Jay Cross helps people work and live smarter. Jay is the Johnny Appleseed of informal learning. He wrote the book on it. He was the first person to use the term eLearning on the web. He has challenged conventional wisdom about how adults learn since designing the first business degree program offered by the University of Phoenix.
Join me tomorrow, Friday, April 27, at 9:30 Pacific/12:30 Eastern in a Google+ Hangout to talk about the future of continuing education five to ten years out.
Let’s pretend we’ve just ridden our time machine to 2020. How will professionals keep up? Progress is zipping along faster than ever. The half-life of professional knowledge is measured in days. Most work that’s merely complicated has been automated; working means working with complexity. Software agents are doing our bidding. We’re connected to vast store of information in the cloud 24/7.
To stir the pot, consider these key trends in higher education from the 2011 Horizon Report:
These trends from the 2009 Horizon Report are still in play:
Certification and compliance drive continuing education in IT, medicine, and other professions. How will those look in 2020?
Join the conversation tomorrow, Friday April 27, at 9:30 am Pacific on Google+. I’ll Tweet the URL @jaycross
Image credit: http://hollywoodlostandfound.net/props/timemachine.html
At DevLearn 09, Michael Allen gave us a peek at a new authoring system under development at Allen Interactions. (In case you didn’t know, Michael was chief architect of Authorware, the precursor to Macromedia and granddaddy of digital authoring systems.)
His latest project, code-named Zebra, is a powerful, drag-and-drop authoring environment. I’m impressed. I expect Zebra to own the market when it becomes available. I’ll let Michael tell you what he’s got:
The inaugural issue of Impact, the Journal of Applied Research in Workplace E-learning just appeared on the web. You can read this first issue on the web for free. (Disclosure: I am on Impact’s Editorial Board.)
I’ve read a little over half of the 14 articles. Richard Straub writes cogently about the lay of the eLearning land. Andrew Whitworth presents a fascinating thought piece on context. Stewart Hase explains heutagogy (a new term for me, I’m going to have to re-read this one.) Kay Strong and Holly Hutchins contribute a great overview of connectivism. The case study of eLearning at St George Bank is enlightening; I was intrigued because I’ve talked with these guys and know they’re thoughtful.
Two articles on literature searches puzzled me. The first found a paucity of information about the results of corporate eLearning. The second decried the lack of studies on eLearning in small/medium enterprise. Here’s the rub: both articles were looking in the wrong places. The first looks primarily at academic journals. Why not include CLO magazine and Training? Their readership is corporate; they relate case studies. Neither piece looks at information in the blogosphere. That’s where I find information on what’s happening; often it’s some place I’ve been directed to by Twitter.
Related:
Top 99 Workplace Learning Blogs
OED list of top 100 education blogs
Jay’s learning research page
Tony O’Driscoll delivered a fantastic at LearnTrends this morning. The recording will be up shortly but you may want to look at the back channel to see what you missed. The back channel is a step toward evolving a conversation between presenters and their audiences.
TONY ODriscoll: I AM HERE NOW ; )
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teresadeca: yes
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Moderator (Harold Jarche): yes, here you
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Mars Chen: yes
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Jon Folkestad: yep
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Wendy: yes
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Katina: yup
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Tony Karrer: here you
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83yalow: oui...yes
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Russ Clarke: We can hear you.
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Tony Karrer: can you promote me to moderator
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Moderator (Harold Jarche): you will need to upload - give me mic & I'll explain
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Moderator (Tony Karrer): akarrer@techempower.com
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Moderator (Harold Jarche): harold@jarche.com
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Moderator (eLearnspace): yes
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Moderator (Jay Cross): Guys make me a moderator, please
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John McDermott to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, kim caise: Tony: we have a new wave for today - more organized and less confusion.
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Moderator (eLearnspace): yes i will upload now
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Jenna Papakalos: Good morning! How are we today? Fabulous here in Orlando, FL!
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Moderator (TONY ODriscoll): COOL SOCIAL MEDIA IN ACTION
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Moderator (TONY ODriscoll): Thanks Jay ; )
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virginia yonkers: That's assuming you have twitter
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Paula Colwell: great idea!
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tabitha: just tweeted the link but happy to retweet
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Sara Jean Ward: i got here thru Ning today
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Kay Wood: I came in thru the Ning site. No problem.
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Diane Anderson: I just came in through the ning site. no problem
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tabitha: yeah thats how i got in
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Christy Tucker to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, kim caise: I got here through Ning: this page looks OK http://learntrends.ning.com/page/learntrends-2009
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Maryanne Burgos: me too
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Karen Bowden: I came in through Ning with no problem.
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Cynan: the agenda is back up
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Cynan: http://learntrends.ning.com/page/learntrends-2009
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Moderator (Harold Jarche): http://learntrends.ning.com/page/learntrends-2009
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DGlow: no prob with ning.
