Rick ButlerCHEP

The point of the rule of twenty is to keep things dynamic. The "Rule of 20" is loosely based on the notion coming out of my experiences in youth work. When talking to youth, the good rule of thumb is "age+3", so a teacher teaching a 7 year old should keep it to ten minutes. My assertion is that adult mental age bends this curve to about 15-20 minutes overall. Some adults can easily go longer, some get bored and disconnect after 15 minutes. (just survey the congregation whenever you're sitting in church sometime...) Since a typical class period is… >>>

Adult learners have an attention span, like everyone else and needs variation to stay engaged in the learning environment. To that end, I recommend The Rule of Twenty: "Ensure there is a change in classroom activity every twenty minutes." Whether it be lecture, lab, a video, whatever, the instructor should constantly plan to do something different every twenty minutes. To me, this reduces monotony and keeps things fresh and interesting. This also ensures an adequate amount of preparedness for the class because the instructor is only managing 20-minute blocks, which are a lot easier to predict than a 2-3 hour… >>>

Back when I started instructing, I always have to have PPT to teach. Without them, well, I just couldn't teach. But somewhere along the way, I learned that when I teach information technology and lean heavily into the 135 slide PowerPoints, I created a dependence on them. And it was evident, particularly when the projector stopped working. So, I started getting away from them. I pared them down to the 5-bullet, 10 slides per 20 minutes rule as a start. Eventually, though, PowerPoints de-evolved to more trouble than they are worth for most teaching situations. The reason: I want students… >>>

To me, sharing is a key service that I offer my students. I heard a statistic once that 90% of people today have NO ONE with whom they can share their feelings, thoughts, and the like in a way that is open, honest, and nonjudgmental. We live in a society that is the most connected through social networking, with literally millions of people with whom we can reach out and talk, even if we want to do so anonymously. But yet, as connected as we are, we are the most socially detached group in human history. And we wonder why… >>>

One thing I learned in the military is that of the "battle rhythm" for recurring tasks. If crews laid out what their tasks are along with the recurrences, managers can see the tasks and how they contribute to the overall objectives of the school. Managers can also see if recurring or repeating tasks are conflicting and help crew members interoperate with their peers. Management by Objective also is a great approach as it sets the corporate, department, team lists of what is most important and how that rolls up into the bigger picture. If crew members can see how their… >>>