How did I end up here?

I have always been a visual learner.  Pictures, charts, and graphs help me to make sense of what is being taught and I enjoy creating these things to help teach others.  In college I took an elective called Audi-Visual Aids and thoroughly enjoyed it.  When I was student teaching, I found that I really enjoyed putting together bulletin boards as well.   Little did I know that these skills would lead down the path to something called Instructional Technology.

Several years ago, I took some classes in media design.  Through these classes, I discovered that Instructional Technology exists and that there are people who actually get paid to create training with technology.   Around the same time, I was forced to endure an online class through the military.  This class consisted of several learning modules and was very frustrating to me.  The source of my frustration was that the modules had written words and an audio narration that read the text word for word.  The narration was slow and there was no way to skip ahead to the next page without hearing the narration.  I felt frustrated and insulted because I didn’t feel that I needed someone to read for me.   

The online module had one redeeming quality-nice graphics.  It was at that moment that I thought to myself, “I can do this.”  So I applied to graduate school.  I have enjoyed every class I have taken and anything I have learned is easily applied to training I have to do for the military. 

I plan to retire from the Army in 2016 and get a job utilizing my Instructional Technology skills.  I feel that it’s my mission in life to help others learn through the use of technology.  I also plan to continue my education as well, although I’m not sure what I path I wish to pursue.  I will either  work on an undergraduate certificate in multimedia design, work on a graduate certificate in online learning or instructional game design, or work on an EdS degree in the design and development track of an Instructional Technology program somewhere.