Well, my plan to do video recaps at DevLearn didn't go exactly as planned. The Day 1 video refused to upload to YouTube and I got back way too late on Day 2 (thanks to attending a surprise wedding renewal... a nice problem to have!) to record coherent sentences. By Day 3 I figured this was all going to be post-conference reflections and that was just going to be okay.
Now that I'm home and have access to delightfully strong Wi-Fi, I've posted that Day 1 video after all (you can view it here). But since I'm doing all the other days as blog posts, I figured I may as well just recap it in text too.
1) Keynote - Learning Disrupted: The unrecognizable new world of tech and culture
Speaker: David Pogue
Who doesn't want to start a learning & tech conference by looking at the absurd amount of things our tech can do these days?! From keeping track of your health to making your smart phone into an ocarina, Pogue talked about we are surrounded by new tech. And what's cool is this tech doesn't just make our lives better (or, at least, more ocarina-infused), it also changes how, what, and why we create, share, and interact. No surprise, that's why it's important to keep on top of it, especially for those of us in L&D.
So there's that point, but Pogue also made another important one: not all these tech ideas are going to make an impact. For every tech success, there are dozens of products that don't pan out (or, let's be honest, were just too stupid to succeed... I'm looking at you Nintendo Power Glove). It takes all that trying weird ideas and often failing, though, to find what sticks.
2) DIY Music Tracks - Loops and Virtual Instruments
Speaker: Don Bolen
If you're looking to create a more immersive experience in your eLearning, videos, podcasts and other cool training mediums, adding a soundtrack can help you out. They're great for conveying moods, emotions, transitions, and/or a sense of place, all of which can make what you create feel more realistic. That said, most of us aren't trained composers. But thanks to loops (tiny snippets of sound/music you can chain together to create songs and soundtracks) all of us have the ability to put together our own soundtracks with a bit of effort.
When it came to what to compile your loops in, Bolen recommended GarageBand. This was because it's cheap (well, it's cheap IF you already own Apple products), easy to learn, and, best yet, comes with free loops already installed. If you want to use other software or if you need to expand your library of loops, though, Bolen mentioned a few options for acquiring more cheaply, including:
On a related note, if you're looking to make your own loops, I've actually bumped into a few easy-to-use iOS apps that are great for that. As of late, I've been playing with Auxy, Beatwave, and Figure, all of which are worth poking at with a stick.
3) We don't own social in the workplace and we never will
Speaker: JD Dillon
Has the universe ever conspired against you? That's how I used to feel about JD's sessions. If we were both speaking at a conference, then inevitably we'd always be scheduled at the same time, much to my annoyance. Thankfully, the universe clearly got lazy this year because I FINALLY got to see him speak. No surprise if you follow him on Twitter, his session was both useful and hilarious.
Basically, lots of organizations have invested in social tools that it turns out their employees don't care about using. Some companies like to make the excuse that it's just because people don't know how to use the tools (and then WE all get called in to build completely unnecessary training), but JD says that's not the real problem. It's not that they don't know how to use the tools - in fact, many of these tools are just as easy to use as Facebook or Instagram - it's that they don't automatically see how the tools fit into what they're trying to accomplish at work.
So what can you do to help people want to bother with those social tools? Well, a lot of what JD found helpful was actually modeling using the tools to get things done. Want your team to use your chat tool to keep in touch? Chat with them through it so they can see how it's useful. Want them to start using Slack instead of email? Start running a team project through it so people can figure it out (are you thinking of doing this? Then go bug JD on Twitter about how he got his team using Slack). People don't just magically understand how whatever tool you're trying to launch will make their work lives better. Often you've got to help them see the value.
One of the other key points he brought up was that, for social tools to take off, L&D shouldn't actually be leading the work on them. Sure, L&D should have influence (and often we're in a pretty great position to test out new tools and weigh in on what's actually worth bothering with), but for social to actually take hold it's got to be used beyond just in training.
4) The past, present, and future of games and learning
Speakers: Julie Dirksen, Sharon Boller, Koreen Pagano, and Bianca Woods
Hey look! It's one of my sessions!
Since I was actually speaking and not live tweeting the thing, that makes it a bit tricky to cover afterwards. Instead, let me just give you a taste by answering the last two questions we were asked.
What's your favourite game that you've played recently?
Oh boy... this one's weird. I'm quite keen on both games in the visual novel genre as well what you could basically categorize as "bizarrely random stuff from Japan". My most recent fav, Hatoful Boyfriend, sits well within both of those areas. The thing is a spot-on spoof of Japanese dating sim games, but with one weird twist: all the characters you're trying to romance in the game are pigeons. So it's super weird, but I love it. I adore branched storytelling and it's such an excellent example of how differently a story can go based on your choices. Plus, it just cracks me up every time.
What game do you think people should play to better understand games and learning?
I took a slightly different turn with this question. Rather than recommend a specific game I recommended a specific process: back a game on Kickstarter. What's great about this approach is that games that go up on Kickstarter usually haven't been developed fully yet... and the developers send backers updates through the entire development process (yup... even if you back them at the lowest price point available). I have learned so much about how to develop a game just from all of the backer updates I've gotten through the years, so if you're looking to create or purchase a game for learning, why not learn from the experts?! Plus, I've found there's a ton of overlap between how we develop everything we create in L&D and how game devs approach projects. Even if you never make a game yourself, you can learn a lot about great design and development approaches from these updates.
5) Keynote - Digital badges and the future of learning
Speaker: Connie Yowell
And, to cap things off for the day, another keynote!
Yowell opened with what we need to solve for if we want to reimagine learning: lowered student engagement, entering the workplace without the skills employers want, and a lack of equal access to the tools/programs/resources that help students succeed. To solve for this, Yowell looked at how successful adults mapped the things that helped them learn. As it turned out, they didn't just point to the traditional school path; they also mapped a wide (and not particularly linear) range of other connected and networked ways they learned new skills.
To reimagine learning in a useful way, then, Yowell said you need to find a way to capture and share that wide range of experiences. And the best way to do that is through open badges.
The open badge website has some wonderful content on what exactly these things are. The VERY condensed version is that an open badge carries data about who earned the badge, where they earned it, what they did to earn it, and a connection to relevant standards. You would earn badges for learning new skills anywhere (not just in school) and those badges could be shown to others as a way of displaying the skills you'd learned throughout your life. Kind of like a combo transcript/portfolio/scouting sash that follows you throughout your career and documents a wide range of knowledge. And that broader system of showing a range of experiences could be just what we need to solve the problems Yowell discussed at the beginning of the talk.
So what makes open badges different from any other badges? It's that ability to take them with you anywhere. In most systems the badges you earn are for that system alone. If you leave the system, you don't take the badges with you. In the world of gaming, that's like me earning achievements on my PS4 but not being able to transfer them to an Xbox One. That's annoying, but it's way worse in your work life. You're constantly learning things at work, but your record of that progress doesn't travel with you if you move to a new company. With an open badge system, though, it would. And that would be great for reasons beyond keeping you from having to redo the same legally mandated health and safety training every time you move to a new company.
