During the first few months of my teaching career, I stood before a group of students discussing a flowchart I had developed. It was an earnest and misguided attempt to teach them how to read a poem. Fortunately, a student spoke up: “Miss, you talk too much.” Thus began my years’ long journey to figure out how to convey meaning, explain complex concepts, provide direction, and offer guidance to the wide range of learners that I would encounter in my classroom and workplace.
I taught academic reading, writing, and learning skills to high schoolers and college students. While I leaned heavily on constructivist methods – learning through guided discovery – I also deployed direct instruction in metacognition. Metacognition is the ability to think about one’s thinking, identify the options one has to solve a problem or reach a goal, and execute a chosen course of action. Since I taught metacognition, I have become rather good at it. This particular skill set has served me well as I built a repertoire technical and research skills.
Further into my development as an educator, I encountered Universal Design for Learning, a robust framework that starts with the understanding the humans are diverse in their ways of perceiving, thinking, and learning. This framework, now reinforced with the tools of audience analysis and design thinking, informs my approach to communication. It propelled my professional development as a communicator, where I sought out the skills that would allow me to convey information through a range of media that serves the audience’s needs, whether that audience was students, executives, the public, the faculty, or my team.
When I transitioned into my current role as a college administrator overseeing an academic support area, my primary goal for the department was to serve its key audience, college faculty, by demonstrating an ethos of care. This is mainly accomplished by providing high value resources and services that reflect a deep understanding of the varying needs, expectations, and experiences of both tenured and adjunct instructors. The tools and frameworks of technical communication have equipped me to identify what is indeed valued by this audience, and consequently, craft effective programming, messages, and materials.