Happy Tweetiversary to me!

I am typing this Blog from a hotel room in London where I am staying during my attendance at the Learning Technologies conference 2011; I tell you this because it is entirely relative to my Twitter history…..

I had heard of Twitter prior to attending LT10 but admit to having dismissed it as a celebrity ‘fad’, LT10 was the catalyst that I needed to pop my Twitter cherry!

So here I am 12 months later with approx 2500 tweets under my belt, 175 followers and following 92 other people. Everyone one of these people is in some way shape or form involved in L&D, Learning Technologies, Social Media or more usually all 3!

Twitter has enabled me to attend Jane Harts Masterclass on Using Social Media for Learning, James Clays Mobile Learning Boot Camp, the eLearning Network 2010 showcase (which subsequently led me to joining the eLN) It has provided me with some excellent contacts and some fantastic learning opportunities.

So if you haven’t yet set up a Twitter account then please don’t let this fantastic opportunity pass you by. If you don’t know how or where to start, then you could do a lot worse than checking out these resources which will help you on your way…

Image source

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I say “tomato”, you say “redvinegrownvegetableation”

Let’s be honest as Learning Folk who have an interest in using technology to add value to our organisations and our learners, we have a tough job on a number of fronts. Not least of which is the challenge in positively influencing those people in our organisations who are responsible for giving the ‘nod’ or putting their hands in their pockets.

So why do we make it hard on ourselves by (at times it seems) making up words or at best picking an existing word to explain what we are doing i.e. curation and gamification???

Surely a couple of words or even a sentence to explain what we are doing is better than trying to cram our plans into a single word?

I have been working with a published author Fiona Talbot for a few weeks now and she has been telling me of some work she has been doing with Corgi/Gas Safe to rewrite their manuals by putting them into Plain English. Interestingly the rewritten version is slightly longer than original version.

Because sometimes in order to make things clearer to people we need to take the time  (and word count) to explain things in Plain English as opposed to using jargon or overly complex words in a vain effort to sound ‘with it’ or dare I say it…. ‘buzz wordy’!

I’ve been thinking about this for some time, however a recent blog post from Saffron Interactive prompted me to respond to. I suspect that there may be some problems with Saffrons commenting system as I left the comment over 29 hours ago and it still hasn’t been moderated so I though it best that I reproduce the original post (and my comment here)

This is a report back from my first day working at Saffron Interactive. Apologies for the short delay, but you’ll understand that I have been very busy for the last month! In an exciting start to my Saffron career I spent my first day attending the Learning and Skills Group (LSG) conference at Olympia – a great way to be introduced to the world of e-learning.

I do not come from an e-learning background but I have always had a keen interest in technology and games and one particular talk really captured my imagination. I’m sure most people are familiar in some form or another with the world of video games whether through PCs or a range of consoles covering all ages and tastes. Gaming however is now beginning to have an effect outside of our leisure time and is becoming prevalent in everyday life, for example the way we shop, network and … learn.

For those unfamiliar with Gamification – a new and growing concept in the world of e-learning – the idea is based on the use of gaming mechanics to increase user engagement whilst delivering key learning objectives. For those still somewhat mystified by the term I have included a definition below;

“Gamification works by making technology more engaging, and by encouraging desired behaviours, taking advantage of humans’ psychological predisposition to engage in gaming.”

Radoff, Jon (2011). Game On: Energize Your Business with Social Media Games. Wiley. pp. xxxii. ISBN 9780470936269.

At the LSG conference, this was explored in depth with a talk from Alicia Sanchez who has been appointed “Games Czar” at the US Defense Acquisition University (DAU).

Alicia’s talk presented some interesting examples, in this case based on military procurement, an area that apparently requires regular and incredibly stringent compliance training. By using the setting of a game, a far more positive response was generated from the workforce in digesting the necessary content for their roles. One such example was a simulation where the user would carry out compliance checks on weapons on the premise of preventing an alien invasion.

What’s more as gaming has begun to take on a social aspect, this can be incorporated into e-learning for even higher levels of engagement. For example, in the same way that Xbox players use “gamer scores” to celebrate achievements and relate to their peers, the DAU allows players to build online profiles giving added value and a social element to their learning achievements. This is also great from a learning provider’s perspective as it provides a method for demonstrating the impact that its courses have on user groups.

If you take this social aspect in combination with a Gamification style of e-learning further, it is also clear how learners working together could gain huge additional benefits in terms of organisation and teamwork given the right environment. In a previous organisation I worked at, the Sales Director actually mused:

“If teenagers can work together in World of Warcraft to be organised and achieve common objectives I do not see why our sales force cannot do the same!”

It will be interesting to see if many of the positive side effects of massively multiplayer gaming would become increasingly prevalent as an additional benefit for this type of delivery. Although I would add a caveat here that had the sales force assembled itself into a 30 man raid group and stormed customers offices (a la World of Warcraft) it may not have gone down well. I do hope however you can see the point I am making In terms of cooperation between departments and employees.

Of course there are limitations to the Gamification of learning. Budgets are always under increased scrutiny and is there as one of my colleagues put it an assumption that “if its fun it can’t be good for you”? Even taking these issues into account it will be interesting to see if this is a view that shifts if Gamification style courses begin to build up a backlog of case studies with quantifiable results. The other long term factor here could be as younger generations of the workforce come into management positions with a greater familiarity with the culture of gaming there will be an increasing appetite at senior levels to champion this as a style of learning.

As a final note I would like mention one of my favourite solutions of this type currently on the market: a revision of House of the Dead which is not only guaranteed to improve users’ typing skills but also looks like great fun!