That's a wrap for Day 1! My Days 2 and 3 coverage will be following along later this week. But, for now, sleep. Sweet, glorious sleep!
Showing posts with label elearning guild. Show all posts
Showing posts with label elearning guild. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 6, 2015
Wednesday, September 30, 2015
DevLearn 2015 - Where I'll be
Hey guys! Just a quick post about what I'm up to at DevLearn this year.
As always, I'll be live tweeting the event. I haven't solidified my concurrent session schedule just yet, but I'll definitely be at all the keynotes. There are also two sessions I can guarantee I'll be at... pretty much because I'm actually one of the session speakers for them.
Wednesday, Sep 30th - 3:00-4:00pm
The past, present, and future of games and learning
Hear a panel of really clever people (and somehow me as well) talk about how games and learning come together. Chances are I will find some way to bring up that bizarre pigeon dating simulation game I've been obsessed with. You've been warned! ;)
Thursday, October 1st - 1:15-2:15pm
What? I don't have to be an art wiz to create my own design assets?
Yes, it's another of my series of conference talks that make it very clear I used to be an art teacher! Seriously, though, I really do believe that everyone (even those of you who can't draw stick people) can learn to create images, photos, and/or fonts yourself with the help of a few cheap tool and a couple of nifty tips that we'll discuss in this session. Also, this session *may* have some hideous examples of crummy designs I myself made when I was much younger and a lot less skilled. Come for the design tips! Stay for my horrible first website about the repulsiveness of Tiger Tail ice cream!
For those of you at DevLearn, looking forward to seeing you tomorrow! For those of you not here, hope to see you on the backchannel!
As always, I'll be live tweeting the event. I haven't solidified my concurrent session schedule just yet, but I'll definitely be at all the keynotes. There are also two sessions I can guarantee I'll be at... pretty much because I'm actually one of the session speakers for them.
Wednesday, Sep 30th - 3:00-4:00pm
The past, present, and future of games and learning
Hear a panel of really clever people (and somehow me as well) talk about how games and learning come together. Chances are I will find some way to bring up that bizarre pigeon dating simulation game I've been obsessed with. You've been warned! ;)
Thursday, October 1st - 1:15-2:15pm
What? I don't have to be an art wiz to create my own design assets?
Yes, it's another of my series of conference talks that make it very clear I used to be an art teacher! Seriously, though, I really do believe that everyone (even those of you who can't draw stick people) can learn to create images, photos, and/or fonts yourself with the help of a few cheap tool and a couple of nifty tips that we'll discuss in this session. Also, this session *may* have some hideous examples of crummy designs I myself made when I was much younger and a lot less skilled. Come for the design tips! Stay for my horrible first website about the repulsiveness of Tiger Tail ice cream!
For those of you at DevLearn, looking forward to seeing you tomorrow! For those of you not here, hope to see you on the backchannel!
Tuesday, March 24, 2015
Learning Solutions 2015 - What I'm going to try to live tweet!
It's the night before one of the most fun events of the year (and one that's happily NOT in Vegas): Learning Solutions!
I just had an amusing day of playing absurd pirate mini golf with my work siblings, AKA: two of my awesome co-workers, and my mom. It should surprise no one that none of us are going to ditch L&D for a professional mini-golf career, but we had a great time in spite of our lack of athletic ability.
Now I'm just settling in, getting excited about my schedule, and thinking about the sessions I'm going to see. Once again, I'm going to try and live tweet this thing, and here's my intended schedule for the next three days. It may change a little bit here and there, but this is at least what I expect I'll be live tweeting each day:
Wednesday
8:30-10:00 AM - Keynote - Return on imagination
Speaker:Tom Wujec
10:45-11:45 AM - Featured session: Bridging the gender gap
Speakers: Jennifer Hofmann, Mark Lassoff, Megan Torrance, and David Kelly
1:00-2:00 PM - I know it's ugly, but I can't tell you why: Fixing common design mistakes
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Oh look... it's my own session! Yeah... I somehow suspect I won't be live tweeting this one.
2:30-3:30 PM - The second-screen experience: Designing a paperless classroom
Speaker: Andrew Vecchiarelli
Andrew is one of the awesome co-workers I mentioned earlier and you should totally go to his session. Also, I've seen his content and it is GOOD!
4:00-5:00 PM - Interactive video for training: Secrets of success
Speakers: Cass Sapir and Ty Marbut
Thursday
8:30-10:00 AM - Keynote- The future of learning at work
Speaker: Michael Furdyk
10:45-11:45 AM - Training hacks to improve your practice
Speaker: David Glow
1:00-2:00 PM - Serious game secrets: What, why, where, who cares?
Speaker: Andrew Hughes
2:30-3:30 PM - Free and low-cost eLearning tools you should know!
Speaker: Joe Ganci
3:45-4:45 PM - BYOL: Project paramedic: Tools and resources to resuscitate your projects
Speaker: Coline Son Lee
4:45-6:45 PM - LS DemoFest
Friday
8:30-9:30 AM - BYOL: Video 101 - Creating captivating videos on a budget
Speakers: Amanda Mahoney and Stacy Bodenner
10:00-11:00 AM - BYOL: Video 102 - Building your intermediate video skills
Speakers: Amanda Mahoney and Stacy Bodenner
11:15 AM-12:30 PM - Keynote: Design thinking to enhance learning
Speaker: Juliette LaMontagne
Hope to see you there, either in-person or on the backchannel!
I just had an amusing day of playing absurd pirate mini golf with my work siblings, AKA: two of my awesome co-workers, and my mom. It should surprise no one that none of us are going to ditch L&D for a professional mini-golf career, but we had a great time in spite of our lack of athletic ability.
Now I'm just settling in, getting excited about my schedule, and thinking about the sessions I'm going to see. Once again, I'm going to try and live tweet this thing, and here's my intended schedule for the next three days. It may change a little bit here and there, but this is at least what I expect I'll be live tweeting each day:
Wednesday
8:30-10:00 AM - Keynote - Return on imagination
Speaker:Tom Wujec
10:45-11:45 AM - Featured session: Bridging the gender gap
Speakers: Jennifer Hofmann, Mark Lassoff, Megan Torrance, and David Kelly
1:00-2:00 PM - I know it's ugly, but I can't tell you why: Fixing common design mistakes
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Oh look... it's my own session! Yeah... I somehow suspect I won't be live tweeting this one.
2:30-3:30 PM - The second-screen experience: Designing a paperless classroom
Speaker: Andrew Vecchiarelli
Andrew is one of the awesome co-workers I mentioned earlier and you should totally go to his session. Also, I've seen his content and it is GOOD!
4:00-5:00 PM - Interactive video for training: Secrets of success
Speakers: Cass Sapir and Ty Marbut
Thursday
8:30-10:00 AM - Keynote- The future of learning at work
Speaker: Michael Furdyk
10:45-11:45 AM - Training hacks to improve your practice
Speaker: David Glow
1:00-2:00 PM - Serious game secrets: What, why, where, who cares?
Speaker: Andrew Hughes
2:30-3:30 PM - Free and low-cost eLearning tools you should know!
