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Sep
29
Teachers are project managers
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I realize many of my posts this week have looked at how project management skills can develop in a non-business setting. This is mostly because I have been preparing to take a certification exam in project management, trying to fill in the gaps in my knowledge. I may not go through with the third test, and just let me certification level sit, but I really haven’t decided yet.
As I was reading one of the books, though, I was looking at the description of certain processes and thinking, ‘Wow! That’s a skill I learned in my teacher prep program,’ or, ‘I gained that skill through hard work at the museum.’ It was really interesting.
Teachers are one of those very underestimated groups. Each teacher has to be able to create programs with no real knowledge of the audience (students) they’ll be presenting to. They have to prepare resources, in the hopes those resources will be the right ones. Then, they have to be able to change course mid-stream if the original plan doesn’t work out. (For newer teachers, this requires having a back-up plan. For those who teach in cultural institutions, that requires over-planning and then designating what is crucial to a workshop, and what is going above and beyond.)
Teachers have to be everything. Even when they create a classroom environment that supports student exploration and peer teaching, they have to know where the class is going, and be able to guide them there in a timely manner relying on whatever resources are on-hand. Teachers are problem-solvers with a good deal of creativity. It’s not an easy career, and you really do have to absolutely love it to be able to do it well.
One of these days, I’m going to develop a fact sheet about myself that is going to detail the unusual way I acquired skills in project management, training, and technical writing.
Sep
28
We are becoming a family of bloggers!
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I learned over the weekend that my big brother has started blogging!
All right, so he’s sort of blogging (long political rants at that, but that’s just the kind of guy he is!). He was always the writer between us (an odd thought we’ve deicded, given that I seem to be doing far more writing than he is).
Oh, and he’s not really my brother. Might as well be for all we’ve been through together. He is one of my oldest, dearest friends. He could start telling all my secrets…but he really doesn’t want his own dirty laundry aired on any of my blogs, now does he?
Anyway, he has a blog.
You should all go read it. Now!
(Now I just have to convince Mom that she wants to blog on crafts or something, and my world will be a truly evil place, for we will have taken it over! Mwahahahaha!)
Sep
28
Scriptwriting as business planning
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As usual, I’m marveling at how the seemingly unconnected areas of my life intersect yet again. I’ve written about business planning through writing a query letter, and today I’m looking at scriptwriting as another possible method of business planning. This is perfect timing, actually, since I’m studying for my project management certification as well!
Oddly enough, trying to write a script and developing a project management plan aren’t too entirely dissimilar. You have to determine the events and their proper sequence (scope), the characters (team members), and you’re constantly revisiting your plans to re-evaluate them.
I’m going to have to do some experimenting to see if I prefer the query letter method or the scriptwriting method for business planning, but I suspect they’re both going to end up as tools I pull out depending on the situation.
Sep
26
The lines simply blur!
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I’m still on this branding warpath, and it’s become an interesting project. I’m finding that as I’m exploring who I am and want to become on a professional level, I’m really relocating a lot of the person who got lost along the way.
Slowly, it’s almost become a process of blending my professional and personal activities and beliefs into a brand that is really a more complete picture of the person I am. This works for me because I, and many of the people around me, see my professional life as an extension of who I am personally. I do many of the same things, regardless of where I am, and there really isn’t anything wrong with that. (I have the great fortune of being a teacher, one of those rare professions where people are fine if your career spills over into your personal life.)
I got to thinking about this as I was creating a character on USA’s site. I still haven’t figured out what the point of this character project is, either, but I figure anything that causes me to become even more introspective is a good thing. One afternoon at the dojo will pull me right out if I get too introspective.
Now I just have to figure out how to present everything so that it all works for me!
Originally posted at 100Bloggers
Sep
26
If you look at my resume, you’ll notice I have a fairly unusual background. Trying to explain how I came up with such a crazy lifepath is an interesting challenge. Explaining the collection of skills I’ve acquired along the way makes people stare at me like I’ve grown a second head.
I’ve decided that at some point, I’m going to actually develop a skills-based resume. Each header will be some major skill, and then it will be backed up by how many years of experience I have in doing smaller skills under that heading.
