FCF module is online

I received an email from Anthony Hubbard stating the following:

The Rangers Ministry Academy is now offering the FCF Continuous Learning Elective! (FCF CLE)

This can be accessed from the national FCF website at www.nationalfcf.org, or directly from this link:

http://nationalroyalrangers.eleapcourses.com/frontiersmen-camping-fellowship-19815.html

Also, for all you Twitter tweeters, you can now follow us on twitter at @nationalfcf!



Replied back I think FCF mod is best taught live with real members in garb showing their kits.

What's your opinion?

Money Generation.  There is no teaching better than acutally doing it with real stuff in a real place.  

All our training is done online at work.  The new guys don't know the basic safety practices as it's all been done online. They Safety guys that come in to evaluate will tell you the only guys that know the safety practices is the guys that did it hands on.  

Yet on a computer screen when you pull up the persons training records.  WOW...look at all that training. GRIN!  Most of it is skip to the test take the test 4 times and pass it and move on.  

There must be a connect between seeing it and doing it at the same time to get any lasting benefit from it.  Then that must be done at least once a year to keep it in your mind.

I don't think it will change. I think it will get more and more online because it's EASY!  We dont' really care about quailty anymore. We are rasing a whole generation of inep folk. Lots of talk they just can't do much. GRIN!
Mark Jones

I once years ago was "shown" how to mix paint and cut keys. They did all the work while I watched. I can't do either one.

Online mods work only if its information they want to download to your brain. It fails to teach real practical skills.

I do watch Youtube videos that show you how to do something. They are pretty good. Almost as good as having the person there. You can remind and rewatch what they are doing and pickup what you missed on the first view.

The text versions even with graphics that tell you step by step how to do something are often very very lacking.

Some training is better than others. I hate online power point type training. It just aggravates me. At work they try and build in delays and make buttons to make you have to click on button and review the lessons. Problem is we get so aggravated by the Graphical User Interface (gui) all we want to do is get it over with. Lags and delays and tests that require 100% correct answers and mouse clicks that are not meant to happen just bring it to the point of wanting to give it a toss across the room..GRIN!

As far as FCF goes. I would rather sit down around a fire and cook up some grub and get the stuff ready and talk about it and then go and do it. Fun and so much better.

Sadly it's been my experience the guys that are all computers and no go can really only tell you they can do it. When it comes down to it they can't do it at all. To me that is a failure.

This year my boys most of them had all the FCF merits. Yet we went through them..doing the hands on. No paper work at all. Just hands on and we did most of these hands on things several times. Even after a year of doing them after a few months they forget.

Mark Jones

They're doing the same with Hunter Safety Courses.  I am currently an Alabama Hunter Safety Instructor.  The State originally required that students take the entire Classroom and Field Test On-Site.

Then they modified it to where you could take the Classroom portion on-line, and you would get certified when you did the 4-hour Field-Day with instructors.

Option #2 is now being phased out (as of this Fall).  If you are taking the On-Line Course, the entire thing (Classroom & Field-Test) will be over the computer.  

In my opinion, physical tasks involve "muscle memory" and need to be repeated until correct in order to be ingrained.

I fear that our rate of hunter-related accidents may start to go toward Pre-Hunter Safety days.

It would be a good idea to send the bean counters out with the online hunters ed recruits. It would be a win win for everyone. With the loss of a whole generation of bean counters getting back to the hands on stuff and the world would be better for it.

Being a little ok..a lot sarcastic. Someone that is worse than a lawyer or a used car sellsperson is a bean counter. The first two have a hope they are doing someone a favor..the bean counter cares only for his beans could care less about how it affects the people. I think there is a special place in hell for bean counters.

Mark Jones
Ok..now that I have vented about the bean counters...Training is better face to face.

I suppose I agree partially. It still comes down to the individual taking the training. I've learned some fairly technical lessons by watching YouTube videos (as has been discussed already). You can pause and/or rewind until you get the step down pat. I've also been in face to face training that I left not completely understanding the issue at hand because I either zoned out, or the instructor moved on too quickly. A lot of it come back down to the student....