Speaker: Joe Ganci
3:45-4:45 PM - BYOL: Project paramedic: Tools and resources to resuscitate your projects
Speaker: Coline Son Lee
4:45-6:45 PM - LS DemoFest
Friday
8:30-9:30 AM - BYOL: Video 101 - Creating captivating videos on a budget
Speakers: Amanda Mahoney and Stacy Bodenner
10:00-11:00 AM - BYOL: Video 102 - Building your intermediate video skills
Speakers: Amanda Mahoney and Stacy Bodenner
11:15 AM-12:30 PM - Keynote: Design thinking to enhance learning
Speaker: Juliette LaMontagne
Hope to see you there, either in-person or on the backchannel!
Thursday, March 27, 2014
Learning Solutions 2014 - Day 3
Okay, it's taken me a bit of time to get this up here (I blame a terrifying wave of post-conference exhaustion) but here's your wrap up of Learning Solutions: Day 3 (AKA: the half day in which everyone is both ready to fall over from tiredness AND still sad the conference is almost over).
1) BYOL: Awesome Audacity - Tips and Techniques for This Free Tool
Speaker: Don Bolen
This was a walkthrough of the basics of using Audacity, so it's a bit hard to give you all a rundown of what happened other then yes... we did get a great introduction to the tool. Instead, here are a few links that will help you get up to speed with this tool:
I'd actually never used Audacity before this session, but had previously had friends tell me it was a great tool. By the end of this session I'd have to say I agree. While it's not remotely as easy for newbies to just pick up and go the way Garageband can be, once you have someone show you the ropes it's pretty simple. It's also substantially more powerful in a lot of ways than Garageband. I honestly wish there was some way to mesh the ease of use and friendly UI of Garageband with the power of Audacity.
2) Today's Visual Design Trends: What Non-Designers Need to Know
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Yes, I actually did two sessions at Learning Solutions this year.
I'm going to do the exact same thing I did with my Thursday session: show my work by giving you the link to my session resources website. It's got links to all the tools I talked about in this session (plus a few more I thought were worth sharing), the session slide deck, and my full speakers notes. Enjoy!
3) Keynote: Now You See It: How the Brain Science of Attention Will Transform the Way We Live, Work, and Learn
Speaker: Cathy Davidson
Awww... the last session of the conference. It's always a bit bittersweet.
In this session Davidson explored the idea of attention, in particular how our perception of how well we pay attention to the world around us doesn't typically mesh well with reality. In our heads we think we're fantastic at paying attention, but as it turns out we're rather rubbish at noticing things outside of what we're focused on.
To make matters worse, it's incredibly easy to manipulate our focus. Take this famous video: the Monkey Business Illusion (AKA: the Gorilla Test). Don't read any farther... just go watch this video and come back.
Did you watch the whole video? Great.
So did you notice all the other stuff going on in the video? Chances are you missed most or even all of it beyond the basketball. Don't worry, there's nothing wrong with you in particular, this is just a demonstration of how human brains tend to focus on one thing to the exclusion of everything else. Our attention can be influenced by others (such as the directions in the gorilla video telling you to focus on the basketballs), but it can also be influenced by our own experience. Yes, your expertise can actually make you less inclined to notice some things because your attention is guided by your expectations and past experience. This is why sometimes a newbie can notice things that experts can't, particularly if that thing is surprising.
Yes, our brains sometimes betray us. So what can we do? Well, we need to leverage tools and partners to help us see the whole picture and catch the things we miss. Here are a few ways you can do this:
And so Learning Solutions 2014 came to an end. As always I found myself happy I had attended, but really ready to take a nap for about three days straight.
As a final side note, this year the conference was helpful not just for learning from sessions and other attendees, but also for this spectacular reveal about DevLearn 2014:
Yeah, the fangirl squeeing will be non-stop until October. :)
1) BYOL: Awesome Audacity - Tips and Techniques for This Free Tool
Speaker: Don Bolen
This was a walkthrough of the basics of using Audacity, so it's a bit hard to give you all a rundown of what happened other then yes... we did get a great introduction to the tool. Instead, here are a few links that will help you get up to speed with this tool:
- You can download Audacity for Windows, Mac, and Linux (yes, Linux!) here.
- Learning the keyboard shortcuts in Audacity will speed up your workflow a lot. Here's a handy dandy keyboard shortcut cheat sheet I found.
- One of the first steps in getting used to Audacity is figuring out what everything on the Control Toolbar actually does. Here's a quick guide to it.
- Finally, here's the Audacity help manual. Among other things, it also has a number of tutorials.
I'd actually never used Audacity before this session, but had previously had friends tell me it was a great tool. By the end of this session I'd have to say I agree. While it's not remotely as easy for newbies to just pick up and go the way Garageband can be, once you have someone show you the ropes it's pretty simple. It's also substantially more powerful in a lot of ways than Garageband. I honestly wish there was some way to mesh the ease of use and friendly UI of Garageband with the power of Audacity.
2) Today's Visual Design Trends: What Non-Designers Need to Know
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Yes, I actually did two sessions at Learning Solutions this year.
I'm going to do the exact same thing I did with my Thursday session: show my work by giving you the link to my session resources website. It's got links to all the tools I talked about in this session (plus a few more I thought were worth sharing), the session slide deck, and my full speakers notes. Enjoy!
3) Keynote: Now You See It: How the Brain Science of Attention Will Transform the Way We Live, Work, and Learn
Speaker: Cathy Davidson
Awww... the last session of the conference. It's always a bit bittersweet.
In this session Davidson explored the idea of attention, in particular how our perception of how well we pay attention to the world around us doesn't typically mesh well with reality. In our heads we think we're fantastic at paying attention, but as it turns out we're rather rubbish at noticing things outside of what we're focused on.
To make matters worse, it's incredibly easy to manipulate our focus. Take this famous video: the Monkey Business Illusion (AKA: the Gorilla Test). Don't read any farther... just go watch this video and come back.
Did you watch the whole video? Great.
So did you notice all the other stuff going on in the video? Chances are you missed most or even all of it beyond the basketball. Don't worry, there's nothing wrong with you in particular, this is just a demonstration of how human brains tend to focus on one thing to the exclusion of everything else. Our attention can be influenced by others (such as the directions in the gorilla video telling you to focus on the basketballs), but it can also be influenced by our own experience. Yes, your expertise can actually make you less inclined to notice some things because your attention is guided by your expectations and past experience. This is why sometimes a newbie can notice things that experts can't, particularly if that thing is surprising.
Yes, our brains sometimes betray us. So what can we do? Well, we need to leverage tools and partners to help us see the whole picture and catch the things we miss. Here are a few ways you can do this:
- Like I mentioned before, think about including thoughtful non-experts (or people who aren't close to a project) in some of your reviews and discussions. Their lack of expert focus will actually cause them to see things and expert might miss. Of course, thoughtful is the key word here in choosing who to ask to be your non-expert in the room.
- Don't do everything alone. Team up with other people who have different skills and experiences from you. These differences will help your group pick up on different things (this is one of the great arguments in favour of team diversity).
- Just simply talk about ideas/problems with others.
- Everyone has different things that help them focus their attention. Do some reflection and think about what things work specifically for you, then remember to use these techniques regularly.
