Although the study of generations is an inexact social science, it may help company leaders empathize, minimize conflict, and get everyone on the same page. Diane Thielfoldt, co-founder of The Learning Café, Daniel Island, S.C., has helped employees at various companies, including manufacturers, relate to one another. In 2014 she spoke at the Fabricators & Manufacturers Association Annual Meeting on the topic, and in late 2015 The FABRICATOR spoke with her about how metal fabricators can work with their multigenerational workforce. The FABRICATOR® is North America’s leading magazine for the metal forming and fabricating industry. Click here to read Managing metal fabrication through the generations.

I have so much to do at work that I always work later than I should. I rarely find time to exercise or even walk away from my desk.When I eat, I eat quickly, usually at my desk and often choose food that's either fast to get or comforting- not healthy.Once I get home, it is hard for me to bring my best self to my family/friends because I am so exhausted.Here are some tips from Adrian Savag.  I recommend that you pick one a week and try it every day until you find certain routines that help you de-program after work:Treat your commute home as a positive time to wind down and start the process of relaxation. Play some favorite music, if you can. Whistle or sing to yourself. Enjoy the drive or the train journey. You might as well, since you have to do it, enjoyable or not. Don’t catch up on the news. It’s bound to remind you of work or depress you.Match your journey time with the time you need to relax. If that means taking the long, scenic route, so be it. If it means stopping at Starbucks, that’s just fine. Your family and friends will prefer you half an hour later in a calm mood rather than half an hour earlier in a foul one.Never hurry home. If you do, every hold-up, traffic jam, late train, or missed bus will be a source of additional stress.Take it easy, even if you don’t dawdle.Treat your commute home as your time- a period just for you. All day at work, you’re at other peoples’ call. Now it’s time to relax and be yourself. Don’t turn the people at home into imaginary "bosses" monitoring your progress along the way and eager to complain over every lost moment.On a bad day, leave for home early and arrive on time or later. The worse the day, the more time you will need to relax. The worst thing to do is stay late, then rush home. You’ll arrive like a grizzly bear with toothache.If you need to rant and vent, do it along the way. Curse the world in the privacy of your own vehicle. Park  and yell where no one can hear you. Walk to the station the long way, yelling and cursing (silently!) to yourself. Don’t walk in the door when you arrive and start into a rant. Who wants to welcome anyone like that?If you must take work home- and you should treat that idea as you would infecting yourself with a specially repulsive social disease- agree a set time to do it and stick to that agreement. Early is best. If you spend an hour or more working before you get into bed, you’ll be wide awake, probably sleep badly, and start the next day off on a poor footing. Besides, who wants to make love to someone running over budgets in their head at the same time?When you get home, pay full attention to whoever’s waiting for you. Never be present physically and mentally elsewhere- it’s an insult. Even the most insignificant domestic matters can help wean  your mind away from work.Always keep your promises. If you’ve arranged to eat out, don’t cancel, pleading tiredness or extra work. If you’ve promised to help your child with homework, do it whatever. Firstly, people who break promises are teaching those around them a dangerous lesson. Secondly, though you may really, really not want to do what you promised, you may well end up enjoying it- and feel far more energized than if you slumped in front of the TV. And lastly, you promised, remember? Don’t be a jerk as well as a wimp.Be firm with yourself. In the end, leaving work behind, mentally and physically, is down to you. You have to want to do it, decide to do it, and then do it- and keep on doing it until it becomes the norm. Slowing down and clearing your mind of the leftovers from the day is an act of will. You may think that watching TV or distracting yourself in some other way is a short-cut, but it isn’t. The minute you ease up on the distraction, all the worries will be back.

