Snow Plow & De-icing Safety Awareness Training
Learning Module
- Creator(s):
Cuyahoga Community College is committed to the safety of its employees and all community members who utilize our campuses and properties. This training is designed to move beyond employees just watching a training video and answering quiz questions about safety. It is designed to give employees proven techniques to use and practice mindful safety while on the job. The goal is that the training will improve and adapt through the feedback and experiences of the employees who perform snow plowing and de-icing duties over the coming years.
The Learning Objectives for the newly developed Snow Plow & De-icing Safety training are:
This Learning Module is intended to transition from a purely, didactic online video instruction for Snow Plow Driver Safety training to a mixture of didactic, active and transformative learning using Learning by Design (L-by-D) pedagogy. The training is directed at grounds employees at Cuyahoga Community College a large urban community college located in Cleveland, Ohio and its surrounding suburbs. During the winter months, the college’s grounds crew perform snow and ice removal at campus facilities and other college properties. The current training includes a video that only addresses de-icing and a quiz that only asks questions related to snow plow safety.
Employees have been disenfranchised from the safety training process and are used to didactic Environmental Health & Safety trainings often delivered through digital video via a proprietary portal (TEC). The employees have never been asked for input on training efficacy or ideas regarding improvements or training needs. The new training will be transformative in nature in that employees will be given more agency in the use and implementation of the concepts and techniques presented and future iterations of the training.
The Learning Objectives for the newly developed Snow Plow & De-icing Safety training are:
By the end of this training:
The learner profile is grounds workers who perform a variety of physical tasks related to the maintenance and care of college grounds including snow plowing and de-icing. Previous training provided the college was a didactic training session and a didactic video posted on an online portal with a quiz at the end. The new training is divided into two parts the six (6) online learning modules and a simulator session at the college’s Transportation Innovation Center. Typical college modules for EHS are between one (1) and two (2) hours in length. This training would be anticipated to be completed within an hour and a half (1 1/2) to two (2) hours.
The Learning Outcomes for this training are:
Snow Plow Equipment Inspection (4:32)
Safety Awareness (19:27)
(McMannes, 2017)
Supporting Material
6 Unbreakable Rules for Snowplow Driver Safety
Comment: Conduct a pre-trip inspection of snow plow equipment you will use on your campus and take cell phone pictures of the elements you identified and any concerns you have and submit to your instructor.
Learners watch videos to review steps for inspecting the plow and review safety tips for plow operation in-module. Learners inspect the equipment at their home campus and share their findings and concerns with fellow learners. The learners are asked to take pictures of the inspection and submit findings to the instructor for review based on the elements of the inspection video.
Distracted Driving (2:09)
Driving Without Rest (3:05)
Materials
Click to review the college’s policy on alcohol, drugs, and tobacco use
Click to review the college’s Choose Not to Abuse program
Comment: Comment below on a concept or idea from the materials in this module that struck you about impaired driving. How do these concepts inform your snow plow driving? How about your regular driving? Use @Name to speak with others about their thoughts.
Learners review risks of impaired driving and college’s policy and program in-module as it relates to drugs and alcohol use. The learners are asked to comment on this update and this interaction will hopefully produce new insights and allow learners, who may not normally interact due to working at different campuses, interact and cooperatively learn and discuss.
Read the article Antidote for a Mild Case of ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder). Try using the technique described in the article throughout the day.
Comment: Post a comment about what you noticed when using the technique. How did your awareness of what you were doing change? Use @Name to speak with others about their thoughts.
Exercise: Visualize driving the plow through your typical routes. As you visualize in your hide, say the route you are taking "I am driving up Letterman Dr. and will turn near the Public Safety Training Center," and as you drive identify hazards by saying in your head "there is a fire hydrant ahead on the right," "there is a light post ahead on the left."
Learners are presented with a mindfulness technique in-module and are asked to use it. This is used to introduce the learners to the concept of mindfulness in preparation for the Point & Call Method. The learners are asked to comment on this update and this interaction will hopefully produce new insights and allow learners, who may not normally interact due to working at different campuses, interact and cooperatively learn and discuss.
Project:
Obtain a map of the campus or college location where you perform snow plowing and de-icing here.