The session wrapped with Davidson talking about how our current education system is rooted in the Industrial Age mindset of just teaching kinds to have singleminded focus and punctuality... the exact skills required to work in a factory. However, these skills don't prepare us for our world today, a world in which it's much more important to be able to see topics both deeply and broadly. A world in which it's not just important to know how to learn skills, but also know how to unlearn and relearn skills too. A world in which we're lifelong learners. Changing how we teach (and the values our teaching methods imply) is the best way to strengthen our ability to notice more and come up with better solutions.
And so Learning Solutions 2014 came to an end. As always I found myself happy I had attended, but really ready to take a nap for about three days straight.
As a final side note, this year the conference was helpful not just for learning from sessions and other attendees, but also for this spectacular reveal about DevLearn 2014:
 |
| Oh HECK yeah!!! |
Yeah, the fangirl squeeing will be non-stop until October. :)
Friday, March 21, 2014
Learning Solutions 2014 - Day 2
Day Two of the conference featured absurdly good weather, yet again. Seriously, it is making me so happy to not be wearing a big, bulky coat (and, even with that, STILL be freezing to death). *sigh* I don't want to move back to FL anytime soon, but it's definitely great to visit at this time of year.
So here's what I was up to today...
1) General Session- Big Data Demystified for Learning: What's Important, What's Not, and What's Next
Speaker: Douglas Merrill
I feel like most conferences have at least one session these days that focuses on a buzzword topic (not a complaint, just an observation). So this was our LSCon trend topic session: big data.
Big data is something we hear about constantly, but often without much context other than "Look at all the info we can capture! More info must mean we'll do better at _____." But Merrill made the point that there's no guarantee that'll actually happen. In fact, he made some very sensible challenges to the idea that big data is an automatic game changer.
On one hand, big data isn't this magical, mystical thing it's sometimes made it out to be. Many people get stressed out at the very mention of the word "math", and so they buy in to this religion of data because it's a way of dealing with the potential for data and math to help us, without going into the actual details of how exactly it can do that. You don't have to understand the data... you just have to have faith that it works.
Except there are so many ways to manage and interpret data, so if you don't understand how that process works, you're going to just mangle what all your data actually means. Be aware of how outliers can warp results in weird ways. Acknowledge that data isn't independent, it's always connected to other factors ("No data is an island..." *laugh*). Understand how the real world can be messier and more chaotic than mere data can represent.
Or, to summarize, ignore your anxiety and go take a great Stats 101 class (seriously, stats is the best kind of math for people who hate math)!
On the other hand, if you can learn to interpret data properly, it can empower you to do some fantastic things. It allows companies to pay better attention to what their customers are actually doing, not what they think they're doing. For instance, take the music industry back when they were in the early days of dealing with pirated MP3s. They thought the solution was to sue the people who were illegally downloading the most of their music. But, as it turns out, these exact same people were also the users who were spending the most on legal downloads as well. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot instead of looking at the bigger picture. Now, this doesn't mean you only listen to what your customers want and do. That mindset gets in the way of innovation (sometimes customers can't actually conceive of the new thing they might someday want),. That said, it's definitely worth paying attention to data for interpreting what your customers are actually doing.
Crowdsourcing is another angle on using big data smartly. Done right it allows you to use a wide array of sources to do things as different as building a spell correct system for Google searches or hiring more effectively.
2) Doing Things With Words: Words That Work in eLearning
Speaker: Lisa Russell
In this session we talked about the nuts and bolts of the words, phrasing, and sentences we choose to use in our training.
3) Best Practices For Enlivening the Virtual Classroom
Speaker: Pandora Bryce
You know what's a bizarre but amusing experience? Live tweeting a session lead by a coworker where she's presenting a case study involving your own workplace. Not bad... just a bit surreal. *laugh*
So here's what I was up to today...
1) General Session- Big Data Demystified for Learning: What's Important, What's Not, and What's Next
Speaker: Douglas Merrill
I feel like most conferences have at least one session these days that focuses on a buzzword topic (not a complaint, just an observation). So this was our LSCon trend topic session: big data.
Big data is something we hear about constantly, but often without much context other than "Look at all the info we can capture! More info must mean we'll do better at _____." But Merrill made the point that there's no guarantee that'll actually happen. In fact, he made some very sensible challenges to the idea that big data is an automatic game changer.
On one hand, big data isn't this magical, mystical thing it's sometimes made it out to be. Many people get stressed out at the very mention of the word "math", and so they buy in to this religion of data because it's a way of dealing with the potential for data and math to help us, without going into the actual details of how exactly it can do that. You don't have to understand the data... you just have to have faith that it works.
Except there are so many ways to manage and interpret data, so if you don't understand how that process works, you're going to just mangle what all your data actually means. Be aware of how outliers can warp results in weird ways. Acknowledge that data isn't independent, it's always connected to other factors ("No data is an island..." *laugh*). Understand how the real world can be messier and more chaotic than mere data can represent.
Or, to summarize, ignore your anxiety and go take a great Stats 101 class (seriously, stats is the best kind of math for people who hate math)!
On the other hand, if you can learn to interpret data properly, it can empower you to do some fantastic things. It allows companies to pay better attention to what their customers are actually doing, not what they think they're doing. For instance, take the music industry back when they were in the early days of dealing with pirated MP3s. They thought the solution was to sue the people who were illegally downloading the most of their music. But, as it turns out, these exact same people were also the users who were spending the most on legal downloads as well. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot instead of looking at the bigger picture. Now, this doesn't mean you only listen to what your customers want and do. That mindset gets in the way of innovation (sometimes customers can't actually conceive of the new thing they might someday want),. That said, it's definitely worth paying attention to data for interpreting what your customers are actually doing.
Crowdsourcing is another angle on using big data smartly. Done right it allows you to use a wide array of sources to do things as different as building a spell correct system for Google searches or hiring more effectively.
At the end of the day big data isn't the magical solution that some people think it is, but if you use it smartly (and stop being so darn afraid of math) it can be more effective than skeptics would lead you to believe.
So overall the session was enjoyable. However, there was one thing that, while it may have seemed small to others, stuck out to me. Merrill made this crack during his talk about the CEO of Zappos and what exactly it said about him that he spent so much time around women's shoes. I'm sure he wasn't intending to be a jerk, but, you know, that's not the kind of comment that would be likely to make a transgender Guild member feel particularly welcome. It's more often the repeated little things, like those kinds of jokes, that make people feel like they're not a part of a community and I would have thought a lot more of the session had that one thoughtless joke not been there.
2) Doing Things With Words: Words That Work in eLearning
Speaker: Lisa Russell
In this session we talked about the nuts and bolts of the words, phrasing, and sentences we choose to use in our training.
Words, even a small number of them, have the power to move people. Take, for instance, Ernest Hemingway's famous 6-word story:
"For sale: baby shoes, never worn."
It's just a few words, but because they're so cleverly chosen they can still stir a surprising amount of emotions.
"For sale: baby shoes, never worn."
It's just a few words, but because they're so cleverly chosen they can still stir a surprising amount of emotions.
