Sunday, November 2, 2014

Effectively Organizing the TLE Platform

I am very good at doing things twice: first the cumbersome way and then a better way; I've discovered that long-term "learning style" again through uploading documents into The Platform.  My initial uploads seemed precise to me, and then after reviewing them, they were overly complicated and unclear (and probably would irritate the Evaluator).  I offer this procedure:

1.  When you upload a document, you have to specify which Performance Standard with which it will be associated before you are allowed to upload the document.  In the description section on the left, I put the section and element number and the descriptor, "Section 2.3: Plans instruction effectively for content mastery, pacing, and transitions."  Under that, I put the exact titles from my table of contents from my notebook (copy and paste).  It looks like this:

Section 2.3: Plans instruction effectively for content mastery, pacing, and transitions.
Lesson Plans (dated 8/30/13) showing sequential process for section assessment
Lesson Plans (dated 9/9/13) showing integration of curriculum to long-term goals
Example of all Essential Questions for the year for each lesson with mastery items underlined
Essay: §3.4.2 Understanding the Content and Mastering the Skills Through Research-Based Instructional Strategies

Then, click the check box for Standard 2 from the right side of the window, and then click, "Done."  This will create a section on the right that has a tab, "Attach File."  Like other "attach" tabs, it will open a "choose file" where you can select the document, then click, "OK" and it uploads.  You can upload electronic documents from your computer or scanned files.  Use electronic documents if you have them.  I had many samples of handouts I created for class as well as TKES essays - that had identifying titles - and loaded those into The Platform.  The titles of the documents load into The Platform.  

This is where it gets a little odd: I have scanned many documents (300+) into my computer to upload into The Platform.  Each scan automatically gave it a scan number (Scan0235).  I did not rename each file - that would take too long.  To help organize The Platform, I attached the scanned documents in scanned order with the associated Element descriptor in order of the scanned documents.  Meaning: if the Evaluator wanted to see the, "Example of all Essential Questions for the year for each lesson with mastery items underlined," s/he would look at the third scanned document under Section 2.3.

I have documents in my computer in folders such as, "Teaching Techniques," "Handouts," "GC-Publications," and "GC-TKES."

2.  What do you do with all of those scanned documents?  I occurred to me that I file them somewhere for safe keeping.  So, I created a folder, "GC-TKES/TLE Upload Documents/TO DO."  These files were scanned in order from my notebook, so as I use my table of contents from my Word document, I can put them in the right section of The Platform.  I did not scan all of my documents; only the clear, precise ones that showed excellent evidence.

3.  What do you do with the scanned files after you upload them?  They are still located in your, "TO DO" subfolder.  I decided to create a subfolder entitled: "GC-TKES/TLE Upload Documents/Section 1" then one labeled, "Section 2," etc.  That way, if I need to go back and double check a scan/file, I can find it easily.  I know now which scans have been uploaded into what section and what scans I still have to upload.  It looks like this:

GC-TKES
TLE Upload Documents
Section 1
Section 2
etc...
TO DO
Table of Contents

You may recall that I decided to enter my entire table of contents (TOC) into each Standard to show the totality of my evidence.  (You would be correct in inferring that I have a, "preponderance of the evidence" philosophy with this new system.)  I will reload the TOC as my evidence notebook changes.

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