So true that hands-on skills shown on youtube are great for everyone to see in class and I don't have to repeat the same lashing for boys that can't watch you do it. They tend to focus on tv better than people. Its sad but I think if I teleconferenced my ranger meetings they might listen!

Live videos work great. A lousy instructor can be just as bad as the CBL's we take at Walmart.

Mark Jones wrote:It would be a good idea to send the bean counters out with the online hunters ed recruits.  It would be a win win for everyone.  

The Philosopher/Laureate of RangerChat strikes again.

Or send the bean counters out with Obama and Dick Cheney for some hunting and skeet shooting. Be like shooting two birds with one pellet.

When we did the full "Traditional" Course, we used to have the students shoot .22 rifles.

An On-Line Course cannot tell you if a student has a flinch, or is anticipating the shot & dipping the barrel, or if he/she has too much finger through the trigger.

Also, if a student makes an unsafe act (like sweeping someone with the muzzle of their gun), an instructor can put his hand on the gun, the student will understand the physical correction, and have instant mental feedback.

"Some people" may be able to self-teach. "Some people" may even be able to self-test. But those aren't the ones that we're worried about causing hunting accidents: it's the rest.

I did option #1 with my dad in MD. Option #2 sounds ok but #3 is nuts.

I hope that the Alabama Department of Wildlife isn't as thin-skinned as RR/HQ.

They might threaten to kick me out of the Instructor's Staff.

In all seriousness, it’s great to have the access of the Internet for training, but I still believe that doing a physical task with an instructor is best for the vast majority of students.

In the military (at least when I was in), the concept for the Instructor was, “I do, We do, You do.” In other words, I will explain and demonstrate the task, we will then do it together, you will then show me that you know how to do it.

I think that many of us have done that with the U-Tube videos. We watch how to do something, maybe try it partway through & go to perfect it, then master the task on our own.

But will there be a way for the course to verify that the students are doing Steps #2 & #3?

I think that a good example of a physical and technical “frontier skill” is making black powder. Many of us may have read about it, and even watched a video. But until you really make a batch, stuff it down the end of a rifle or musket & find that it works as good as the stuff back in 1776, you’ll never know for sure that you can do the task (and you will most-likely not retain the details of it).

I would love to make black powder. That would be cool to me.

Mark Jones

Are you going to make and post a utube video how to make black powder?

I agree that face to face is probably the best way, but I've been face to face with my employees showing them how to do what they're GETTING PAID TO DO, and have them walk away and do it wrong after they did it currently in my presence. As if I wouldn't find out eventually that they didn't do it right. Stupid lazy people! But I digress... My point here is that whether face to face, or being expected to watch a video, it will always come back to the willingness of the student to grasp, own, and carry out the procedure.

Put another way, if you're worried about a person not putting forth the effort to learn on their own, then they probably won't learn all that well face to face either. It's a decision that only the student can make. Oh sure, the military can force someone to do something, but I still contend that the person who was forced will never perform as well as the person who does it willingly.

RRCmdrBennett wrote:Are you going to make and post a utube video how to make black powder?

 

I never throw hijacks for other rabbit trails.

In my defense black powder is FCF related skill that a student might ask questions about in a class. As relevant as talking about our work related training experiences.  

I probably shouldn't have, but I was more messing with you than anything.   It's your thread anyway so you can steer it wherever you like...

RRCmdrBennett wrote:I never throw hijacks for other rabbit trails.

better check your drawers Dan! I think they might be burning

ccm2361 wrote:

RRCmdrBennett wrote:I never throw hijacks for other rabbit trails.

better check your drawers Dan! I think they might be burning

Its alright Philip I knew you were...but that forum copper is like Rosco I can easily handle him.  

Sooooooooooooo . . . .


Does anyone know what this new FCF training contains???

I was curious myself, but theres no information on whats in it. At least that I can see.