Week 7

Light at the end of the tunnel:  Putting your skills (and you) to work

Chapters 26-28 are all about finding a position in Instructional Design.  

Chapter 26 offers 19 lessons one can consider when looking for a job in this field.  I thought a lot of them translate into any field (like lesson 11, "become active in professional organizations," which I've already  done with the National Council for Teachers of English).  Lesson 2, "most instructional design positions are in business and industry," was a bit worrisome as I intend to go into education, but a majority of them were useful for anyone looking for a job.

Chapter 27 offers tips for the process (before, during and after) of looking for work, most of which was covered (for potential teachers, anyway) in the student teaching seminar last quarter.  I felt a lot of the tips were kind of obvious (like "don't wear flip flops to a job interview" and "make sure to use proper spelling and grammar on your resume").

I thought chapter 28 was the most interesting because it was mostly information I was unfamiliar with (as opposed to the first two)--professional organizations and journals, and other resources for a budding instructional designer/technologist.  One of the groups that caught my eye is the Society of International Chinese in Educational Technology since many students I work with are from China.  I thought that maybe a group like this could give me insight into better technological applications for them as they work in their primary language towards proficiency in English.