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Moderator (Tony Karrer): I just added it in
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Moderator (Tony Karrer): We are a well oiled machine
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Moderator (eLearnspace): apparently my computer did a windows update
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Moderator (TONY ODriscoll): With so many options via social media it is hard to stop presentation progress
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Moderator (eLearnspace): and i could not connect for awhile
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tabitha: hey i tweeted the link and got my first retweet! Sweeet.
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Jenna Papakalos: Good for you @tabitha! Nice.
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Moderator (George Siemens): audio is great
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Moderator (Tony Karrer): yes
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tabitha: yes
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Gillian: yes
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Will Thalheimer: yes
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Karen Bowden: yes
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83yalow: yes
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Diane Anderson: yes
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Diane D'Amico: yes
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Julie Spokus: Yes
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Jenna Papakalos: Good morning Tony! Looking forward to your presentation.
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Laura F.: a square?
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AlanW: white box
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Mitch Oliver: square
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Will Thalheimer: folder
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Christy Tucker: A quadrilateral
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tabitha: foder
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Paula Colwell: pat of butter
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jadekaz: square dot
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83yalow: button
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Karen Bowden: a folder
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Diane D'Amico: a box
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Cynan: kind of oblong
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Jenna Papakalos: box
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@AgileBill4d: PRIM!!!
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Asif: light at the end of a tunnel
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Sara Jean Ward: big pixel
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Dan: the abyss
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Gillian: off-cquare oblong of light
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GarethM: small screen
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Julie Spokus: A small window to the world
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tabitha: *folder
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virginia yonkers: A chip?
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Moderator (Jay Cross): A NODE
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John Zaums: primal shape
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Immernet Singularity: polygon
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Larry Irons: a train
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Rob C: my cubical
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John McDermott: file folder
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Kay Wood: rectangle
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Maryanne Burgos: Button to push
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Mitch Oliver: Black screen
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Russ Clarke: White
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Jenna Papakalos: a state
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Moderator (Jay Cross): Colorado
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Sara Jean Ward:
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Julie Spokus: South Dakota
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Russ Clarke: Wyoming
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Danny Ortegon: wyoming
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Will Thalheimer: a state
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Diane D'Amico: a state
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teresadeca: a state
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AlanW: wyoming
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Paula Colwell: some stat in mid westà
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Susan Lewis - Rustici Software: wyoming
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virginia yonkers: wymoing
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Dan: colorado
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Gillian: a state in US
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Laura F.: wyoming?
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DGlow: S. Dakota
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Maryanne Burgos: Wyoming
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Karen Bowden: wyoming
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Gail H: Wyoning
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Jon Folkestad: WY
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dannymacc: wyoming
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Cynan: flat
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Madhuri: m??????
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Moderator (George Siemens): heh
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@AgileBill4d: WY
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Cynan: flat and cold
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Kay Wood: Nebraska
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Cynan:
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Larry Gourley 1: Wyoming
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Moderator (George Siemens): there's a country underneath us?
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Paula Colwell: hahaha George - way to represent!
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Moderator (George Siemens):
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Madhuri: context is king
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virginia yonkers: Context will be more important since our fixed places are no longer fixed
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virginia yonkers: But content is king for most decision makers
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Larry Irons: looks like my elementary school
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virginia yonkers: Looks like my 5th grade teacher
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Jenna Papakalos: That is a smart 4 year old who can write a whole report.
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@AgileBill4d: We can all make notes at http://tr.im/welearn using Etherpad
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John McDermott: There is also a wave. Search for #learntrends
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Cynan: Interesting bill.
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Will Thalheimer: yes
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Laura F.: what's a school?
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Paula Colwell: no change!
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dannymacc: that's sad!
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Maryanne Burgos: Yes. Good one!
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Mitch Oliver: Yes - no change
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Amy Graff: lol
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Erika Robertson: nothing's changed
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GarethM: yes
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Karen Bowden: Sorry, I was fascinated by the etherpad! Missed the punchline.
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virginia yonkers: Too many students in a huge classroom and one teacher and if lucky a TA
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Will Thalheimer: Bars and restaurants probably would look the same too.
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Moderator (Tony Karrer): So why do they create classrooms in Second Life?
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virginia yonkers: Do classrooms look different in Second Life?
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Kay Wood: No classrooms in 2nd Life...please
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Moderator (Tony Karrer): Great!
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jadekaz: field trips in SL
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Jenna Papakalos: @virginia If you want them to.
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Karen Bowden: Prezi is cool alternative to ppt
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Dan: because we haven't fully understand the platform capabilities in the same way that we put radio shows on TV when that medium became available
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@AgileBill4d: OMGosh, LOL
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John McDermott: Good, Dan!
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Solveig: Whose is that quote again? THanks.