On the map identify potential hazards and locations related to snow plowing and de-icing:
Review the below rubric as you are preparing your map. You will submit your map for peer review and review a co-worker's map. After receiving peer feedback, review and edit your work, and submit it and the peer-reviewed copy to your instructor for review.
Learners will develop a map to identify potential hazards for the campus they are based. Upon submission, maps will be peer-reviewed by co-workers based at the same campus. Learners will assist each other in developing an awareness of potential hazards. The instructor will review the work using the rubric.
Point & Call Method
Pointing & Calling is a Japanese safety method in which an individual points at an object and announces the potential danger or to general create awareness for safety purposes. The system has been shown to reduce workplace errors by approximately 85%.
(Quality Digest, 2017)
Exercise
Now visualize the route you typically drive to plow at the college and use point and click to identify potential hazards:
Using the below Rubric from the previous exercise develop a point and call for each element. You can use an actual physical Point and a verbal Call or you can create an Imagined Point and Call (IPC) that will be only in your head. You will use these Point and Call cues in Snow Plow Simulation training.
Learners will watch the video and develop their own schema of Point and Calls for use in Snow Plowing and De-icing work duties. These will be tested during the Snow Plow Simulator Training.
The Instructor will observe each Learner's handling of the simulator and use of Point and Call to create awareness of potential hazards. The Instructor will observe each learner and grad on the rubric.
For this exercise Learners will partake in a half-hour session at the College's simulator located at the Unified Transportation Center.
Learners will be evaluted on the below rubric.
Instructor will observe the Learners in the simulator and score based on the rubric.
This Learning Module is intended to transition from a purely, didactic online video instruction for Snow Plow Driver Safety training to a mixture of didactic, active and transformative learning using Learning by Design (L-by-D) pedagogy. The training is designed to transition employees to a more active and aware form of safety consciousness using Point and Call a highly effective, inexpensive Japanese safety methodology. Westerners may be reluctant to use the method for fear of embarrassment, but use of Imagined Point and Call may be used to overcome it.
Participants will be asked to complete a post-training survey after the winter season.
Chu, C.N. (2000). Do Less, Achieve More. New York: HarperCollins.
JICOSH Home: Concept of "Zero-accident Total Participation Campaign"[English]. (n.d.). Retrieved September 29, 2019, from https://www.jniosh.johas.go.jp/icpro/jicosh-old/english/zero-sai/eng/.
Kihl, M. (2006). Snowplow simulator training evaluation (No. FHWA-AZ-06-585). Arizona. Dept. of Transportation.
Kishi, C., Nakano, Y., Bhuiyan, M. S., Kawanaka, H., & Oguri, K. (2014, October). Verification of the effect on “Finger Pointing and Calling” method from observation of brain activity related driver's attention. In 17th International IEEE Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITSC) (pp. 1896-1897). IEEE.
McMannes, C. (2017, October 18). Snow Plow Safety. Retrieved September 29, 2019, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tJM2cX1dK4&feature=youtu.be.
O'Rourke, T. (2011). Snowplow Simulator Training Study.
Richarz, A. (2018, March 12). Why Japan's Rail Workers Can't Stop Pointing at Things. Retrieved September 29, 2019, from https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/pointing-and-calling-japan-trains.
Harish. (2017, July 4). Shisa Kanko, a Different Kind of Checklist: Retrieved September 29, 2019, from https://harishsnotebook.wordpress.com/2017/07/04/shisa-kanko-a-different-kind-of-checklist/.
Quality Digest (2017) STORY: Why Japan's Rail Workers Can't Stop Pointing (QDL, 5-5-17). (2017, May 5). Retrieved September 29, 2019, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFJozEPGaFA&feature=youtu.be.
Snow Plow Safety. (n.d.). Retrieved September 29, 2019, from http://safetytoolboxtopics.com/Seasonal/snow-plow-safety.html.
Tennant, E. (n.d.). 6 Unbreakable Rules for Snowplow Driver Safety. Retrieved September 29, 2019, from http://info.winterequipment.com/blog/snowplow-driver-safety.
The Hazards of Distracted Driving. (n.d.). Retrieved September 29, 2019, from http://www.sr22agency.com/the-hazards-of-distracted-driving-lp/.
WYDOTVIDEOS. (2016, November 23). Plow Equipment Inspection. Retrieved September 29, 2019, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rj9DAyh-xJc&feature=youtu.be.