Supporting Human Performance Across Disciplines: A Converging of Roles and Tools

Performance support is close to the center of a host of related fields and specialties, including human performance technology, electronic performance support systems, technical communications, and instructional design. Because of their common interest in performance support, and common external influences such as cognitive psychology and digital technologies, roles and tools within these fields are beginning to converge, resulting in unprecedented overlap. In times of rapid change, related fields have an opportunity to learn from one another, borrowing useful elements and incorporating them into their own practices. The purpose of this paper is to explore the similarities, differences, and emerging trends among some of these fields and to gain insights into how their evolution affects performance support. Across these fields, we find a continuing tension between designed messages and tools allowing users more flexibility and control. The best performance-support systems include both of these components as well as a strong human support component. We also observe a trend toward greater reliance on users and user communities in defining and controlling support systems.     

Integrating Knowledge Management Systems,Electronic Performance Support Systems,and Learning Technologies

The field of training and development has been increasingly affected by knowledge management, performance support, and learning technologies, yet the impact of these disciplines has typically been disjointed and uncoordinated. Projects in each of the disciplines are often implemented systematically, but not systemically. To take full advantage of their potential to improve performance, we must develop the possible synergies that exist among them. In this paper, we aim to develop a theoretical argument for integrating electronic performance support systems (EPSS), knowledge management systems (KMS), and learning technologies as well as to create a conceptual model for the integration. This understanding will guide training and development professionals in developing more systemic performance improvement interventions. We start with an overview of KMS, EPSS, and learning technologies. We then examine the intersection of these areas and present a rationale for integrating the three technologies under the framework of Human Performance Technology (HPT). Finally, we propose a conceptual model for the integration and discuss its technical and organizational implications.     

The Implementation of an Electronic Performance Support System for Teachers: An Examination of Usage,Performance, and Attitudes

This study investigated how teachers used an electronic performance support system (EPSS) and whether the usage of this EPSS affected their work performance and attitudes toward computer technology. The findings suggested a framework for the implementation of an EPPS in an educational setting, specifically at a middle school. The data were collected through observations, questionnaires, anecdotal logs, database records, and interviews. Four middle school teachers used the EPSS primarily for completing student progress reports wherein the results indicated that the EPSS decreased the amount of time to perform this task. Computer usage, performance, and attitudes were affected by work responsibilities, accessibility to computers, the change agent, the technology support personnel, as well as the specific characteristics of the EPSS. The teachers' attitudes toward the EPSS and technology in general were affected by their performances when using the system, by interactions with the person responsible for technology support, and by the ability to customize the computer program to fit their needs.     

Coping with mismatched courses: students’ behaviour and performance in courses mismatched to their learning styles

Although learning styles are considered as an important factor in education, students often have to learn in courses that do not support their learning styles. A challenge for technology facilitated learning is therefore to assist and help students to cope with courses that do not match their learning styles by training and developing their less preferred skills. In this paper, the interactions between students’ learning styles, their behaviour, and their performance in an online course that is mismatched regarding their learning styles were analysed. The results show which learners need more help in mastering mismatched courses, help in getting a better understanding about how students with good performance record and poor performance record learn with respect to their learning styles, and provide information about how to identify learners who might have difficulties in learning based on their behaviour.     

电子绩效支持系统:教师职后培训的新手段

教师职后培训是教师教育的重要组成部分,已有的相关研究成果涉及了教师职后培训的现状、问题和改革方案等方面。本文拟从提高教师教育质量入手,引入电子绩效支持系统这种快速、及时、具有交互性的支持系统,分析应用优势,以此促进教师在职后培训中的有效学习。     

基于绩效技术的中小学教师信息技术培训的探讨

随着教育信息化的推进,中小学教师信息技术培训已经成为教师继续教育的主要内容之一。本文从中小学教师信息技术培训的现状出发,探讨如何在中小学教师信息技术培训中更有效地运用绩效技术来提高培训的效果,以期为中小学教师信息技术培训工作开辟一条新的思路。     

从技术的角度探讨教育技术与绩效技术的关系

技术是可以将人类的潜能转化为资本的人类智慧与力量的结晶,教育技术与绩效技术就是这种结晶的承载体。教育技术与绩效技术的关系是学术界讨论的热点,教育技术与绩效技术有着在技术、绩效和个性化培养等方面的共同点,但是同时也在定义、核心、理论支持与来源、应用领域、培训／培养对象及实施者和最终成果方面表现出不同特点。     