Want to increase the interaction between your learners and your course material? Taking notes has long been considered a way to increase engagement and retention. What if your course included a feature that enabled learners to take notes directly inside the course and then print them out later? Open up Lectora® and follow the easy step-by-step instructions below (or steal from the example files), and your learners will be typing notes and printing them in no time. First, let’s list the things that we want to include: A Notes Summary pop-up page containing the following: Text field that displays the notes taken Print button Close button A Notes Entry pop-up page containing the following: Entry field for notes Save Note button Note Summary button Text field that displays the current page name Close button A globally available Notes button for popping up the Notes Entry page. For this tutorial, we’ll be using a shell title containing three chapters with one of the Lectora themes applied (On Display - Gray). The number of chapters is not significant as the feature will be global to a title of any size. Let’s start by setting up a Popups chapter and the two popup pages we designated in the list above. Add a new chapter after the last chapter in the title and name it Popups. Rename the default page inside the chapter to Notes Entry Page. Add a new page to the Popups chapter and name it Notes Summary Page. Now let’s set some properties for the Popups chapter and the pages it contains. In the Inheritance Settings for the Popups chapter, choose to inherit NO objects from parents.  Set the page size for the Popups chapter to 480×450. (You can actually make this any size you like as long as it fits within the page size for the rest of the title.)  Copy and paste the Exit button from the title level into the Popups chapter and position it in the upper-right corner of the page. Copy and paste the Page Title text block from the title level into the Popups chapter and position it in the upper-left corner. The Page Title text block and Exit/Close button will be inherited by both pages in the Popups chapter.   Now let’s add the elements needed for the Notes Summary Page. Add a Print button to the left of the Exit/Close button on the Notes Summary Page. If you are using a Lectora theme, you may find a print button that matches the theme in Stock Library > Media Online > Theme Stock Buttons. If you use a theme stock button, you can skip step 2 as it will already have the Print Current Page action attached to it. Add a Print Current Page action to the print button that is triggered by a Mouse Click. Add a text block to the page and resize it to fill most of the page. Type the following into the text block: VAR(_NotesSummary) Tick the Vertical Scroll property on the Properties ribbon for the text block.   This completes the elements needed for the Notes Summary Page. Now let’s put the Notes Entry Page together. Add a Text Block to the page and position it just below the page title and close button. Resize the block to be almost as wide as the page and to accommodate a single line of text. Type the following into the text block: VAR(_CurrentNotePage) Add a Form object from the Test & Survey ribbon. Add an Entry Field to the Form and resize it to fill the space beneath the text block, but leave a half-inch of space at the bottom of the page. Set the Max Characters to 250 and tick Multi-Line on the Properties ribbon for the Entry Field.  Add a Text Button and position it in the lower-right corner of the page. Change the text to Save Note and rename the button in the Title Explorer to Save Note as well. Add another Text Button and position it to the left of the Save Note button. Change the text to Notes Summary and rename the button in the Title Explorer to Notes Summary as well.   Now that our pages for the feature are in place, we need to add a button to allow access to them. At the title level, add a new button and position it appropriately in the GUI layout. Name the button Notes in the Title Explorer. In this example, we are using the stock Transcript button that matches the On Display - Gray theme. This can be found in Stock Library > Media Online > Theme Stock Buttons > On Display > Gray.     