It will seem somewhat obvious in some sections. As a teacher and curriculum developer, the teaching and writing sections will make perfect sense. However, it will have to include sections on design, project management, leadership. Not skills you’d generally associate with the normal teacher.
I don’t know how many teachers get involved with design (namely graphic and web design issues), but it occurs to me that any teacher who develops their own curriculum- units, lessons, tests, field trips, extensions- has some very strong project management skills behind them. There are teachers who have strong negotiation skills, either from using it as a classroom management tool or when trying to get certain dispensations from their principal/director. They have strong personnel mamangement skills (you try managing a class of thirty individuals!). And your good teachers have the grace to handle all of it tactfully.
When this year started, I couldn’t imagine how to repackage my life a s ateacher to make it make sense to anybody else. Now I realize that my possibilities are literally endless!
Sep
25
Why I’d rather self-publish
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Reviews of Jath over at YouWriteOn have been going pretty well. Everyone seems to enjoy the idea, and has been wonderful about offering some very valuable advice for my next editing phase. I’m pretty excited.
The more I work with Jath, the more I read about getting published and finding an agent, the more I read already published books, the more I think I’m really going to take the self-publishing route. For starters, I’m not certain my writing has enough potential for an agent or editor to be willing to pull it from what i can do for it to something actually publishable.
My other reason is a bit more serious. A friend loaned me a book a few months ago, thinking I would enjoy it. Looking at the book’s cover, I assumed it was a chick lit novella. Not exactly my style, but the friend in question usually has pretty discriminating tastes, so I figured I’d give it a try. Fourteen pages in, I was ready to hand the book back to her.
It was autobiographical. Non-fiction. Poorly written. Poorly edited. Not engaging. I can only assume my friend was trying to bolster my faith in myself as a writer, because I have never seen anything so poorly written in my life. When you consider that I spend two to five hours a week editing or providing feedback on fan fiction for barely literate teenagers, this is actually saying something. To make matters worse, this author has published a few of these autobiographies, and they’re supposedly well-liked. To matters just a bit worse, she isn’t self-publishing. She’s publishing under a smaller division of Random House.
I’m scared. I’m truly scared.
Of course, I’m not expecting to be a published writer. Not really. I write because if I don’t, the voices in my head will drive me insane. I share my stories because people ask. The only reason I’d actually consider publishing one of my novels is because I think a wider circle of people would enjoy it (and Jath is certainly proving that).
I just think I’d be better off self-publishing instead.
Sep
25
A while back, I shared my issues with my shyness. Someone asked me how I cope with my shyness, and I gave a very weak answer because I really didn’t know how to explain.
In catching up with my feeds over the wekeend, I found a post that just resonated with me. He talks about being so shy that it hindered him for the most part until his adulthood. I haven’t been quite so hindered by my own shyness, but I could relate to some of the behaviors he describes. Like me, he just had to make the decision to not let being shy be a weakness and go from there. He calls it an act, and I call it my mask. We’re both apparently pretty convincing since no one can tell that we’re both terribly shy.
In retrospect, I suppose it makes sense. There are quite a few actors who fell into their craft because they were trying to deal with shyness issues. Some of them discovered it was just easier to pretend to be someone else, and some discovered that acting was actually healing. (Don’t you love how I say that as if shyness is a bad thing? It’s not!)
There are days when I definitely hear that little voice in my head, praying to let me get through talking to this one group of people and then let me be. I come home, warn the roommates that I’m feeling anti-social, and then hide in my room to recuperate. It takes a lot of energy to not let yourself be stopped by overwhelming shyness, but it’s so much better than the alternative.
Originally posted at 100 Bloggers
Sep
25
A gathering of writing notes
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Firstly, I’d like to say how annoying it is to discover that people have stolen names that you worked very hard to come up with, and then build web sites and/or businesses around them. It’s not flattering in the least. It just says you were too lame to come up with something on your own. I wish bad karma on each of you.
That out of the way, I’ve been sick all week (still am, actually) and have been dodging any and all writing responsibilities. This week’s writing project? Nope, haven’t touched it (and it’s due in a couple of weeks). The manga script? Still sitting at the end of the first chapter (at least, I have a storyboard…sort of…now). NaNoWriMo planning? Really hasn’t happened outside of a fever-inspired wild idea that everyone likes a lot.