And yet, when most people write they pad out their content, using filler words and sloppy sentence structure to convey information clumsily. But in training, we don't have the luxury of letting our writing meander. If you don't grab people in the first few words, you may have lost them for good. So you need to make your prose snappy, and you need to figure out what your specific audience will actually respond to.
So how can you fix this? First, pay attention to your phrasing. Arrange your words for emphasis, keeping in mind that the first and last words in a sentence will get special attention. Next, don't be a word hoarder by padding your writing with filler words. If you can't tell your information simply, you don't know it well enough. Also, use active, not passive words. Passive language kills the action in what you're writing.
Finally, use the framework of the MEAL plan to balance your paragraphs:
M: Your main idea
E: Your evidence
A: Analysis
L: Link back to the main idea or lead out to the next one
Keeping these tips in mind can make your writing clear and concise.
3) Best Practices For Enlivening the Virtual Classroom
Speaker: Pandora Bryce
You know what's a bizarre but amusing experience? Live tweeting a session lead by a coworker where she's presenting a case study involving your own workplace. Not bad... just a bit surreal. *laugh*
Bryce used this session to talk about two aspects of virtual classrooms (VCs): a summary of some of the ways we use VCs at BMO Financial Group and a selection of VC roadblocks (plus suggestions for ways around some of them).
So, for context, we run about 110 VCs per week at BMO and have 50+ certified VC facilitators. That is a lot of VC content. On the plus side, VCs have no travel costs, don't require a physical classroom, enable broader access to training, have features that are difficult/expensive to replicate in classrooms, allow anonymous knowledge checks, make it easy to capture questions and output, and are, no surprise, relatively cheap. On the other hand, all of them suffer from the same problem: it's a challenge to maintain learner attention.
So there are a few VC best practices that can help attract and keep people's attention in them:
Bryce then followed this with a description of two programs at BMO that use VCs in engaging ways, one for Customer Service Representatives (bank tellers) and another for first time leaders. In both cases the VCs were just one part of the program, with eLearning, manager 1-on-1s, and group work (obviously done via conference calls) included in the overall experience. The VCs themselves were used not for basic content that was explained by a talking head, but instead for facilitated group discussions and debriefs on the more complex, grey areas of the content. And using VCs for discussion and talking through tricky issues tended to get people to buy in to the learning experience substantially more than just asking them to put on a headset and listen to a live lecture.
As for VC roadblocks (and a few suggestions for solving for them), Bryce mentioned 3:
If you can figure out your own team's solutions to these barriers, it makes running VCs much easier.
4) Telling Your Story With Infographics
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Oh look... it's my own session!
Obviously I'm not going to review my own talk. However, I am going to to do the "share your work" thing and give you a link to my session resources page. It's got links to all the tools I talked about in this session (plus a few more I thought were worth sharing), the session slide deck, and my full speakers notes.
Enjoy!
And this has turned into yet another terribly late night for me. So I'm going to keep this wrap up short by saying this conference continues to be excellent in all ways.
As for VC roadblocks (and a few suggestions for solving for them), Bryce mentioned 3:
- Human Obstacles: What if people don't do their prework? What if they haven't figured out their tech setup before the session. Solutions can include giving them training and support on the tech side of things long before the session starts. Also, set their expectations for the VC early, so they get why the prework is important.
- Organizational Obstacles: In the case of the new customer service representatives, when they began their training many of them didn't have access to corporate email or the company intranet yet. Plus, many bank branches only had a single computer available for employees to use for training, which meant you couldn't schedule more than one person at a branch at once for a VC at any given time. Because learners didn't have remote access to the intranet either, they couldn't do their training remotely from home. As well, there was a culture of text and content-heavy slides for VCs that didn't work well for learners.
- Technology Issues: What if the technology doesn't work as planned? Obviously doing the pre-session tech test first helps, but sometimes things just stop working in the session itself. What should you do then?
If you can figure out your own team's solutions to these barriers, it makes running VCs much easier.
4) Telling Your Story With Infographics
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Oh look... it's my own session!
Obviously I'm not going to review my own talk. However, I am going to to do the "share your work" thing and give you a link to my session resources page. It's got links to all the tools I talked about in this session (plus a few more I thought were worth sharing), the session slide deck, and my full speakers notes.
Enjoy!
And this has turned into yet another terribly late night for me. So I'm going to keep this wrap up short by saying this conference continues to be excellent in all ways.
Thursday, March 20, 2014
Learning Solutions 2014 - Day 1
I've got to say, it's nice to be at Learning Solutions in Orlando right now. Yes, obviously it's great to hear fantastic speakers and catch up with industry friends, but, as I'm sure anyone from the northeast will agree, it's even more exciting to actually be without snow for awhile! *laugh*
Okay, all kidding aside, I really am happy to be back here for my second Learning Solutions. As this was a particularly session-packed day (and I have a presentation tomorrow and need my sleep) I'm going to cut to the chase and get right down to the session reflections.
1) Keynote - Leapfrogging to Learning Breakthroughs
Speaker: Soren Kaplan
I've said this before and I'll say it again: I feel like the first session of a conference needs to focus on getting you energized and open to learning more. In this case, Kaplan definitely hit the right note with his talk of creating breakthroughs using surprise.
Kaplan became interested in finding out how business leaders had made major breakthroughs, and what he found was this: many great breakthroughs involve an element of positive surprise for the customer, and sometimes even the business too. In fact, brain science confirms the benefits of this as well. When people experience a positive surprise, the pleasure centres in their brain actually light up.
But how do you go about finding the right surprises? And how do you broaden your view so your focus on one issue or thing doesn't get in the way of your seeing other options? Kapan suggested there are three things anyone can do to become more innovative and find the surprise in their business or role:
Sure, I'll agree that much of his content wasn't rocket surgery or anything new, but it was a good reminder to all of us that we need to not just know these things, but actually act on them on a regular basis.
2) Featured Session - Subscription Learning: A Fundamentally Different Form of eLearning
Speaker: Will Thalheimer
Subscription learning is a pretty simple concept: it's smaller packages of learning that you sign up to receive and get on a regular basis. It's like the magazine subscription of the learning world. While it isn't exactly a brand new idea, it is much easier to implement today than even just a few years ago (both from a tool and a cost perspective).
Many L&D groups put out one-time learning events or a handful of multi-session lessons. Unfortunately, what we know about how content is actually retained tells us this isn't the best way to ensure the people actually learn the information we're trying to teach. The forgetting curve tells us that learners unfortunately don't remember much content in the long-term from one-time learning events. However, if you regularly repeat and build on content over time, people remember substantially more. Subscription-based learning is an excellent option for training in the way we know people actually retain content.
When it comes to how you teach your information in a subscription situation, there are a few tips to keep in mind. First, repeated content is good, but don't repeat it the exact same way each time. Studies showed that paraphrased repeated content was much easier to remember than the exact same text repeated over and over. Also, space out your learning. Give people time in between learning content, repeating it, and adding on. This gives them some time to process.