This completes all of the elements needed for the feature. Now let’s make it functional. First, let’s add a couple of User-Defined variables. Open the Variable Manager from the Tools ribbon and click the Add button at the bottom of the User-Defined tab. Set the Variable Name to _CurrentNotePage, delete the 0 in the Initial Value field, and click OK. Click the Add button again. Set the Variable name to _NotesSummary, delete the 0 in the Initial Value field, tick the Retain variable value between sessions checkbox, and click OK. When the user clicks the Notes button, the _CurrentNotePage variable will be set to the name of the current page in the title from which the Notes Entry Page was popped up. The value will then be used in two ways. It will be used to display the name of the page for which the user is taking notes on the Notes Entry Page itself. The value will also be added to the beginning of each note that the student saves to identify on which page the note was taken. The _NotesSummary variable will hold the contents of all of the student notes taken. Its value will be displayed in the text block on the Notes Summary Page. When the Save Note or Notes Summary buttons are clicked, the current value of the entry field on the Notes Entry Page will be added to the value of _NotesSummary.   Now let’s add the actions for the title level Notes button. Add the following actions to the Notes button in this order: Action 1 - This action will set the value of the _CurrentNotePage variable which will be displayed on the Notes Entry Page.                   Name: OnMClkModVar _CurrentNotePage                   Trigger: Mouse Click Action: Modify Variable Target: _CurrentNotePage Type: Set Equal To Value: VAR(CurrentPageName) Conditions: All conditions must be true Variable: CurrentPageName Relationship: Not Equal To Value: Notes Entry Page Action 2 - This action will pop up the Notes Entry Page in a lightbox window.                   Name: OnMClkPopUpPage Notes Entry Page                   Trigger: Mouse Click Action: Display Page in Popup Target: Notes Entry Page Scroll To: Top of Page   Next, we’ll add the actions needed for the Notes Entry Page to function. First, we’ll add two actions to the Save Note button. Add the following actions to the Save Note button in this order: Action 1 - This action will save the value of _CurrentNotePage plus the current value of the entry field (Entry_0001) to the _NotesSummary variable. The value of Entry_0001 will be whatever the student has typed into the field. Name: OnMClkModVar _NotesSummary Trigger: Mouse Click Action: Modify Variable Target: _NotesSummary Type: Add to Variable Value: Notes for VAR(_CurrentNotePage) page: VAR(Entry_0001) [End] - - Action 2 - This action will close the Notes Entry Page lightbox popup window. Name: OnMClkExitClose Trigger: Mouse Click Action: Exit Title/Close Window   Now add the actions for the Notes Summary button. Add the following actions in this order: Action 1 - This action can be copied and pasted from the Save Note button. It is exactly the same. Name: OnMClkModVar _NotesSummary Trigger: Mouse Click Action: Modify Variable Target: _NotesSummary Type: Add to Variable Value: Notes for VAR(_CurrentNotePage) page: VAR(Entry_0001) [End] - - Action 2 - This action will open the Notes Summary Page in a new window. Name: OnMClkGoTo Notes Summary Page                   Trigger: Mouse Click Action: Go To Target: Notes Summary Page Scroll To: Top of Page Open In: New Window   Now add an action to the Notes Entry Page itself that resets the Form when the page shows. Action 1 - This action will reset all of the elements contained within a Form object and the values of their associated variables to their original empty states. In this case, it is just the entry field and its Entry_0001 variable. Without this action, the student would see whatever it was they had previously typed when they opened the Notes Entry Page again and duplicate entries would be added to the _NotesSummary variable.                   Name: OnShowResetForm                   Trigger: Show Action: Reset Form Target: Form_1  There is one final thing that needs to be done to prevent the user from accidentally navigating to the Popups chapter using the Next button of the main interface. Disinherit the Next button on the final page of the content chapter preceding the Popups chapter.   The student notes feature is now functional. Publish your title and give it a try! One thing you may notice while typing a note is that once you’ve reached the 250 character limit on the entry field, you can no longer type into the field with no warning. In my next blog, we will add a nice bit of user feedback to the Notes Entry Page that counts down the number of characters remaining that can be typed into the entry field. For you hands-on learners and for those who cannot wait to see the characters remaining feature, you can download the completed example built from this tutorial on the Trivantis Community! Get Example Lectora Advanced is for developers who want to get more creative with Lectora. In this blog series, Wendy Miller, Lead Content Developer here at Trivantis, will share Lectora tutorials that go beyond basic course development. Wendy is a visual designer and computer programmer with extensive experience developing software, courseware, web sites, games, and multimedia. The post Lectora Advanced: Creating a Student Notes Feature appeared first on .