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Moderator (eLearnspace) to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, George Siemens: i just uploaded the no build PPT so you can use the second set of slides tony
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DGlow: Some folks can't let go of traditions- and Dan's point- it gives folks an anchor to move into a new medium.
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Kay Wood: Alvin Toffler
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virginia yonkers: So we don't really need technology for that. Rather a change in mind set
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Rob Robertson: @Tony I think there is value in is recognizable spaces when entering a world like SL for the 1st time...but after the initial experience I agree classrooms in SL do not make much sense
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Moderator (Tony Karrer) to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, George Siemens: Kim - do you have slides from all the presenters scheduled today?
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Moderator (Harold Jarche): http://www.alvintoffler.net/
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Dan: I should say that my point came from Marshall Mcluhan
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Kay Wood: Thx, Harold
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Moderator (eLearnspace) to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, George Siemens: yes i do
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Sara Jean Ward: huge paradigm shift!
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Moderator (eLearnspace) to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, George Siemens: tony needs to advance to the slide 6 on the second set
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Paula Colwell: @virginia - still great to have the technology but unless you have the change in mind set happens
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Paula Colwell: not worth much...
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Jenna Papakalos: Thanks to Renee and Jon Folkestad for taking such copius notes in Google Wave!
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Maryanne Burgos: Hoiw do you find the wave?
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Rob Robertson: @jenna is there a wave url for this session?
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virginia yonkers: My daughter's school is project based where many of the projects are in the field. The technology has HINDERED the learning process because of the firewalls and restrictions needed at the secondary ed level. It muddies the learning water
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mariancasey: can someone invite me to Google Wave?
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Sara Jean Ward: https://wave.google.com/wave/#restored:wave:googlewave.com!w%252B081oy2-vG
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Maryanne Burgos: ty
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Moderator (Harold Jarche): ABC Learning (anything but courses) for me!
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John McDermott: The wave is public
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Moderator (eLearnspace) to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, George Siemens: sorry, trying to give you the new set sent before the session
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mariancasey: I heard you need invite
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virginia yonkers: Starting at the same page is tough
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tabitha: need invite
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Jenna Papakalos: @mariancasey - Yes you need an invite to join the Wave
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Moderator (eLearnspace) to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, George Siemens: email me at kcaise@gmail.com and i will send you an invite
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Moderator (eLearnspace): email me at kcaise@gmail.com and i will send you an invite
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Moderator (eLearnspace): i only have 8 left
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Jenna Papakalos: @Rob - yes, here is the Wave URL http://bit.ly/42mF9
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mariancasey to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, George Siemens: Thanks I'll send you an email. M
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Rob Robertson: @jeanna & @Sara Thanks!
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Jenna Papakalos: @Rob: welcome!
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virginia yonkers: What about context transfer?
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Moderator (eLearnspace): how do you find the URL for waves?
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John McDermott: You can search for #learntrends with:public
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Jenna Papakalos: It's on Twitter too http://bit.ly/42mF9
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John McDermott: The search entry is in the top center window on wave
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virginia yonkers: What about support? psychological especially
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Sara Jean Ward: i found the URL for the wave posted on yesterday's (Day1) wave
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Jenna Papakalos: @mariancasey: Cool! Interesting marrying into a Greek family. Certainly messes people up when they see my last name.
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Moderator (George Siemens): agree....
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jadekaz: Great explanation
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Jenna Papakalos: I like that. Webvolution
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abhijitk: that's a nice graphic
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Sara Jean Ward: agree (yay WoW!)
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virginia yonkers: And within the co-create are "societies" and "cultures" and "communities"
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virginia yonkers: Not just content and processes, but meaning making and artifacts
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Cynan: who are you calling an oxymoron pal
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Robin Haines:
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Danny Ortegon: roaring silence
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tabitha: hah
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Cate Poole: Are these slides going to be available after the presentation?-I am unable to listen, but am watching.
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Cynan: er... yeah.. except for the desire for all these vendors to lock in users by locking in their content
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Cynan: maybe not all, but many
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@AgileBill4d: re flow - that is very Lean / Kanban like - cool
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vincentBerthelot: KM is dead don't try to reanime it with just the 2.0 behind. We have to innovate !
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virginia yonkers: But I think he's saying we should be able to find others with the content
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virginia yonkers: But then how will content makers make money?
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@AgileBill4d: as consultants, how do we charge for the 'microservices' we provide as part of a network?
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virginia yonkers: So do instructors
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John McDermott: @AgileBill4d, good question
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virginia yonkers: My school doesn't meet my needs so I will outside the firewall and give my students a basket of tools
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Cynan: you don't. do bands get paid for putting demo tracks on myspace? use free services to generate your paying ones
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tabitha: nice yonkers, need more teachers like you!
