Bea V. Larsen . . . .Commentaries

Bea V. Larsen is a Senior Mediator at the Center for Resolution of Disputes in
Cincinnati, Ohio 
Bea V. Larsen

For a number of years Bea V. Larsen, senior mediator at the Center for Resolution of Disputes in Cincinnati, Ohio [www.cfrdmediation.com], presented weekly commentaries on WVXU radio, both on her professional work as a mediator and on more personal or general experiences. These broadcasts reached thousands of listeners in a number of midwestern states and elicited many comments. This new series of online commentaries will continue that tradition, now broadcast to the world via the internet. Comments, which can be posted directly to this blog, are warmly encouraged. More personal background information can be read in the "Introductions" category below.
 

Just In Case or Just in Time?

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This entry was posted on 9/16/2006 8:00 PM and is filed under Generally Speaking.

      From two very different sources within the past week, I came across what was, for me, an illuminating concept. Here is a brief summary of each.
   
    A newspaper item told of a remarkable development in medicine. For patients with chronic medical problems, monitors are being implanted in the body and also placed at the home bedside, so that their medical team can receive real time information about heart rate, kidney function, weight, etc.

    On receipt of this data via the Internet, doctors communicate with each other, and promptly take steps to stabilize their patient. Such timely care, provided for the patient at home, prevents many hospitalizations.

    V.A. physician Adam Darkins pointed out that instead of prescribing medication in a particular dosage, "just in case" it may be required, medication choices and dosages are ordered or adjusted "just in time", as the need is actually manifested.

    Just days prior to seeing that news feature, I read a fascinating article, shared with me by a law professor friend. The author,Tracy McGaugh, delineates the different learning styles of the generation now making up most law school faculties, mainly Baby-Boomers in their mid-forties to early sixties, and the student body, Generation Xers in their early twenties to early forties.

    When the Boomers were learning how to learn, before the technology revolution, the standard educational approach was to acquire information that might be needed sometime in the future, "just in case" learning.

    But Generation Xers, exposed as very young learners to the technology explosion, developed the skill of sorting information into:
   
     1) that needed now
     2) that definitely needed later, and
     3) that they could find later, if needed.

    "Just in time" learning.

    This "just in time" approach is proliferating.

    Academic librarians are adopting a "just in time" approach to acquisitions.

    Businesses are adopting a "just in time" approach to employee training.

    What next?

   Those seeking to not be left behind, must shift gears and learn to scan and filter the vast amount of information offered each day, and then spend time honing Internet search skills, rather than attempting to commit new material to memory. Access recent findings, as needed.

    Although initially somewhat disorienting, there is also something liberating about this approach, especially as memory becomes somewhat less reliable. In fact, it's just in time.








 

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    • 9/17/2006 2:20 PM Eric Gruenstein wrote:
      The idea that younger students are focused on learning what they need to know on a just in time basis is enlightening. I had never thought of that. But what about the old concept that chance favors the prepared mind? The field of science is full of instances of great discoveries being made because someone knew lots of 'stuff' he or she didn't need to know.
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      1. 9/17/2006 2:46 PM Bea Larsen wrote:
            An interesting counterpoint, Eric. I've been trying to think back on the origins of my own more creative moments. I think they derived from long held values, certainly not picked up in law school. I cannot speak from a scientist's perspective, of course. I suspect the unlimited curiosity of the scientific mind (or is this a myth?) leads to one knowing a lot of "stuff" that may have no present relevance. Interesting.Thank you.

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    • 9/17/2006 5:39 PM Diane wrote:
      Bea,
      Great article...and thank you for writing it. Pardon these rambling thoughts but I want to write them down before time gets away.

      Lst week I had a chance to do something fabulous-I attended a presention on surgical robots and after, a hands on presentation was offered.

      Not to miss an opportunity to try something new, I waited an hour or so and then it was my turn. I sat in a chair not unlike a desk chair, and placed my head into a machine shaped like the one used to do vision tests. Placing my index fingers and thumbs into loose velcro loops I heard the machine"OK" me....it actually thought I was someone who knew what they were doing...( see how easy it becomes to attribute intelligence to these hunks of metal?)

      As I twitched or moved my fingers, hand or arm, the robot "sensed" my movements and moved in accordance- opening and closing tiny "pinchers" which would hold a scalpel,needle, suture or whatever...
      I used this "Da Vinci" robot to move tiny plastic rings and a penny from stubby, rubber "flesh cone " to "flesh cone." If I have known how to do it I could have actually sutured the flesh together each other!

      Me and a robot? You know me well enough to find that laughable. Yet I didn't want to be intimidated - and there were kids watching!

      It was a moment to come face to face with what the next generation will actually "do" with their lives..what we were experimenting with will be obsolete in 10 years...and we, the adults in that field,won't be on the fast end of technology for too much longer than that ..
      Yet, I who am not a techno geck fell in love with teh Da Vinci robot....of course that was my heart speaking, my mind kept saying,

      " hold on now- this is a robot you know- what do you know about robots? The jetsons..and robim williams movie...
      wait a minute what are you doing next? Is this too big a move, too much twitch?"
      You get the picture.Yet, I was successful in moving rings.

      After a few minutes I reluctantly "shared " the robot with others...including 15, 16 and 8 year old kids.
      And guess what? The kids who came to the exhibit- surrounded by over a thousand years of cumulative education and training approached the robot as if it were their own....cushioned their little heads and velcroed their fingers and never again thought about the 30 or more people standing around ...

      Hopefully, they will become future surgeons because they were incredible ... the robot arms moved smoothly and gracefully and rings sailed and plunked.

      So, your article actually reinforces what I learned that day; it was fun to share the moment, to see how their minds work ( and mine) and be a part of their future.

      But what we did really was only childs play, Da Vinci will be obsolete long before these kids have a chance to use it...

      I have so much to learn!
      Reply to this
      1. 9/19/2006 8:06 PM Bea Larsen wrote:
            What a delightful story. I get the mental picture so clearly, you in love with this new found prowess, and then recognizing the super-prowess of the younger ones. What is it that we can do  better other than be wise? On, well. At least we are not giving up, even as we accept our limitations. Thanks, Bea

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