for me, belief in my ability to accomplish a goal usually overrides my struggling self-esteem. I wouldn’t be here today if this were not the case. Since women have been proven to have lower rates of self-efficacy than men (Lemme, 2006), studying the effects of gender roles on this personality determinant is something I would like to learn more about after degree completion.
Another dragon I have successfully slayed several times during this program is my fear of technology. In fact, I delayed taking D525, Introduction to Distance Education Systems in Adult Learning, simply because I was scared to death that I wouldn’t be able to keep up with my fellow students and assignments. But I succeeded every time, thanks to a lot of support from Dr. Marje, and my self-efficacy won out over my fears yet again.
In terms of values, a happy life is at the top of my list, much more than money or status. Work-life balance is now of the utmost importance, and spending time with my family is on the top of my to-do list most days.
Can You Get to the Point?
The majority of this portfolio will allow readers to see my emotional growth while earning this degree: from someone who doubted her ability to complete the program, due to age and illness, to a woman who gradually found her voice and now believes she can succeed, regardless of any obstacles.
During the course of the program, I even developed the idea for a business that may or may not happen in the future. Since my Multiple Sclerosis diagnosis, I have become extremely interested in the power of the mind in healing and the many benefits of mindfulness for dealing with life’s stressors. With my advisor’s blessing, I focused a great deal on mindfulness in final class projects, my practicum and research opportunities. I believe I have developed several modules that would be extremely effective in a face-to-face or online course. So in addition to my personal evolution, readers will also see a focus on mindfulness instruction and how the theories and philosophies studied in this program influenced that development.
The presented artifacts reflect my overall growth, sometimes in obviously substantial ways, and sometimes in seemingly small ways that influenced me greatly on a personal level.
Artifact #1 is the very first paper I wrote in my very first class, D500-- Introduction to Adult Education Theory. You will see how my insecurities almost got the best of me before I even started; but my self-efficacy (and my husband) came to the rescue to give me a happy ending.
The second artifact is my final project in D506, Adult Education Planning and Development. It was the first mindfulness workshop I designed. This was during my first semester, so I didn’t yet have a firm understanding of the learning philosophies I would come to know and embrace. But I hope the reader can see the seeds of a mindfulness instructional designer planted on the pages.
My practicum is Artifact #3. I was lucky enough to spend a semester with an organization that combines mindfulness with leadership training. I was given the opportunity to co-design and co-facilitate mindfulness workshops for local city and county government, as well as programs for seniors, Indiana University graduate students and recent graduates, as well as various for-profit organizations.
Artifact #4 was the first project assigned in D525, the Distance Education course. It may seem a rudimentary choice for tech-savvy readers, but for someone who fears technology as much as I sometimes do, my History of Distance Education timeline is the equivalent of the first smart phone designed by Steve Jobs. I still smile when I look at it.
My fifth artifact is a literature review I completed for a summer research project. After the enjoyable experience working with seniors during my practicum, I became very interested in designing mindfulness instruction for this age group. Knowing that I needed to understand how older adults learned best, I reviewed various academic and other articles and wrote a beginner’s meta-analysis on how best to facilitate mindfulness instruction in a senior living environment.
My sixth artifact is from the class I took on active listening. The course, one of my favorites in the entire program, focused on the work of Jane Vella, a world-renowned adult educator. This class added so much to my knowledge of transforming theory into practice; and my final project, a mindfulness course utilizing the ideas and theories described by Vella, is one of which I am especially proud.
My seventh artifact is the final project from Career Counseling, an elective course I took, intended for educators in the K-12, college and adult realms. Utilizing all my knowledge of adult education, I designed a five-week program for mothers returning to the work world after staying home with their children for several years. The idea that I could design an effective and very usable curriculum about an entirely new subject speaks volumes about the applicability of the knowledge learned in this program.
My eighth artifact is one of the final papers I wrote in the program. It's actually from an elective course, Introduction to University Administration. For me, it represents a true evolution from the start of the program to the end. I hope you agree.
A Theme Emerges
Working towards this degree has allowed me to grow in ways I had never imagined and has helped me outgrow some of the insecurities that have shadowed me for years. I am also extremely proud to be completing this degree over the age of 50. So I feel the theme, Old Dog, Super New Tricks! accurately reflects my journey. It certainly covers my woman-of-a-certain-age learning about herself, and it also mirrors how I’ve grown in the Adult Education field of study. I came into this program knowing only the Behaviorist theory of learning (although I didn’t know the name). In my Human Resources career, I developed learning objectives and worked to meet them with trainees. I thought that was the only way to teach. So I was very surprised that I came to see myself as a Humanist and embraced the tenets of Humanism, including student-centered learning, the instructor serving as facilitator and the intrinsic motivation of learners (Elias & Merriman, 2005). This philosophy of instruction certainly mirrors the teaching of mindfulness, in which learners determine their own objectives, based on individual circumstances.
So I cordially invite you to come on this e-journey with me. I think you’ll find my thematic metaphor accurately reflects what I’ve gained from every artifact and lesson learned in this program and life.
Let’s Get Started!!
Lemme, B. H. (2006). Development in adulthood. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.
Elias, J.L. & Merriam, S.B. (2005). Philosophical foundations of adult education. Malabar, Florida: Kreiger.
"Blessed is the person who has earned the love of an old dog." -- Sidney Jeanne Seward