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jadekaz: bands get paid for putting music on thesixtyone and allowing people to listen free, but pay for downloads
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Jenna Papakalos: Let's take this conference as an example. Synchronous virtual collaboration using Elluminate (facilator to participants), Google Wave (partcipants to participants) and Ning for asynchronous ongoing learner driven interaction.
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virginia yonkers: There are many of us tabitha, it is just the organization doesn't know
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vincentBerthelot: Nice slides !
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jadekaz: great job at capturing concepts through imagery
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virginia yonkers: Information or expertise is the currency?
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Will Thalheimer: Wait. People still have the content in their heads, no?
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Jenna Papakalos: info is currency
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abhijitk: here comes everybody is a really cool
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teresadeca: fabulous! ty, tony!
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Will Thalheimer: People are NOT just the flow.
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vincentBerthelot: The information given by people, dialog ...IS the flow
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@AgileBill4d: could we peek at that last slide one more time please?
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Moderator (Tony Karrer): I didn't quite get the connection between web 2.0 and 3D environments - see like they are pretty separate right now
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jadekaz: So, what can we do about getting out of the box - when we're assigned a training module to create?
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Asif: difficult to imagine what this type of space would look like
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john_royer: how will this evolve to create a more accepted evironment for the majority of businesses?
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virginia yonkers: Where does the social rules and new culture come into this? And how do you overcome management fears in this?
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Maryanne Burgos: What is the advantage of using a 3D environment? What extra does it offer?
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Asif: & how it would be different from the classroom paradigm
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Jenna Papakalos: What are your thoughts on how we are interacting and learning during Learn Trends 2009?
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Moderator (Harold Jarche): the network routes around hierarchy and gets the job done
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Cynan: "its conversation that's the king, content is just something to talk about"
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Will Thalheimer: Okay, but if my learning methods are better for my network partners, they'll be better able to retrieve info when I need it.
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@AgileBill4d: notes at http://tr.im/welearn
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John McDermott: Asif, it is hard to take a physical class to a new site in seconds -- works in a VW
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Sara Jean Ward: @jenna - it gave me a millenial a headache yesterday but i love how it enhanced my learning
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John McDermott: Virtual field trips
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Danny Ortegon: Depth and breadth of Web 2.0 tools may grow too fast to channel effectively??
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Asif: wondering how the gatherings would be represented differently than in a 'classroom' paradigm
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Sara Jean Ward: charge for onboarding!
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jadekaz: situated constructivist learning?
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@AgileBill4d: re economics: good question!
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virginia yonkers: How do you grab the attention and motivate the learner to what YOU want them to learn or need them to learn?
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mariancasey to Harold Jarche, Jay Cross, Tony Karrer, TONY ODriscoll, eLearnspace, George Siemens: I'm at Northwestern and we're still using Blackboard to interact; while students are continuous online during class participating in other networks. How do you bring educational institutions around do this type of thinking?
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Clark Quinn: and how do we discover things from flows that we aren't watching that are relevant to us, the captured nuggets. Or, what's the role for the learning function here?
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lauraoverton: Will this happen overnight or do L&D have a role to play in facilitation and change?
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Sara Jean Ward: 90-9-1 rule makes it so tough to get Web 2.0 going
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Sara Jean Ward: too many lurkers
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@AgileBill4d: thanks!
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Darren Short: HRD functions are used to demonstrating value through student numbers, course numbers, basic evaluations, etc. How does this change the way we demonstrate our value to key decision makers in the company?
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virginia yonkers: Many of my students don't feel they have learned if they find it "fun". THEY equate learning with content.
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tabitha: Im new to elearning what is the 90-9-1 rule
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tabitha: oh
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tabitha: nevermind!
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virginia yonkers: How do you change the students/trainees mindsets?
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mariancasey: The Wikipedia phenomenon
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Moderator (Harold Jarche): lurking is contextual
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jadekaz: Those that are there partiipate. But 90% still don't use social. What is twitter is still a common question.
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mariancasey: Charlene Li identifies the new types of network participants.
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Jenna Papakalos: @Sara Jean: Too funny! Be glad if you can type fast.
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Cynan: come on be fair - I use twitter a lot, but its pretty weird to get your head around
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virginia yonkers: Key point...those that use twitter...
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Ray Deis: Participation Inequality http://www.useit.com/alertbox/participation_inequality.html
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Jon Folkestad: people lurked because they didn't know how to interact. Now that norms and parctices are being esablished people are adding more value
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virginia yonkers: What is participation though? are we still using an old model of back and forth?
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jadekaz: Corp culture or school culture would determine what the percentages are in participating.
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Christy Tucker: Legitimate peripheral participation still has a role
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Will Thalheimer: What models, besides my Situation-
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Asif: more participation means larger online populations, which doesn't necessarily indicate reductions in lurking
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jadekaz: @christyTucker - that's the theory I was trying to remember!
