Gary Meers, Ed.D.

About me

I am an Education Advisor/Consultant for MaxKnowledge. I write courses that assist in the professional development of career college instructors. These courses range in content from the introductory level to advanced instructional development. I started my teaching career as an instructional technology teacher on the high school level, completed graduate school and then moved into higher education. I spent many years in the area of teacher training at the University of Nebraska. While at the University of Nebraska I stared working with career college instructors to improve their instructional delivery skills. As a result of these experiences I have been a consultant to career colleges throughout the United States and a number of foreign countries.

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Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Adapting Your Instructional Strategy

Hi Jim, Thank you for the information you gave in this forum response. You have the knowledge and experience needed to offer instruction in a wide variety of ways to appeal to different age and learning groups. With your perspective I know you are meeting the needs of your students while providing them with solid foundations from which they can move to become career successes. Gary

Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Clarifying Your Expectations To Students

Hi Michael, Great way to start a class off with a lot of good information and the course requirements. This helps to keep the mystery out of the course. With your ice breaker how do the students respond to the ice breaker sheet you hand out? Is it individually, small groups or does the entire class work through the sheet? Thanks. Gary

Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Clarifying Your Expectations To Students

Hi Trudy, Good point about the ongoing reminders about where they should be with their work and deadlines. Even though given students need ongoing reminders of such things to keep them up to date with the course. Gary

Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Clarifying Your Expectations To Students

Hi Kristine, Your last line in the forum response says it all. Not wanting students to be confused about how they will be graded. Learning is hard enough and there will be enough questions about how to do the assignments that the students don't need to be fretting about how their grades will be calculated. Gary

Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Matching Content to Need

Hi Shannon, Great response. Your strategies are right on in terms of helping students to apply the knowledge they have acquired. The next step is transference and you helping them with that through your case studies. Gary

Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Matching Content to Need

Hi Ray, I like your approach. The majority of education that goes on in career colleges is service based. We have to develop individuals that can solve problems if they are going to be successful. Your approach of having them to think like detectives is a good one. They are tracking down and solving the problem and the result is a problem fixed and a happy customer. Gary

Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Matching Content to Need

Hi Shannon, I like your mult-directional approach to engaging your students. You are coming at them with many different techniques, media and applications. This way you are targeting the different learning preferences that are represented among your students. Gary

Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Becoming aware of retention strategies...

Hi Karen, Great way to start a new class. I am sure your new students are excited and motivated as a result of how you set the stage for the course. Having your previous students come in is always good because they can tell it how it is plus give the new students hope for their own success. Gary

Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Adapting Your Instructional Strategy

Hi William, You are correct about retention of course content and skill development being higher if the senses can be employed and application seen. All fields can use this method though those that involve tactile effort really help with sensory integration. Culinary arts is an area that requires all of the senses and applications because the preparation of fine food is a multi-sensory experience. Gary

Gary Meers, Ed.D.

Discussion Comment

Matching Content to Need

Hi Christina, I really like your way of making a complex concept simple by the example you used. This is what our instructors need to be looking for as they develop their own examples in their fields. Gary

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