Student made robots will be invading the vendor floor of NCCE 2016! Mark Ehrhardt, recipient of the Eric Jensen Award at NCCE 2015, and his team will be demonstrating their amazing robots that are sure to blow your mind! Mark will also be presenting a session on: How To Run A Successful STEM Summer Camp Thursday, February 25 | 2:00 PM - 2:50 PM | Room: Yakima 1 Description: Our High School Robotics Club runs a summer STEM Camp teaching robotics, 3D printing, coding and electronics to 3rd through 8th graders. Last year we served over 170 campers and earned over $13,000 for the club! Come learn how to organize, advertise, and run the camp. We will share lots of resources from forms to lessons used in the camp. What is First WA Neobots Robotics Club and who are the members? The Neobots FIRST Washington Robotics Club, http://www.neobots2903.org/ is a group of students and mentors based at Arlington High School in Arlington, WA. We currently have 35 student and 8 mentors whose mission is to spread STEM education to our community through robotics and the principals of FIRST. What are the events the robots compete in? Our club has a FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) and a FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) Team. We competed in three regional events for FTC and will compete in at least two FRC this spring. The events are game based competitions that change every year. For each completion we have a short window of time to design and build a robot to compete. This year’s FRC competition is build around a medieval theme.   What are the educational benefits of having a robotics club in your school? FIRST Robotics is unique in that we really run the club like a business. Students manage the fundraising, business, and public relations in addition to designing/building the robot and competing. Dean Kamen, one of our founders is fond of saying "its not about the robot". Its really about students working together to find out how great it is to be involved with STEM. What are some tips for a teacher that wants to start a robotics club? It takes time to build it. This is our 8th year. Our club has grown because it’s a place where high school students can hang out together and participate in something they love. They do lots of fun things together all through the year. We hear you are going to be at NCCE 2016! Where can I see the robots? Our students will be setting up a booth in the vendor area. We also hope to have them driving the robots around the convention area. I encourage participants to ask questions of the students. Talking to others about the robot and program are an important part of our student’s experience. Will you be presenting at NCCE 2016 this year? Yes! I will be presenting a session on running a successful summer stem camp. Our club raised over $13,000 last summer running a three-week camp featuring 3D printing, electronics, robotics and programming with Minecraft. The camp is developed and run by students on the team. Any parting thoughts you would like to share with our readers? One of the founding values of FIRST Robotics is called gracious professionalism. We compete hard to build the best robots, but we also support other teams with parts, expertise, respect and kindness. http://www.firstinspires.org/about/vision-and-mission It’s a value worth spreading in today’s world. The post The Robots are coming to NCCE 2016! appeared first on NCCE's Tech-Savvy Teacher Blog.

For many years now we have been reading alarming headlines about online safety and well-being. On Internet Safety Day this year the BBC disseminated that one in five 10-12 year olds with a social media account has been bullied online; The National Fraud Intelligence Bureau revealed that online scams lost victims across the country £670 million over a year, and there are likely to be many more unreported scams; Experts say that those participating in online dating are contending with one in ten profiles not being real people, but scammers; In a Get Safe Online survey of 2,075, over half have been a victim of online fraud, but only 32 per cent reported the crime. Even the world of education and training is a target for scammers, with them offering high value distance learning courses that lead to a qualification, when in fact it is not a qualification accredited by a registered awarding organisation, and therefore not a qualification at all. At Elearning Marketplace we check that every course is accurately described, and challenge e-learning suppliers and publishers if the accreditation for a course is not evident. Whatever you are accessing online whether it’s email, social media or you are online shopping the risks are increasing. An excellent resource for information on scams and how to report them is the BBC’s ‘You’ve Been Scammed‘ webpage where you’ll find useful information about each of the scams covered during the BBC One series You’ve Been Scammed, with links to websites and organisations where you can get more advice and guidance. Sainsbury’s Bank has created an excellent resource for shopping safely online with very valuable advice. Sources: http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/35523838 http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-2801328/top-ten-online-scams-fraudsters-stole-victim-s-money-conned-facebook-friends-too.html http://www.whoishostingthis.com/blog/2015/09/22/online-dating-scams/ www.sainsburysbank.co.uk/money-matters/