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Larry Gourley 1: Going back to Christy Confetti's presentation from yesterday, there will always be a need for people who can help filter, tag, and align the "firehose" of information with helping companies get things done on a project basis.
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Jenna Papakalos: Learning is learning. Content is content. Technology is just another way to deliver the learning, another access point. How you get to the content is irrevelant. What changes is how the content is designed for optimal learning impact.
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John McDermott: How do we get management buy-in to using VWs? How do we show value?
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Clark Quinn: @Jenna, it's not about the content, it's about the experience!
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virginia yonkers: That assumes they motivated to change rather than just give up and settle
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Will Thalheimer: What models, besides Situation-Based Learning Design, have surfaced to help us design these learning interventions/environments?
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Kay Wood: Good question, Will.
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jadekaz: connectivism
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Gillian: One of the major changes now is that the floor goes to (s)he who types fastest rather than (s)he who shouts loudest?
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Clark Quinn: @Will, I still like cognitive apprenticeship
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David Walkup: well said @jenna Papakalos
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Will Thalheimer: Jenna, it's not just getting at content. What we want is to get info into people's heads in a way that it will be triggered to be retrieved from memory when the "learner" needs it.
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Clark Quinn: that question was about mining, federated search
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Robin Haines: It's all too common for L&D to have a Transactional focus rather than a strategic partnership focus
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Moderator (George Siemens): @Jenna - I take a slightly differetn view - technology has affordances that change what is possible.
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Clark Quinn: e.g. like SD Zoo looking for biological metaphors
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Will Thalheimer: Thanks @Clark Quinn
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Frank Budimir: @Gillian which means that (s)he who needs time to reflect still gets overlooked, heh
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virginia yonkers: I think it is more intrenched in the US than it was 20 years ago (classroom)
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Kay Wood: I read somewhere, "technology is not the driver, but the enabler." Can't recall who said it originally.
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Gillian: @Frank:
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Moderator (George Siemens): @Kay - again, I think tech is more than an enabler. it transforms
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Clark Quinn: I know it sounds like old KM, but I still think there's a role
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virginia yonkers: Still a tension between individual and company goals
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Naomi Moneypenny - ManyWorlds.com: Search is often a failure of navigation design
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@AgileBill4d: "aggregate behaviour" = wisdom of crowds?
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virginia yonkers: I prefer to browse a bookstore than go through amazon
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jadekaz: Technology separates "search" in the enterprise. Have to go to many diff places.
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Clark Quinn: I buy the overall proposition, but I think there're roles for both learning facilitiation, and semantic engineering
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Kay Wood: George, it has transformed my learning experiences for sure, but for many who are terrified of this, I have to sell it as an 'enable' first. Then the transformation occurs, but often slowly.
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virginia yonkers: Browsing a book store I find things I might not have thought of
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Moderator (George Siemens): @Clark - complexity in learning is best addressed through social sensemaking networks...and technology sorted connections/content (i.e. semantic)
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Will Thalheimer: I have found in doing my work-learning audits of clients in big companies, that most informal information gathering is NOT technology-enabled, but rather geographically and socially contiguousness enabled. In other words, if someone knows they need to know, they ask someone in the next cube, they ask someone after a meeting, etc.
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Jenna Papakalos: @Clark Quinn: Agreed! Why proper instructional design is so important.
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Jenna Papakalos: @David Walkup: thanks!
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Moderator (George Siemens): @Kay - that's a fair point. I have an ongoing issue with the "it's not about the tech" view. It. is. all. about. the. tech.
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John McDermott: That is a valuable insight, WIll. Sort of a "mesh of knowledge" view.
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Clark Quinn: @George, agreed, facilitation above and below
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mariancasey: In my research with multinational corporations, many are using Everest Leadership simulation from Forio Solutions to develop soft skills.
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Kay Wood: Will, I agree, but with remote work teams, I have found that technology subs for the "question over the cube."
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virginia yonkers: Tech muddies the water and can either support or set up barriers to learning
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jadekaz: People work around the technology
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Will Thalheimer: My point is that we as learning/performance facilitators ought to help people learn from each other in non-technology ways too. Some management/leadership training/thinking gets at this, but not too much. You and I can do better I think.
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Jenna Papakalos: @Will Thalheimer: Definitely agree. Big propronant of proper design to deliver learning most effectively or just wasting everyone's time.
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Clark Quinn: @Will, yes, it's not just about tech environs, but social environs, physical environs, a coherent performance ecosystem
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Jenna Papakalos: @George Siemens: good point. i like that.
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John McDermott: @will. 100% agree
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Will Thalheimer: @Clark. Yes, I've been using the term ecosystem as well. It's what makes sense.
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virginia yonkers: So back to my question, how do you get the students on board?