This week’s writing project is giving me no end of grief anyway. Right now, the piece is full of licensed information and just doesn’t feel real. Unfortunately, no other option has presented itself yet. I’m going to end up writing and editing this thing with my back against the wall at the last moment. It does seem to be my modus operandi.
The manga script is going fine. Last weekend, just before I got sick, I started working out a storyboard of sorts. It’s actually more of an outline, but it was enough to encourage me. The manga now looks like it will span at least ten chapters, possibly more depending how story arcs play out.
During my manga script research (I swear, there needs to be a book/web site just on writing these scripts!), however, I came across this great article on whether or not comic book characters should age. I wrestled with this over the summer while writing fan fiction. The fandom I was writing for has had its characters locked in an ageless time warp for nine years. You know the age of most of the characters, but have no idea how much time has actually been covered by the manga/anime. The one character I needed an age on, however, doesn’t have a current age. You know that he was sixteen when the last major event in his life happened, but there’s no telling how long ago that was. Quite annoying.
Personally, I like the idea of generational superheroes. I’m not comfortable with the Superman of my childhood trying to save the world from my grown-up world’s troubles.
I’ve also been toying with this NaNo plot problem all week. For a while, I briefly flirted with the idea of novelizing the manga I’m trying to write (which is actually how the storyboard came into existence). I didn’t really like the idea. I’ve been thinking for several months now about writing something in a cyberpunk vein, but my background in cyberpunk is only strong enough for me to look at something and say whether or not it’s cyberpunk.
Apparently, my subconscious is really hooked on this sci-fi/archaeology blend idea. I love both space and archaeology. The novel I’m currently working on is archaeology. One of my favorite movies is a lovely sci-fi/archaeology blend (Stargate, in case you’re curious). It’s not completely out of the question. The reason I say my subconscious is married to this train of thought is becuase the past couple of days have seen a couple of interesting articles show up in my Bloglines account.
Really, I ought to wait until I’m feeling better to start attacking any of my writing projects, but i hate sitting here doing nothing but reading and playing sudoku!
Sep
24
My blogging MO
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I’m a bit more on the ball with this week’s blogging challenge, probably becasue it’s such an easy one to discuss.
My method of blogging was actually recommended in an article on small business blogging a few months back. I really take a slackers’ waay out, but it works well with my lifestyle.
During the week, I find links and events that are blog-worthy and capture them in my calendar. On Friday morning, I sit down with my calendar and start writing the entries for the upcoming week, scheduled to post at a certain time (part of why I absolutely adore WordPress!). Sometimes, I get them all written out on Friday morning. Sometimes, I’m still writing entries late on Sunday night. My goal is to have all of the upcoming week’s blogging finished before I go to bed Sunday night. I did briefly try to incorporate blogging into my daily routine, but it just drove me insane. The timed-release method works a lot better for my mixed-up lifestyle.
Lately, I’ve been considering revising my plans. I’m trying to determine if I have the time and energy to supplement my normal blogging activities with more “on the spot” blogging, but it really doesn’t seem to be in the cards these days.
Perhaps someday…
Sep
24
When motivation is lacking…
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I’ve been wrestling with low motivation for so long now that I’m starting to get a bit slap-happy about it. Not one to be kept down or still for long, I’ve started having some fun in making myself get through my work.
It started a couple of weekends ago when I erased my to-do list off my whiteboard and relabeled it as “My accomplishments”. That worked for one weekend. The following week, I went back to my to-do list, which worked periodically. Last weekend, I simply did nothing until Sunday, when I suddenly felt the need to get things done. (It was amazing how much i got through in one day!)
This week, many things have conspired to keep me from getting anything accomplished. I figured that I’d be resorting to my list of accomplishments again. Instead, I’m finding myself making a game out of tackling two major tasks on my to-do list. It’s like this rabid multi-tasking race to see which project gets finished first.
From there, who knows? I may set up more “races”. I may be driven back to the to-do list or accomplishments list. I might just get tired of playing games and buckle down and get more work done.
I could always write out each task on a slip of paper and draw them from a container. That could be fun! Perhaps I’ll even introduce a timed element. I tend to be able to work under excruciating deadlines!