Identifying A Range of Performance Improvement Solutions Through Evaluation Research

Using the evaluation research strategy (Geroy & Wright, 1988) as a guideline, the authors conducted a needs assessment with 280 support staff, faculty, and administrators at a mid–sized community college. We taught the nominal group technique (Delbecq & Van de Ven, 1971) to representatives from each of these three groups. These representatives facilitated the participation of virtually all employees at the college in identifying a prioritized list of items that would enable these persons to “do their jobs better.” Analysis of the suggested performance improvement solutions utilized the performance technology model (Gilbert, 1978) and indicated that the solutions fell into five categories of intervention: high–yield training, direction and flow of information, resources, performance incentives, and medium–yield training. This combination of models and methods provided the decision makers with data that refocused their vision from planning professional development training to planning for performance improvement. These data represented needs, not wants, and enabled them to recognize the importance of addressing both training and non–training options.     

Preparing teachers for a mobile world,to improve access to education

Recent statistics on the use of mobile technology proclaim that the world is becoming mobile. People use their phones to socialize, to conduct business, to search for information, and more. For the first time in history, people around the world have the potential to learn from any location at their own convenience. But first, education systems must change, to facilitate mobile access to education. As this article describes, the most important change will be training teachers, both in pre-service programmes and through professional development, to use the technology to design and deliver education and to create bridges to informal learning. The article also describes some projects around the world that are helping to prepare teachers for the mobile world, and some pilot projects using the technology. Most such research, however, is limited to short-term studies focusing on learners’ satisfaction with mobile learning. Future studies must consider its long-term benefits and its impacts on performance and retention. As mobile technologies emerge, teachers have to keep up with the changes so that they can take advantage of the power of the technology to design and deliver education.     

Determinants of salary growth in Shenzhen, China: an analysis of formal education, on-the-job training, and adult education with a three-level model

Using 1996 surveyed data of 1023 employees in Shenzhen, China, this study estimated the effects of three forms of human capital on employee salary, namely formal education, on-the-job training provided by employers, and adult education pursued by employees. Using a hierarchical linear model, the analysis estimated employee monthly salary growth over a maximum of six years due to (a) such temporal factors as work experience and improved performance, (b) individual-level characteristics, and (c) firm-level characteristics. This study found that (a) pre-work formal education was positively associated with salary only at hiring, (b) employees' experience in changing production technology as well as on-the-job training were positively associated with salary increases through improved technical proficiency, formal education was not; (c) manufacturing firms introduced more new production technology than the service sector and provided more on-the-job training, thus improving workers' performance and increasing their salary.     

Performativity,Performance and Education

This article explores Lyotard’s notion of performativity through an engagement with McKenzie’s analysis of performance as a ‘formation of knowledge and power’ that has displaced the notion of discipline as the tool for social evaluation. Through conditions of ‘performance’ capitalism, education is to conform to a logic of performativity that ensures not only the efficient operation of the state in the world market, but also the continuation of a global culture of performance. I further trace Lyotard’s postmodern aesthetic of experimentation through performance as an ‘event’ in an analogous attempt to track the process of cultural production in terms that acknowledge the temporality of the event so as not to reduce the artwork to a commodity, knowledge to information, and ‘performance’ to be managed. Where this has critical traction is in education, a site that deals with the intersection of politics, art, theory, philosophy and history—in short, a site where all aspects of ‘performance’ are fully realized. This article engages with the key ideas of these thinkers’ approaches to notions of performance, and assesses their relevance for an understanding of the ambiguities of ‘performance’ in contemporary education institutions.     