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Kay Wood: Will, I agree completely. People to people...that social part is essential for healthy working relationships.
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mariancasey: You can't do any of this without a collaboration culture.
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John McDermott: @virginia: I think it is far more difficult to persuade management than learners. Add fun and content and learners will come
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Sara Jean Ward: ROFL
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jadekaz: culture just important as context
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virginia yonkers: Not my students and not those who I've just studied.
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jadekaz: culture and contxt = collaboration?
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Gillian: @Virginia - find the problem and use the tools that fix it. Learning is not quite incidental but it's less of a thump than dishing out a textbook.
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John McDermott: Hmmm, any insights why?
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virginia yonkers: This is not the currency for success in their minds
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virginia yonkers: If they are having fun, they must not be learning
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mariancasey: plus learner's prior knowledge
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Jenna Papakalos: @virginia: depends on the audience. all goes back to understanding what motivates ppl and how to deliver the message
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Kay Wood: Where I am culture currently trumps just about anything. Changes in culture most often are sllow.
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virginia yonkers: They have more important things to do with their time
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John McDermott: @Virginia: I see that with techies, too.
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mariancasey: Without culture on board, any initiative will fail.
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@AgileBill4d: re diversity training - makes a huge difference - after 26 years of IBM Diversity training, I was blow away by wearing one different avatar - much more powerful
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virginia yonkers: And marian, culture goes all the way to the front line workers
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jadekaz: change mgt portion of HPT model is important
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John McDermott: I think we need to get culture/management on board. We need to help people see value in learning
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vincentBerthelot: Agree with mariancasey
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mariancasey: Agreed. Multigenerational issues also at play here.
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Kay Wood: The idea of a outrageous avatar is bit beyond me. I can't understand what it is like to be a NFL player by dressing as one. I prefer a better looking me.
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Gillian: @Kay - is there a culture emerging as an exo-skeleton? I've met lots of places where the side conversations on FB/Twitter are far prerferable to the ones in work on the official platform.
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virginia yonkers: John, many see the value in "learning" they just don't see the "fun" stuff as learning
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Asif: what is being learned in the image we are looking at?
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tabitha: its question time
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tabitha: hence the question mark
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@AgileBill4d: (don't forget to grab a copy of our collaborative notes 11 of us took at http://tr.im/welearn) social learning in action! lol
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jadekaz: we are the machine - wesch
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John McDermott: Virginia, yes, I have seen that. I still think that is an anachronism from K-20 school we need to try to overcome
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Clark Quinn: @asif collaboratively building questions (and, presumably, answers)
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Asif: @tabitha -- for the user inside the environment
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Kay Wood: @Gillian, few are on the Twitter/FB banfdwagon. Our company reflects its primary client, the Federal government. The ecoskeleton has started to form, but there is great fear. Will our client like us this way?
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Asif: is there an added value to this environment?
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John McDermott: welearn etherpad is full.
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teresadeca: ty, tony and jay!
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Gillian: @Kay - understand that. Try the UK whre there are departments where the preferred medium of comms is internet, not even telephone. It will happen everywhere sometime...
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Mary Myers: Thanks Tony and Jay!
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Moderator (TONY ODriscoll): Thank You ALL!
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Moderator (Tony Karrer): thanks tony
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jadekaz: Thanks! Great job!
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Jenna Papakalos: Thanks Tony!
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Karen Bowden: Sorry, I have to go to another meeting.
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Moderator (George Siemens): Thanks Tony!
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Karen Bowden: TY
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Gillian: Thanks!
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Mitch Oliver: Thank you.
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Moderator (TONY ODriscoll): Appreciate you taking time to listen to my ramblings.
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Clark Quinn: Great stuff, Tony, as always
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Janet: Thanks!
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lauraoverton: thanks Tony
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Moderator (Jay Cross): Bravo!
Last month, immigration officials began hassling me because every square inch of my passport was filled up with stamps and visas. I mailed it to Washington to have extra visa pages inserted. Now I’m sweating bullets because I’m supposed to fly to London on Sunday and my passport is in transit and may not make it on time.
Public speaking, like writing, forces me to sharpen my thinking, and that, in turn, improves my coaching and workshop sessions with corporate clients. In London, I’ll be talking about how to evaluate informal social learning and learning infrastructure, things that are tougher to get your arms around than individual courses. In my keynote address in Faro, I plan to discuss post-industrial learning and new approaches to instructional design. The next week in Madrid, my workshop will focus on informal learning: what it is, how to take advantage of it, and who’s been doing a good job thus far.
People invariably ask for slides and recordings, so from now on I will be posting follow-up information on my primary website, jaycross.com
If you’re in London, Faro, Seville, or Madrid, ping me if you’d like to get together.