When it comes to actually delivering this content, there are numerous ways to push it out to your subscribers. Email is a simple, yet effective, option. Apps and bite-sized eLearning are other delivery method too. Even texts can be a reasonable choice in some situations. And, while we didn't discuss it in this session, there are tons of other alternatives (both tech enabled and not) you can try. How about podcasts, interactive PDFs, or videos, just to name a few?
3) Where Does the Learning Occur In Games?
Speaker: Rick Blunt
You know, I had actually sworn off sessions on learning and games (long story), but this one pulled me in with an intriguing concept and a Twitter buddy (@rblunt81) as the speaker... particularly because I hadn't realized this friend actually had a background in games for learning (the more you know). So, I went anyway and was glad I did.
To really get this session it's important to first establish what exactly a game is. Blunt's definition was simple: a game is an engaging activity in which players seek a goal by overcoming challenges within a given set of rules. That definition applies as much to a simple game of tic-tac-toe as it does to a modern videogame. Game-based learning (in this case, serious games) is just an extension of that, where the game's main purpose is learning. Games like this aren't just fun, when designed well they give nearly all types of learners a noticeable boost (the only group left out: most learners over 40... sorry guys!). Now, just like any tool, you can't use games for learning in all situations, but for the circumstances they work well in they're a good option to consider.
When you're designing a game for learning there are three goals you need to consider: the business goal, the learning goal, and the game goal. Only when you've considered all three of these goals (and made sure your solutions for each aren't working against each other) can you create a game that actually teaches content in a meaningful and successful way.
Then Blunt showed us an example of a serious game done right: Re-Mission. This game was designed for adolescents with cancer to both teach them about the disease, as well as prepare them for how it would affect their day-to-day life. And what was interesting to see was that, by structuring the game missions and elements around what you want players to learn (in this case, how to live with cancer) while also not forgetting the fun, you could create an engaging game that would also manage to teach players content as they played. Game-based learning also allows for something we know is a powerful learning tool: failure in a safe environment.
Now, this isn't to say that all game-based learning is effective. Goodness knows any kid from the 80s can tell you about all the well-intentioned, but content-devoid learning games they played as kids (I'm looking at you The Oregon Train). But it does mean that there are ways to make games that can lead to actual learning.
And if you only take one lesson from this session, let it be this one: a game will resonate with people if you make sure to give players the opportunity to make meaningful choices.
4) Reality TV Training as an Onboarding Program
Speaker: Gail Griswold and Samuel Weber
I'll admit, other than an affection for the early seasons of Project Runway I'm not that in to reality TV. But, based on the sheer number of different reality shows available right now, it's clear that many people are attracted to this genre, so I thought it was worth taking a peek at how one team had created a reality TV-inspired onboarding program for their company.
The project started out in a way that loaned itself well to an eventual session at this conference: they actually came up with the concept while attending Learning Solutions two years ago. Their old method of doing onboarding was the usual suspects: lecture and PowerPoint. The team thought it could teach the content in a more interesting way by leveraging the style of reality TV... the episodic content, the in-the-moment revelations, the confessionals, the true-to-life situations and scenarios, not to mention the drama... all of that could be a package for showing the content that new employees needed to know as they began working at this company. While the "reality" would be fully scripted (not, let's admit, unlike some current reality TV), the situations would still be written to feel as true to life as possible.
However, the team hadn't created anything like this project before, so the first thing on their list was to make a proof-of-concept video. The goal of it was to both have an example of what they were trying to accomplish to show stakeholders, as well as prove to themselves that they could actually create this thing in-house for a reasonable cost. So, they made the proof of concept with the barest of bones resources and used themselves as the actors. Because they were just creating a proof of concept it didn't need to be perfect and polished, it just needed to show the gist of the idea. The video worked, they got buy in early on in the project, and even managed to acquire a bit of a budget for better tools too.
Then came casting. They knew they wanted to make episodic content revolving around a few major characters, they knew they needed to find in-house employees to be their actors, and they most assuredly knew they didn't want to be the actors themselves. So they did the equivalent of a casting call and screen test. They asked for people to audition using a short script with three mini-scenes, recorded it all on video, and then focus tested the results to land on the best choices for the job. In this case, once they had the cast settled, only then did they start deciding what their characters would be like (a great option if you're using amateur actors: work around the talent and range your people have to offer). In the end they put together 5 characters who represented the various average new employees in their workplace (read: not just new graduates!) and got ready to film.
The setup for filming was relatively simple. They wrote a detailed script that included many of the standard reality TV tropes; picked up a decent DSLR camera for filming; added a microphone, 3-light set up, and green screen as supplies; and started filming their main footage as well as b-roll. They then used Adobe Premier Pro, Flypaper, Camtasia, and Adobe After Effects to edit and add in effects, and then packaged the results (along with some accompanying eLearning) in Articulate Storyline. And there you have it: a reality TV-style training program.
Here's one final thing they did that I found interesting: they created buzz around the project even in its early stages by sharing a music video, trailers, and sneak previews with the organization. By the time the episodes were ready to share, people were already excited about the project and itchy to get their hands on it. This isn't the first time I've heard of learning projects successfully using an ad campaign to drive interest, and I really hope it's a practice that we consider using more often in L&D on a whole.
5) Gaining Altitude: Sustaining Ed Tech Culture
Speaker: Mark Sheppard and Luc Blanchette
Here's another session I attended both on the appeal of the topic as well as the appeal of seeing a Twitter buddy present (this time it was @MarkLearns). What can I say, it's my duty to heckle... um... I mean "support" my fellow Canadian presenters, right? Okay, all joking aside, I work in a conservative and heavily regulated industry (banking & finance) and I was curious to see how Sheppard and Blanchette had managed to encourage and sustain ed tech culture in an equally strict industry (the Canadian military).
The school Sheppard and Blanchette design training for is the Canadian Forces School for Aerospace Technology and Engineering. You'd think that a school with the work "technology" in the name would be all on top of using technology for training. Alas, you'd be wrong. The typical method of training is your standard one: lecture and (often bad) PowerPoint. Training aids are surprisingly old. Instructor turnover is, for a multitude of reasons, incredible high (1/3 per year) and many people selected to be instructors have little to no experience as formal teachers. Not a comfortable situation, but one that was most assuredly ready for some revamping.
I loved that, at the end of the day, Sheppard and Blanchette came up with a flight-related analogy for how you make ed tech culture thrive in this, or any other, environment. They suggested that there are four forces at work on ed tech culture: lift, thrust, weight, and drag. You need to achieve balance between all four in order to succeed, and to do that you need to do the following:
These forces aren't ever going to go away, which is why it's so important to acknowledge them and work to keep them as balanced as possible.
This is the part where I'd write a wrap up... except it's super late and I need to sleep or I'll end up walking into walls tomorrow. So, to summarize quickly, yea Learning Solutions Day 1!
Okay, all kidding aside, I really am happy to be back here for my second Learning Solutions. As this was a particularly session-packed day (and I have a presentation tomorrow and need my sleep) I'm going to cut to the chase and get right down to the session reflections.
1) Keynote - Leapfrogging to Learning Breakthroughs
Speaker: Soren Kaplan
I've said this before and I'll say it again: I feel like the first session of a conference needs to focus on getting you energized and open to learning more. In this case, Kaplan definitely hit the right note with his talk of creating breakthroughs using surprise.