Epss在教师教育技术培训中的技术实现

论文从高等院校教师教育技术培训的现状出发,结合实际技术,尝试研究一个以培训高等院校教师教育技术为案例的电子绩效网络支持系统。整个系统包括学习信息库,训练系统,专家指导系统,效能工具和学习帮助系统五部分,希望通过此系统可以较大幅度的提高培训绩效,并为高等院校教师教育技术培训提供新的思路和方向。     

构建教师网络培训评价体系的理论思考

随着信息技术与课程整合在我国基础教育领域的积极开展,教师继续教育网络课程培训已成为校本研训的有力支撑,为教师的教育信息化与教师专业化的发展提供了良好的平台。但目前在教师网络课程培训领域,缺乏一种动态的、科学的评价体系和评价质量标准。     

全日制教育硕士教育技术能力发展现状调查与分析——以东北师范大学为例

基于问卷调查,发现全日制教育硕士(非现代教育技术专业)的教育技术能力发展途径单一;绝大多数全日制教育硕士能够认识到教育技术应用对于教育教学效果优化的重要性,但教育技术知识与技能水平还有待提高;大多数全日制教育硕士对影响教育技术应用实效的各种因素的认识不够充分,缺乏教育技术应用实践能力;绝大多数全日制教育硕士期望高师院校加强教育技术实践教学环节并为其提供具有实用性的教育技术学习资源及相关支持。针对发现的问题,就高师院校如何通过加强系统规划、注重实践教学、建设信息化培养资源进一步优化全日制教育硕士教育技术能力培养工作提出相关建议。     

Performance,performance system,and high performance system

This article proposes needed transitions in the field of human performance technology. The following three transitions are discussed: transitioning from training to performance, transitioning from performance to performance system, and transitioning from learning organization to high performance system. A proposed framework that comprises performance, performance system, and high performance system is suggested, along with recommendations for future research about the viability of this framework.     

面向职业技能发展的EPSS开发研究

EPSS是为了提高工作绩效利用计算机技术开发的一种电子绩效支持系统,这种系统具有信息集成性、工作情境性、学习自主性、知识共享性等特点。职工利用它既可以实现在工作中学习,又可以实现在学习中工作的职业教育功能。在EPSS逐渐成为促进职业技能发展,提高企业组织或个人绩效的干预措施之后,EPSS的开发成为实现职业教育功能和绩效支持的关键。乔尼(Nguyen)和沃尔(Woll)创建了一种EPSS开发模型,该模型从绩效角度和学习角度提出开发EPSS要经过绩效分析、EPSS分析、EPSS设计、EPSS开发、EPSS的实施与评价等几个阶段。乔尼和沃尔创建的EPSS开发模型将职工培训、工作绩效以及技术支持有效地融合于整个开发过程中,对设计、开发EPSS的实践者提供了一个简洁、便于操作的参考模型。     

高校教师教育技术培训模型的建立、修改与验证

高校教师的教育技术培训已经成为教育部门的一项常规性工作,但如何提高培训效果一直困扰着各级各类培训机构。该研究利用结构方程建模的统计学方法,建立了高校教师教育技术培训模型,并利用该模型揭示出了提高教育技术培训效果的思路。     

The current state of human performance technology: A citation network analysis of Performance Improvement Quarterly, 1988–2010

This study conducted a citation network analysis (CNA) of human performance technology (HPT) to examine its current state of the field. Previous reviews of the field have used traditional research methods, such as content analysis, survey, Delphi, and citation analysis. The distinctive features of CNA come from using a social network analysis approach to see relational and network patterns in the citation data. This CNA found that the Performance Improvement Quarterly network showed more widely but loosely connected and less centralized structural attributes than the human resource development network; the 10 most influential articles in the field were identified; frequently co‐cited articles were recognized as having a strong relationship by subsequent researchers; and five cohesive subgroups showed key topics in the field (performance, instructional design, performance support, organization/workplace, and transfer of training). Implications from the results of the CNA were elaborated on for future research in HPT.     

基于绩效技术的中小学教师教育技术培训探析

为了促进教育信息化的进程,国家很重视中小学教师教育技术培训的工作,投入了大笔资金,但是效果却不够理想。改进培训的绩效成了培训中的重要问题。文章应用绩效技术的方法来分析培训存在的问题,并提出解决的办法,探讨了具体实施方案,系统提高培训绩效。     

Recruitment and training of school psychologists for remote or isolated areas

This paper discusses the problems associated with recruitment and training of school psychologists and school counsellors for employment in remote and isolated geographical areas. Detailed information is provided describing a model of training in the distance education mode which was developed by Charles Sturt University — Mitchell at Bathurst and the NSW Department of School Education in Australia. The model allows for the training of teachers (who already have three‐year majors in Psychology) for the role of School Counsellors, while they remain in employment in their place of residence. The preliminary evaluation indicates close to 100% completion rate for the students enrolled at Mitchell and enthusiastic support for the graduates from their employing supervisors.