Evaluating formal and informal learning
London. June 9, 2009
IADIS International Conference e-Learning 2009
International Association for Development of the Information Society
Faro, Portugal. June 17, 2009
Informal Learning en la Práctica: Cómo diseñar su Proyecto de Aprendizaje Informal
Madrid. June 23, 2009
On April Fool’s Day of this year, I wrote the following page in the Learnscaping un-book. I meant to be serious.
Coincidence happens. Isaac Newton (1643–1727) and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz (1646–1716) invented calculus at the same time but independently of one another! (wikipedia)
When Newton and Leibniz first published their results, there was great controversy over which mathematician (and therefore which country) deserved credit. Newton derived his results first, but Leibniz published first. Newton claimed Leibniz stole ideas from his unpublished notes, which Newton had shared with a few members of the Royal Society. This controversy divided English-speaking mathematicians from continental mathematicians for many years, to the detriment of English mathematics. A careful examination of the papers of Leibniz and Newton shows that they arrived at their results independently, with Leibniz starting first with integration and Newton with differentiation.
To be sure, both inventors were standing on the shoulders of mathematicians who had been piecing calculus together since 1800 BCE, but the primary factor in calculus coming about when it did was that the time was right.
The term eLearning also enjoyed simultaneous discovery. In the late nineties two trends converged to make that timing right.
e + learning. No wonder eLearning sprouted up in many places. I awoke one morning in 1998 with the term in my head. I was not the only one.
Elliott Masie’s bio says he is “acknowledged as the first analyst to use the term e-Learning.” Elliott told me he first heard it at IBM. I have been credited with the first use of eLearning on the web. Six months after CBT Systems announced its transformation into SmartForce, the eLearning company, in late 1999, every training company with a dial-up connection and a web page claimed to have eLearning. The term was misappropriated at warp speed and was soon FUBAR.
2002
Update: I just came upon an article on the web that talks of eLearning in 1997. That pre-dates my earliest eLearning articles. From now on, when asked if I invented the term eLearning, I’m going to point the questioner here and say, no, it wasn’t me, it was that guy.
Frankly, I prefer to be known as the Johnny Appleseed of informal learning than for naming something, in the company of others, more than ten years ago.
Effectiveness Column in June 2008 CLO magazine
Malleability, multimedia, and more
CLOs know that extracting meaning from growing mountains of information is tougher than ever before. The walls between disciplines are falling. Specialization, knowing more and more about less and less, is no longer an option. Everything is connected to everything else.
Reality is an endless stream of knowledge, culture and ideas that flows faster and faster. Traditional books are snapshots of that stream. The swifter the stream, the shorter the life of the book. A book is an event. We need a process that outlasts the moment — a movie in place of a photograph.
“I AM OUT OF TIME. You bought the beta edition of this book. Things change so fast that all books are dated by the time they are published. The world is moving too fast for closure. Our lives are in beta.”
So began my 2006 book, Informal Learning: Rediscovering the Natural Pathways That Inspire Innovation and Performance. The day it was published, my ideas were frozen in time, inert and unyielding to change. My author journey from outline to printed book took the better part of a year.
Something’s wrong here.
Books have been a mainstay of self-directed learning for centuries. CLOs may not break out the cost of books in the budget, but they assuredly invest heavily in them.
Books are not the ideal way to present subjects that change rapidly. Before I’m accused of calling for the death of books, permit me to say that works of art are timeless. Books such as Moby Dick, The Little Engine That Could, Catcher in the Rye, and David Copperfield are unbeatable. These novels and stories are whole unto themselves. That’s not the case for most nonfiction.
Wake-up call to the publishing industry: Why don’t you produce books that are current? Where are the pictures and maps? Why is the text all one size and color? Why don’t you provide updates on the Web? Why does it take a year to turn out a book? Why do most books come out as if one size fits all? Why don’t you encourage conversation with authors? How long do you expect to remain in business if you continue to act like fossils?
The publishing industry hardly has changed at all since the first paperback was printed in Venice. A page from the 1493 edition of Virgil’s Aeneid looks very similar to a page from The Social Life of Information printed 500 years later: rectangles of monochromatic text, no illustrations, page numbers in the corner and 1-inch margins all around.
A study by the Jenkins Group, a custom book publishing firm, found that:
• 42 percent of college graduates never read another book after college.
• 80 percent of U.S. families did not buy or read a book last year.
• 70 percent of U.S. adults have not been in a bookstore in the past five years.
• 57 percent of new books are not read to completion.
Increasingly, people hunt and gather what they want to read. Today’s activist readers pluck information from the blogosphere and YouTube and their friends on Facebook and MySpace.
To prosper in times ahead, we need to re-conceptualize our relationship with books, the role of authors and how to make books better. The shorthand for what I have in mind is the “un-book.” Here are some of the characteristics of un-books:
• Un-books are inherently multimedia. One of those media is paper. Paper is portable, familiar and easy to annotate. A hard-copy book conveys authority.
