Friday, August 13, 2004

Checking Colors. I like this background color. Maybe I will use it on my web page. Or something similar
Project II.2 - Gathering Information

2.1 What I found out is that there is no way that I can get the certified nurse specialist for Med Surg. I realize now . . .looking at the information that this is what I am going to call a quasi classification. It is not a gold standard . . .and may not be frankable. Besides (and now you may recognize sour grape syndrome) I would need to go to school for another full year to meet the educational requirements for this.

So what I am going to do is to drop back and look and the Medical/Surgical Nurse Certification. I think this might be a better base, one that I can obtain, one that I can write materials for that will be useful as an associate professor in Med/Surg and information that will serve me in my current practice.

Well, I guess I gathered all the information so I completed the first step here (2.1). Wait this is actually 2.2. I need to call about 2.1 because that information was not available on the website.

Next Steps:

1. Call the number to find out when the next examinations are (2005) so the first step will be completed.
2. Publish Document 2.1 to website Yikes – kinda long eh?
Oh well. No one will probably read it, but if it is posted there I can always refer to it.
3. Identify learning resources
4. Chunk up information to be mastered.
5. Identify types of teaching tools that could be used for information – concentrate on distance education modalities.

I was going to try to be more reflective on the learning here. I really don't think I have been very reflective. How do I feel? Well, kind of excited I guess. I mean this is what I have been wanting to do for a long time. Now I am on the cusp of it. The PDA eBook project took a long time. And I am glad I did it because I wanted to be able to make learning materials in that modality. For myself and others. But I think I should have lots of modalities. At first I wanted the med/surg book on the PDA. But I think maybe only sections should go on the PDA.

And another idea was that I ought to make a nursing glossary. Because all the nursing terms are not the same as the medical terms that are in the medical dictionary. There ought to be a nursing dictionary. I don't think there is, but I think it would help with nursing knowledge organization.

Then too, I saw an article about healing places that that Sigma Theta Tau had in their last magazine. It was really neat. And now that I have been playing that Wild Devine Game I realized that this is a very big deal . . .I mean calming down and breathing right and thinking right etc. So I was thinking that we ought to have virtual healing places, i.e. sanctuaries. But not all corny. I mean I don't think gongs and swaying music and wind sounds are going to work. But I think what might be nice for people is to have a site where they can have favorite pix and favorite music and favorite quotes and favorite colors. I guess you can't have favorite smells. You couldn't do that at a hospital anyway. I am sure others have thought of this . . .but what have they come up with. I think the virtual reality things are toooooo slow to get this to work, although I have to admit the Wild Devine Project comes pretty close (not the corny things, but the breathing exericises).

But you couldn't force those things on people. People would have to have the things they really wanted. OR else a choice of things they really wanted. Maybe you could "paint" a virtual reality. Like choosing the color (from a limited palette) or the furniture, or the art etc. and the background music for a virtual room. HMMMM. This is way beyond my scope though.




Tuesday, August 10, 2004

Northwest Nurse

Well here it is . . . my first OK looking page for my web. I have to admit, getting web pages posted is not all that easy. However . . .now that I have done it, I must say I do enjoy it. And I think I could manage web pages for health care.

This page has the goal that I developed from CareeRXel. I think it came together nicely and I believe it is the best focus for the web page.

I learned to insert the photos from the image file on Freeservers. But what I never did learn is how to opaque out the white part. I guess what I need to do is to fill in their background with the same color as the web page. ARRRRGH!!!!

I guess I could do that and then repost everything. I guess it wouldn't be too terrible.

By the way, the way I got the blueberry images was that I took a stem of blueberries, scanned it, found the edges, took out the color. Defined the edges, and then added back the color (at a less intense level). Sounds stupid eh?

Is this a form of art? I guess.

Monday, August 09, 2004

PDA Writing Article Submitted


OK, I was going to post my article on my own web site. And I might do that if I have to but I went ahead and submitted it.

Here is my blog
I have to admit, it has taken me a long time to do this task. Basically I have spent another 8 hours or so over the last week revising, revising. Yesterday I lost all the revisions and had to start all over again. I was going to forward the information to Ken Gowan of PDAcortex, but he seems to not be responding of late. Hmmm. So anyway, the article is in very good shape. It is ready for PDA reading and ready for article submission. I also wanted to post it to my web page. And now since Ken isn’t going to publish it, perhaps I will submit it to someone else. Maybe I will try one of the nursing educators journals. HMMM.

OK, So I submitted it. I had to redo the references, etc etc. Another 2 hours of work. But at least someone (the reviewers) will have to read it. So that is something anyway.

And the work is done, now that it is submitted. Yay!!!!

I get this feeling that I am working in a vacuum here. . . but this is not the case. If I have the thought . . . someone else has the thought. I am not that original. I too . . .am shaped by events, times, trends, genetics. Somewhere out there . . .is my ditto. But I doubt my ditto will read this . . .because I am not reading theirs. Oh well.

How do blogs get read anyway?

Monday, August 02, 2004

Northwest Nurse

Well this is it folks. My first self published article. However, I am sending it to PDAcortex too, so it will be double published. Next time I do an article I will have my web page in better shape so I will feel good about publishing my own stuff - like it might be seen. And there might be a better chance on my own web site that on PDA cortex . . . where it will tend to be buried.

Next Steps

1. Web page work
2. Fix internal hyperlinks on each page
3. Make sure there are hyperlinks on PDA article page
4. Take down NEW LOOK page
5. Update photo page
6. Work on New Index page
7. Update Curriculum Vita
8. Install metatags?
9. Submit to search engines



Sunday, August 01, 2004

Article of PDA text writing

OK, I am almost finished with this article.

I almost forgot to write in the journal today. It is a good habit. I actually forgot to keep track of the time too. I just kind of worked on the article. Actually finished it up. Just a few more details. But I am tired of it today.

I think it is a good article. I got the basic ideas together pretty well. I was able to eliminate all the really awkward parts. So that was good too.

I don’t feel very reflective about it though. I should feel very excited because I am sure that Ken will publish this to his web site. I will publish it to mine as well. I guess I will ask Ken if he would like me to do any research on anything in particular next. He did invite me to make contributions. So I guess I will. But I am also going to publish it to my web site.

And the next thing I am going to do is to start the med/surg teaching too.

Next Steps

1. Prepare glossary
2. Prepare references
3. Ensure hyperlinks work
4. Make a eBook PDF file out of it.
5. Send it to Ken.
6. Move on to next part of project. Review steps.