When a representative from Dell approached me and asked if I would like to receive the Dell XPS 15 Touch laptop and review it, I was excited! Being a Mac user, I was anxious to both work with this powerhouse of a laptop as well as see how Windows has progressed with Windows 10. Could I learn to love working in a dual-platform relationship?Dell XPS 15 Touch laptop, power adapter, and Dell HDMI/VGA/Ethernet/USB adapterI started off by learning all I could about this great laptop! A complete overview of the specifications follows with the options I received highlighted, but here are the things that impressed me the most.The 15" screen literally has no bezel! It stretches from side to side with a frame that is only 5.7mm wide!The screen of the Dell XPS 15 Touch is a 15.6" UltraSharp 4K touch display with a resolution of 3840x2160. It is very bright, crisp, and I can easily open multiple documents side by side when I am working. And the screen is made from Gorilla Glass, which means it is well-protected from scratches.I love having a touchscreen laptop! I have only used one once before, but after spending a lot of time with this Dell XPS 15 Touch, I realize what a time-saver it is! The hinge on the Dell XPS 15 Touch does not allow any wobble in the screen when I use it by touching what I need. I found myself using touch more and more as I spent time with the the laptop! This Dell XPS 15 Touch came with a 500GB SSD storage drive. It is extremely fast to open programs, start up, and shut down! In addition, the 16GB of RAM allow me to quickly render videos and speed up other RAM-intensive applications. The battery life of this model, with the 4K screen and the 84Whr battery, is estimated to be 11-12 hours! I have not put that to the test yet, but that would last me an entire airplane travel day in coach, where I don't often have a plug. This model of the Dell XPS 15 Touch, with the 84Whr battery, is ½ pound heavier than the version with the 56Whr battery, but the longer battery life is certainly worth the little extra weight!The keyboard is backlit, which is something that I have become quite accustomed to. The ports on the laptop include the standard HDMI, two USB 3.2 ports, and an SD card reader. However, the Dell XPS 15 Touch also includes the new powerful Thunderbolt 3 port (USB Type-C)  which would allow me to hook up two additional 4K monitors to the laptop if I wanted to!There is a headset jack (which does both audio in and out) and a built-in 720p Webcam. Because of the thin bezel surrounding the screen, the Webcam is below the screen, near the hinge. Having the Webcam in this location will take some getting used to, since I usually am looking at the top of the screen when presenting a webinar or Skyping with colleagues.Specifications for the Dell XPS 15 TouchMy Dell XPS 15 Touch came with a great accessory-- the Dell Adapter USB 3.0 to HDMI/VGA/Ethernet/USB 2.0 (DA200). This one little accessory replaces a multitude of dongles! It plugs into a USB port and contains an HDMI connection, a VGA connection, an Ethernet port, and another USB port. Having all of the connections I would need to present with included on this one little adapter is wonderful!My current Apple 15" laptop is a 2014 MacBook Pro Retina, with 16GB RAM and a 512GB SSD drive. The specs and weight of the Mac are similar to the Dell XPS 15 Touch. But the Macbook Pro does not have the long battery life, the beautiful 4K touchscreen, and is a bit wider and thicker than the Dell XPS 15 Touch.I took some comparison shots after unboxing the Dell. Here you can see the Dell and Mac laptops open, closed, and on their sides. Dell XPS 15 Touch on the left / Macbook Pro Retina on the rightDell XPS 15 Touch on top / Macbook Pro Retina on bottomMy first impression of the Dell XPS 15 Touch is that it is a powerful, fast, solidly-made laptop, with a killer battery life, the best screen I have ever seen, and, with the availability of the touchscreen, it is sure to speed up my workflow!With all else being pretty equal, could I learn to become comfortable using either platform to get my work done?Part two of this series will talk about learning to love both platforms!  Visit Kathy's Web pages: Kathy Schrock's Home Page Kathy Schrock's Guide to Everything