A spokesman for Alpo dog food long ago said the product was so good that he fed it to his own dogs. Using one’s own products is known as “eating the dog food.” In lieu of writing a book, I am going on the dog-food diet. Any CLOs want to join me?
Internet Time Group celebrates its tenth birthday this month. Artifacts from the early days of eLearning keep appearing as I reflect on the long, strange trip it’s been.
At the turn of the century, investors agreed that for eLearning, the sky was the limit. Or maybe it was more: shoot for the moon. As a reminder to never drink the Kool-Aid without sober reflection, here is the advice investment houses were putting out before the dot-bomb implosion:
Corporate eLearning: Exploring A New Frontier, 3/2000 (WR Hambrecht & Co.) The first report to focus exclusively on corporate eLearning and still one of the best out there. “At the beginning of the new millenium, corporations view learning increasingly as a competitive weapon rather than an annoying cost factor. Corporate executives are beginning to understand that enhancing employee skills is key to creating sustainable competitive advantage.”
The Knowledge Web, 5/2000 (Merrill Lynch) “Technology is the driver of the New Economy, and human capital is its fuel. Finding, attracting, and retaining knowledge workers will be mission-critical.
Companies providing online human capital solutions have the potential to bring together both richness and reach, creating a powerful and revolutionary user experience.” Corporate eLearning: Feeding Hungry Minds.
eLearning, the Engine of the Knowledge Economy, 7/2000 (Morgan Keegan) “The critical and distinguishing strength of countries, organizations, and individuals lies in their intelligence and knowledge in this new economy.” “Virtually no emerging industry has ever experienced dramatic growth without a set of common standards…. eLearning standards will allow eLearning content to be easily accessed and reused in various formats and will enable the inteoperability of learning technologies from difference vendors.”
eLearning: The birth of a vibrant industry, 7/2000 (Goldman Sachs) “Why corporate eLearning? Sustainable competitive advantage: More for less. It’s scalable. Customizable. Consistent. Assessible. Relevant. Convenient. Less costly.”
Riding the Big Waves, A White Paper on the B2B e*Learning Industry, 3/2000 (Thomas Weisel Partners) “Today, corporate learning and the corporate learning organization have ascended to a position of strategic prominence in the context of managing and growing the extended enterprise. Bearing this out, the number of corporate universities has grown four-fold to 1600 in the last ten years. Even more telling is corporate learning’s move to the executive suite. The result — an emerging $11.4 billion opportunity for companies providing B2B e*Learning solutions.”
Helping Investors Ride the eLearning Curve, 11/99. (US Bancorp Piper Jaffray) “We liken the evolution of eLearning to the evolution of ERP software, which is going through a very similar metamorphsis.” Go Web! Go ASP!
The e-Bang Theory, 9/99. (Bank of America Securities.) Howard Block was the first analyst of eLearning to “get it.” This report set the agenda for all that came later. Astute and entertaining.
Intellectual Capital for the Knowledge Economy, Proprietary Higher Education, 1/2000, Sun Trust
E-Knowledge, New Ways to Build the New Economy, 8/99, Wit Capital
Trace Urdan is an astute voice of reason among education industry analysts. When something’s bunk, Trace is not afraid to tell you. His free Signal Hill Education Signals newsletter is the only investment advice in our sector that I trust. Of course, it doesn’t have much company these days.
I test-drove a BMW 128 this afternoon. Costs about $30,000. I think I’ll buy the coupe. Any car-enthusiast readers have an opinion on this one?
What is the scope of our responsibility as learning professionals?
Most of us work for someone else, a corporation, school, client, or government. Our first responsibility is to apply our expertise to help our employers accomplish what they are trying to do.
Like doctors, we must take care never to harm the patient (or client).
When a superior asks us to do something unprofessional, we take a stand. You don’t tell your doctor how to take our tonsils. You don’t tell your accountant how to account to off-shore slush funds. (Let me take that back, for that’s what happened at Enron and WorldCom.) Your EVP should not be asking you to buy a thousands of CD titles from this nice guy he met on the golf course, let it be known that from a learning perspective, there are sounder choices.
Scope depends on the scope of the professional. If you’re down in the trenches, your responsibility might extend to preparing the coffee or mentoring someone after a workshop.
A CLO is responsible for developing the talent required for organizational success. This might involve installing better lighting, putting wi-fi in the cafeteria, or reinforcing a change of corporate culture.
I’ve asked a number of people if a CLO is responsible for helping employees with learning disorders. Assuming there’s a decent cost/benefit ratio, I’d say they should take it on. Everyone I interviewed shifted the responsibility to another department. Most frequently, they didn’t want to invade the individual’s privacy. Should we begin treating the infirm and the blind the same way? “It’s not my department” under these circumstances sounds unprofessional to me.
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