Kaplan became interested in finding out how business leaders had made major breakthroughs, and what he found was this: many great breakthroughs involve an element of positive surprise for the customer, and sometimes even the business too. In fact, brain science confirms the benefits of this as well. When people experience a positive surprise, the pleasure centres in their brain actually light up.
But how do you go about finding the right surprises? And how do you broaden your view so your focus on one issue or thing doesn't get in the way of your seeing other options? Kapan suggested there are three things anyone can do to become more innovative and find the surprise in their business or role:
- Rethink what your role actually is. If you're making drills, you're not really in the drill business. You're in the hole making business. If you can see what your real role is, it's easier to find surprising solutions.
- Fall in love with problems, not solutions. If you get married to what you think the solution should be, you're not going to be able to tell when there's an even better problem to solve.
- Go outside to stretch your inside. Staying inside your organization/role isn't going to challenge you to think of things in new ways. You can't just play it safe and expect to be able to find surprise. You have to step outside your comfort zone and go outside your organization/role to get new, surprising ideas. You also have to be open to trying new ideas out and possibly failing for awhile until you find an idea that sticks.
Sure, I'll agree that much of his content wasn't rocket surgery or anything new, but it was a good reminder to all of us that we need to not just know these things, but actually act on them on a regular basis.
2) Featured Session - Subscription Learning: A Fundamentally Different Form of eLearning
Speaker: Will Thalheimer
Subscription learning is a pretty simple concept: it's smaller packages of learning that you sign up to receive and get on a regular basis. It's like the magazine subscription of the learning world. While it isn't exactly a brand new idea, it is much easier to implement today than even just a few years ago (both from a tool and a cost perspective).
Many L&D groups put out one-time learning events or a handful of multi-session lessons. Unfortunately, what we know about how content is actually retained tells us this isn't the best way to ensure the people actually learn the information we're trying to teach. The forgetting curve tells us that learners unfortunately don't remember much content in the long-term from one-time learning events. However, if you regularly repeat and build on content over time, people remember substantially more. Subscription-based learning is an excellent option for training in the way we know people actually retain content.
When it comes to how you teach your information in a subscription situation, there are a few tips to keep in mind. First, repeated content is good, but don't repeat it the exact same way each time. Studies showed that paraphrased repeated content was much easier to remember than the exact same text repeated over and over. Also, space out your learning. Give people time in between learning content, repeating it, and adding on. This gives them some time to process.
When it comes to actually delivering this content, there are numerous ways to push it out to your subscribers. Email is a simple, yet effective, option. Apps and bite-sized eLearning are other delivery method too. Even texts can be a reasonable choice in some situations. And, while we didn't discuss it in this session, there are tons of other alternatives (both tech enabled and not) you can try. How about podcasts, interactive PDFs, or videos, just to name a few?
3) Where Does the Learning Occur In Games?
Speaker: Rick Blunt
You know, I had actually sworn off sessions on learning and games (long story), but this one pulled me in with an intriguing concept and a Twitter buddy (@rblunt81) as the speaker... particularly because I hadn't realized this friend actually had a background in games for learning (the more you know). So, I went anyway and was glad I did.
To really get this session it's important to first establish what exactly a game is. Blunt's definition was simple: a game is an engaging activity in which players seek a goal by overcoming challenges within a given set of rules. That definition applies as much to a simple game of tic-tac-toe as it does to a modern videogame. Game-based learning (in this case, serious games) is just an extension of that, where the game's main purpose is learning. Games like this aren't just fun, when designed well they give nearly all types of learners a noticeable boost (the only group left out: most learners over 40... sorry guys!). Now, just like any tool, you can't use games for learning in all situations, but for the circumstances they work well in they're a good option to consider.
When you're designing a game for learning there are three goals you need to consider: the business goal, the learning goal, and the game goal. Only when you've considered all three of these goals (and made sure your solutions for each aren't working against each other) can you create a game that actually teaches content in a meaningful and successful way.
Then Blunt showed us an example of a serious game done right: Re-Mission. This game was designed for adolescents with cancer to both teach them about the disease, as well as prepare them for how it would affect their day-to-day life. And what was interesting to see was that, by structuring the game missions and elements around what you want players to learn (in this case, how to live with cancer) while also not forgetting the fun, you could create an engaging game that would also manage to teach players content as they played. Game-based learning also allows for something we know is a powerful learning tool: failure in a safe environment.
Now, this isn't to say that all game-based learning is effective. Goodness knows any kid from the 80s can tell you about all the well-intentioned, but content-devoid learning games they played as kids (I'm looking at you The Oregon Train). But it does mean that there are ways to make games that can lead to actual learning.
And if you only take one lesson from this session, let it be this one: a game will resonate with people if you make sure to give players the opportunity to make meaningful choices.
4) Reality TV Training as an Onboarding Program
Speaker: Gail Griswold and Samuel Weber
I'll admit, other than an affection for the early seasons of Project Runway I'm not that in to reality TV. But, based on the sheer number of different reality shows available right now, it's clear that many people are attracted to this genre, so I thought it was worth taking a peek at how one team had created a reality TV-inspired onboarding program for their company.
The project started out in a way that loaned itself well to an eventual session at this conference: they actually came up with the concept while attending Learning Solutions two years ago. Their old method of doing onboarding was the usual suspects: lecture and PowerPoint. The team thought it could teach the content in a more interesting way by leveraging the style of reality TV... the episodic content, the in-the-moment revelations, the confessionals, the true-to-life situations and scenarios, not to mention the drama... all of that could be a package for showing the content that new employees needed to know as they began working at this company. While the "reality" would be fully scripted (not, let's admit, unlike some current reality TV), the situations would still be written to feel as true to life as possible.
However, the team hadn't created anything like this project before, so the first thing on their list was to make a proof-of-concept video. The goal of it was to both have an example of what they were trying to accomplish to show stakeholders, as well as prove to themselves that they could actually create this thing in-house for a reasonable cost. So, they made the proof of concept with the barest of bones resources and used themselves as the actors. Because they were just creating a proof of concept it didn't need to be perfect and polished, it just needed to show the gist of the idea. The video worked, they got buy in early on in the project, and even managed to acquire a bit of a budget for better tools too.
Then came casting. They knew they wanted to make episodic content revolving around a few major characters, they knew they needed to find in-house employees to be their actors, and they most assuredly knew they didn't want to be the actors themselves. So they did the equivalent of a casting call and screen test. They asked for people to audition using a short script with three mini-scenes, recorded it all on video, and then focus tested the results to land on the best choices for the job. In this case, once they had the cast settled, only then did they start deciding what their characters would be like (a great option if you're using amateur actors: work around the talent and range your people have to offer). In the end they put together 5 characters who represented the various average new employees in their workplace (read: not just new graduates!) and got ready to film.
