Dear Eddie and Concerned: I have been an O&M Instructor for going on 11 years now and I have never sat in my office all day while my students are out on their own. As a matter of fact, I am out with them more often than not observing. It is not that I do not trust in their abilities, but I feel it is part of my job. Sometimes even after a student has leared a considerable amout of skill, it is good to be there to evaluate the student's progress and make sure there are not any issues or difficulties they may be having. I do not feel that this is an NOMC problem, at least not for me. Regards, Vicki McDaniel MA NOMC Southern Arizona Association for the Visually Impaired SAAVI 4222 E. Thomas Rd. Phoenix, AZ 85284 602-795-0195 vmcdaniel at saaavi.us -------------------------------------------- On Thu, 7/30/15, Edward Bell <ebell at pdrib.com> wrote: Subject: [Nomc] Discussion: Structure versus Discovery To: "NOMC Mailing list" <nomc at lists.nbpcb.org> Date: Thursday, July 30, 2015, 7:11 AM Dear NOMC, Although this list is primarily for posting jobs and other announcements, we did set it up as a discussion list and from time to time we have enjoyed a bit of back and forth on important topics. ?I received the below correspondence from an NOMC and I thought it was a good question and a good thing for all of us to think about and ponder. I have tried to take care to remove the personally identifying information about the person and state, but I do think that this is perhaps a broader issue and one that we should talk about openly. Maybe it is a growing problem, maybe it is not. ?What say you all? ?***I have now seen three other NOMC's come through our state agency/center. ? , I have got to work with a few that have made their way through. I have seen a common problem that concerns me. The problem is that I have seen all three of these NOMC's sit in their office all day long and never leave to teach?students are just ALWAYS sent out on independent routes. I have gotten their students when they have moved on or left the center/agency that have been here for months but are nowhere near where they should be. All of them have mentioned to me that their travel instructor never went out with them on routes. This concerns me a lot, and I?m not sure if it's a state problem or an NOMC wide one, but I suspect that this is NOT the only place this happens. ?I see this becoming a major issue in our field--that maybe we are understanding the independence aspect and structured discovery method the wrong way. In our Master's program, you and Darick always drilled into us the value of guided learning and teaching the skill set first--so I'm not sure why this is happening. I am concerned that this "laziness" (which is how I see it) might negatively impact our growth in the field and might need to be addressed. Maybe I'm way off--maybe it is just a center/state thing--if so, feel free to tell me. My frustration stems from teaching students who claim they are not getting any, or minimal, one-on-one instruction. ?My suggestion is some kind of friendly reminder to NOMC?s about the value of hands on instruction and the detriments of leaving students to learn it ALL on their own.*** What do you all think? ? ? ?Edward C. Bell, Ph.D., CRC, NOMCDirector, Professional Development and ResearchInstitute on BlindnessLouisiana Tech University210 Woodard Hall PO Box 3158Ruston LA 71272Office: 318.257.4554 ????????????????????? Fax: 318.257.2259 (Fax) Skype: edwardbell2010ebell at latech.edu ?????????? www.pdrib.com**************************************************************"I am somehow less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops." -- Stephen Jay Gould ? -----Inline Attachment Follows----- _______________________________________________ NOMC mailing list NOMC at lists.nbpcb.org http://lists.nbpcb.org/listinfo.cgi/nomc-nbpcb.org