Levi Strauss & Co. Closes Last Two U.S. factories: Canadian Factories will Close in March
After celebrating its 150th year anniversary on 5 May 2003, Levi Strauss & Co. closed
its last U.S. factory in San Antonio, Texas on Friday, January 9th. This closing is symbolic of the trend of textile manufacturing and other industries, which shifted operations into Asian and Central American sweatshops to take advantage of (i.e., exploit) foreign labor (mostly women) who work for $1 per hour. Levi Strauss was paying U.S. workers $11.00 to $14.00 per hour. The last three Canadian factories, in Brantford, Edmonton, and Stoney Creek, closed in March 2004.
Figure 15. Line graph of Levi Strauss factories
Organzng Knowledge for Instructon
At that time, the final 1,180 Levi Strauss and Co. factory jobs in Canada were eliminated. Levi Strauss & Co. total sales “stagnated” in 2002 at $4.1 billion after a peak of $7.1 billion in 1996. A Levi Strauss spokesman, Jeff Beckman, promised “we’re still an American brand, but we’re also a brand and a company whose prod- ucts have been adopted by consumers around the world.” “We have to operate as a global company.”
The propositional knowledge of an information sheet must be accurate and factual. This requires that a fair amount of research and synthesis be completed prior to the creation of an information sheet. Certainly, the information and images provided can be paraphrased and scanned from sources. In most cases, the information retrieved has to be condensed or rewritten to be appropriate for the audience of students. Most technology teachers would create an information sheet to complement the microm- eter lesson plan provided in the first chapter. It would be used as a handout and as a guide for the teacher in a demonstration that deals with various issues related to the micrometer. Given what we know about graphic design, what would an effective information sheet look like? What determines the quality of an information sheet? The key is to develop a format that you can consistently use and is consistent and responds to principles of graphic design. Information sheets deal with propositional knowledge and procedure sheets with procedural knowledge (see Table 4).
Table 4. Handouts for technology teaching
Definitions: Handouts for technology teaching
Activity.sheet: This handout explains the reason and procedures necessary to complete an activity that is
not a design challenge or project.
Design.or.project.brief: This handout provides the information necessary, such as problem, constraints, and
assessment criteria, for completing a design challenge or project (Chapter V).
Exercise.sheet: This handout presents provisions for development of knowledge and skill regarding academic
or technical content.
Information.sheet: This handout provides knowledge (who, what, when, why) regarding the background
or context--ethical-personal, ecological-natural, existential-spiritual, socio-political--of some application, apparatus, material, peripheral, tool, machine, or process. (Propositional knowledge)
Procedure.sheet: This handout explains, in detail, the knowledge (how) and technique necessary to use an
application, apparatus, material, peripheral, tool, machine, or process. (Procedural Knowledge)
Safety.sheet:.This handout provides necessary knowledge regarding safe practices in laboratories workshops,
Projection and Reflective Practice
We began this chapter by reviewing the new views of intelligence and their relation to knowledge. We defined procedural and propositional knowledge and explained how knowledge is articulated and integrated into experience. We also drew distinctions between technical and sociotechnical knowledge. A range of effective techniques for organizing knowledge for instruction was presented. These techniques serve as advance organizers for students. Mind maps, schematics, taxonomies, timelines, graphs, charts, information sheets, flow charts, and procedure sheets are invaluable techniques for creating advance organizers. The field of scientific and technical vi- sualization has transformed the way that technology teachers organize knowledge and present ecological, social, and technical processes. We described a range of cognitive skills that are employed in design and technological processes. In the next chapter, we address action and emotion and their interrelations with cognition.
References
Bagdikian, B. H. (1980). Communications by the numbers. In N. Cousins (Ed.),
Reflections of America (pp. 51-56). Washington, DC: Government Printing
Office.
Benham, I. (1980). The transportation industry and its changing face. In N. Cousins (Ed.), Reflections of America (pp. 167-76). Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
Buzan, T. (1997). The mind map book: How to use radiant thinking to maximize
your brain’s untapped potential. London: BBC Books. Retrieved from http://
members.ozemail.com.au/~caveman/Creative/Mindmap/Radiant.html. Clark, A., & Wiebe, E. (2001). Scientific visualization for secondary and post-sec-
ondary schools. Journal of Technology Studies, 26(1), 34-42.
Gardner, H. (1983). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences. New York: Basic Books.
Gardner, H. (1993). Creating minds: An anatomy of creativity seen through the
lives of Freud, Einstein, Picasso, Stravinsky, Eliot, Graham, and Gandhi.
New York: Basic Books.
Gardner, H., & Hatch, T. (1989). Multiple intelligences go to school: Educational implications of the theory of multiple intelligences. Educational Researcher,
18(8), 4-9.
Jones, B. F., Pierce, J., & Hunter, B. (1988). Teaching students to construct graphic representations. Educational Leadership, 46(4), 20-25.
Organzng Knowledge for Instructon
McCormick, R. (2004). Issues of learning and knowledge in technology education.
International Journal of Technology and Design Education, 14(1), 21-44.
Sternberg, R. J. (1985). Beyond IQ. New York: Cambridge University Press. Wells, J. G. (1994). Establishing a taxonometric structure for the study of biotech-
nology in secondary school technology education. Journal of Technology
Education, 6(1), 58-75.
Wells, J. G. (1999). Biotechnology content organizers. Journal of Industrial Teacher
Education, 36(4). Retrieved May 5, 2003, from http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejour-
nals/JITE/v36n4/wells.html
Wiebe, E. N. (1992). Scientific visualization: A new course concept for engineering graphics. Engineering Design Graphics Journal, 56(1), 39-44.
Wiebe, E. N., & Clark, A. (1998). Evolving technical graphics in the high schools: A new curriculum in scientific visualization. Engineering Design Graphics