The setup for filming was relatively simple. They wrote a detailed script that included many of the standard reality TV tropes; picked up a decent DSLR camera for filming; added a microphone, 3-light set up, and green screen as supplies; and started filming their main footage as well as b-roll. They then used Adobe Premier Pro, Flypaper, Camtasia, and Adobe After Effects to edit and add in effects, and then packaged the results (along with some accompanying eLearning) in Articulate Storyline. And there you have it: a reality TV-style training program.
Here's one final thing they did that I found interesting: they created buzz around the project even in its early stages by sharing a music video, trailers, and sneak previews with the organization. By the time the episodes were ready to share, people were already excited about the project and itchy to get their hands on it. This isn't the first time I've heard of learning projects successfully using an ad campaign to drive interest, and I really hope it's a practice that we consider using more often in L&D on a whole.
5) Gaining Altitude: Sustaining Ed Tech Culture
Speaker: Mark Sheppard and Luc Blanchette
Here's another session I attended both on the appeal of the topic as well as the appeal of seeing a Twitter buddy present (this time it was @MarkLearns). What can I say, it's my duty to heckle... um... I mean "support" my fellow Canadian presenters, right? Okay, all joking aside, I work in a conservative and heavily regulated industry (banking & finance) and I was curious to see how Sheppard and Blanchette had managed to encourage and sustain ed tech culture in an equally strict industry (the Canadian military).
The school Sheppard and Blanchette design training for is the Canadian Forces School for Aerospace Technology and Engineering. You'd think that a school with the work "technology" in the name would be all on top of using technology for training. Alas, you'd be wrong. The typical method of training is your standard one: lecture and (often bad) PowerPoint. Training aids are surprisingly old. Instructor turnover is, for a multitude of reasons, incredible high (1/3 per year) and many people selected to be instructors have little to no experience as formal teachers. Not a comfortable situation, but one that was most assuredly ready for some revamping.
I loved that, at the end of the day, Sheppard and Blanchette came up with a flight-related analogy for how you make ed tech culture thrive in this, or any other, environment. They suggested that there are four forces at work on ed tech culture: lift, thrust, weight, and drag. You need to achieve balance between all four in order to succeed, and to do that you need to do the following:
- Improve lift: Find ways to be cost efficient and align your work with corporate objectives. As well, be sure to make the "trifecta of advocacy" happy: the buyer, client, and consumer.
- Reduce weight: Make due with less. Be responsible with funds. Get approval from the myriad of people you need to get approval from and go through all the hoops required. (While this wasn't directly stated in the session itself, I have to imagine that reducing both the number of people who need to approve decisions/content and the number of hoops that you have to jump through would also reduce weight).
- Increase thrust: Focus on project success. Make sure your projects are able to fulfil a need and/or solve a problem. Look for easy opportunities to meet a need too.
- Decrease drag: Alas, a main source of drag seems to be people who are disinterested in change. Decreasing drag could involve helping them to become more accustomed to change (and get them to buy-in to the plan), addressing their fears directly, or even just waiting for these people to choose to leave on their own.
These forces aren't ever going to go away, which is why it's so important to acknowledge them and work to keep them as balanced as possible.
This is the part where I'd write a wrap up... except it's super late and I need to sleep or I'll end up walking into walls tomorrow. So, to summarize quickly, yea Learning Solutions Day 1!
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Learning Solutions 2014 - Where I'm going to be!
It's Learning Solutions time again, and I'm happy to say I'm back in Orlando this year and all set for three days of live tweeting and blogging about the conference. And, natural shyness aside, I'm also giddy about getting to hang out with all the attendees and meet more of my online Twitter buddies (Twitter PLN FTW!).
If you're curious about what I'm planning to cover this year, here's my (tentative) schedule:
Wednesday
8:30-10:00 AM - Keynote - Leapfrogging to Learning Breakthroughs
Speaker: Soren Kaplan
10:45-11:45 AM - Featured Session - Subscription Learning: A Fundamentally Different Form of eLearning
Speaker: Will Thalheimer
1:00-2:00 PM - Where Does the Learning Occur In Games?
Speaker: Rick Blunt
2:30-3:30 PM - Reality TV Training as an Onboarding Program
Speaker: Gail Griswold and Samuel Weber
4:00-5:00 PM - Gaining Altitude: Sustaining Ed Tech Culture
Speaker: Mark Sheppard and Luc Blanchette
Thursday
8:30-10:00 AM - Keynote- Big Data Demystified for Learning: What's Important, What's Not, and What's Next
Speaker: Douglas Merrill
10:45-11:45 AM - Doing Things With Words: Words That Work in eLearning
Speaker: Lisa Russell
1:00-2:00 PM - Best Practices For Enlivening the Virtual Classroom
Speaker: Pandora Bryce
3:45-4:45 PM - Telling Your Story With Infographics
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Oh look... it's my own session! I should hope I'm planning on being there. ;)
4:45-6:45 PM - SolutionFest 2014
Friday
8:30-9:30 AM - BYOL: Awesome Audacity - Tips and Techniques for This Free Tool
Speaker: Don Bolen
9:45-10-45 AM - Today's Visual Design Trends: What Non-Designers Need to Know
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Yes, I'm actually doing two sessions at Learning Solutions this year. Hope to see you there!
11:00 AM-12:30 PM - Keynote: Now You See It: How the Brain Science of Attention Will Transform the Way We Live, Work, and Learn
Speaker: Cathy Davidson
Hope to see you there, either in person or on the backchannel!
If you're curious about what I'm planning to cover this year, here's my (tentative) schedule:
Wednesday
8:30-10:00 AM - Keynote - Leapfrogging to Learning Breakthroughs
Speaker: Soren Kaplan
10:45-11:45 AM - Featured Session - Subscription Learning: A Fundamentally Different Form of eLearning
Speaker: Will Thalheimer
1:00-2:00 PM - Where Does the Learning Occur In Games?
Speaker: Rick Blunt
2:30-3:30 PM - Reality TV Training as an Onboarding Program
Speaker: Gail Griswold and Samuel Weber
4:00-5:00 PM - Gaining Altitude: Sustaining Ed Tech Culture
Speaker: Mark Sheppard and Luc Blanchette
Thursday
8:30-10:00 AM - Keynote- Big Data Demystified for Learning: What's Important, What's Not, and What's Next
Speaker: Douglas Merrill
10:45-11:45 AM - Doing Things With Words: Words That Work in eLearning
Speaker: Lisa Russell
1:00-2:00 PM - Best Practices For Enlivening the Virtual Classroom
Speaker: Pandora Bryce
3:45-4:45 PM - Telling Your Story With Infographics
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Oh look... it's my own session! I should hope I'm planning on being there. ;)
4:45-6:45 PM - SolutionFest 2014
Friday
8:30-9:30 AM - BYOL: Awesome Audacity - Tips and Techniques for This Free Tool
Speaker: Don Bolen
9:45-10-45 AM - Today's Visual Design Trends: What Non-Designers Need to Know
Speaker: Bianca Woods
Yes, I'm actually doing two sessions at Learning Solutions this year. Hope to see you there!
11:00 AM-12:30 PM - Keynote: Now You See It: How the Brain Science of Attention Will Transform the Way We Live, Work, and Learn
Speaker: Cathy Davidson
Hope to see you there, either in person or on the backchannel!
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