I look forward to giving some further updates on Gamification from the Saffron perspective in the coming months.

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Twitter to G+

So it’s been a whole weekend since I decided to step away from Twitter and concentrate my energies in G+.

As with most reflective exercises, the first weekend has presented me with nothing that I didn’t already know, but it has brought them to the forefront of my mind.

Firstly, I feel that I have used Twitter for 3 purposes to date:

The posting of links to my own online contentThe discussion of professional areas of interestMindless, banal waffle (which rather interestingly was one of the contributing factors to me ‘going off’ Twitter – was I a part of the problem???)

Whereas in comparison G+ had only ever (with a handful of exceptions) been used as a place to tout links to my blog.

I hadn’t really looked at other peoples contentI hadn’t gone out of my way to seek out and follow new peopleI hadn’t engaged in any conversations.

This realisation has confirmed that my decision to engage with G+ on a deeper level has been the right one, in fact my plan (at the moment) is to completely transform my usage of the 2, so I’ll still be posting blog links etc to Twitter but expect to see less conversation and waffle (I can hear the sighs of relief from some of you now) instead if you want to engage in that, then why not head over to G+ and say Hi….

Photo source.

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Scheduling a meeting is a doddle, I mean a Doodle..

…whatever it’s called it’s quick, simple and cheap to do!

Scheduling a meeting with work colleagues is usually very easy to do as (in my experience) everybody is ‘connected’ via an email management client such as Outlook which allows you to organise meetings around peoples availability as you can usually see their calendar which (you hope) they’ve kept up to date.

The problem lies when you are trying to arrange a meeting with people outside of your organisation who do not exist in your calendar system, again in my experience this usually involves time exhausting multiple phone calls and/or emails around the relevant parties in order to arrange a mutually convenient time.

Well no more!

I discovered Doodle several months ago and had the opportunity to use it ‘in anger’ for the first time during the planning stage of my first panel podcast.

Doodle allows you to publish potential dates and times onto the internet, publicise that information to your meeting attendees, who are then requested to select the option(s) that best suits them. A cut off date can be applied to the Doodle which means that you can be getting on with the more important things in life, whilst your meeting attendees are only taking 30 seconds out of theirs to select their preferred times.

Throughout the process you can drop back in at any time to see which option(s) are shaping up as the faves. Once the window of voting has closed, Doodle will even tot up which option is the most preferred.

Here’s a quick overview of how easy it is to set up.

So over to you..

Are you currently using this tool yourself, if so what have your experiences been?

If this is the first time you have heard about it, can you see any occasions when you might find it useful?

Why not share your thoughts with everybody via the comments section of this blog post…

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Virtual Learning Show Day 1

Ask an open question early, VERY EARLY, possibly even on the second slide. It sets the scene and expectations for your learners.

Don’t be afraid of silence. When asking a question SHUT UP and give people the time to think and respond.

Regularly acknowledge comments in the chat panel.

 Presented by Roger Courville
12.30 – 13.30 GMT (UK time)

Brain research confirms what storytellers know from experience: we learn through storytelling. What’s more, we’re wired for it… we learn the pattern, rhythm and structure of storytelling before we learn the rhythms and patterns of written stories. Our job in learning and development is to impart knowledge and skills to create change, and while we don’t abandon facts, data, and processes, adding storytelling to the mix in the virtual classroom will add a powerful dimension to your success.

Join Roger Courville, of TheVirtualPresenter.com, and get ready to take some notes as you learn practical tips for how to construct story and take full advantage of delivering them in the virtual classroom.

Join us for this interactive live webinar to learn:

What story is (hint: it’s not “once upon a time”)How to choose the story or illustration right for youThree steps to transforming story for virtual classroomsFour tips for uniquely combining voice and visuals for improved impact

My key content take-away

If I’m honest, this session flew along so quickly due to the late start that I really can’t recall any of it, so I can’t say what parts of the content I can ‘take away’.

My key facilitation take-away

Roger was approximately 30 minutes late due to t’internet outage in Oregon, however the other facilitators stepped up to the mark and very quickly facilitated and promoted a number of quick fire Q&As via the chat panel. Because the questions were relevant, there was still a level of ‘conversation’ taking place, handy to have this in the back of my mind should things ever go belly up in one of my sessions.

 Presented by Karen Hyder
14.00 – 15.00 GMT (UK time)

While the benefits of virtual classroom training using tools such as WebEx, Adobe Connect and GoTo Training may be obvious to you  and your learners, your managers aren’t sold.  They feel face-to-face training is the only way to control the learning experience and that the transition to online learning will be too difficult.  They’ve seen too many boring webinars where participants multi-task throughout and they believe that an attempt to move training online will be a waste of time and resources.

In 2010, 88% of eLearning Guild’s survey respondents agreed that” when setup and use properly, online training was as effective as good face-to-face training.” Attend this session to experience what it takes to set up and use virtual classroom tools properly.

Discuss ways to maximize the advantages and overcome the objections of virtual classroom deliveryIdentify key considerations for managers and plan what you’ll do and say to make your case for moving your training online.

My key content take-away

Comparison of webinar / virtual classroom tools is difficult due to keeping up with the rapid development of these tools. This Wiki page is a well maintained comparison of web conferencing software.

My key facilitation take-away

Karen used the chat ‘pod’ feature within Adobe Connect which allowed her to separate specific conversations from the backchannel ‘waffle’.  I like the idea of this and would be keen to see if there is a way ‘post session’ to match the questions up with the relevant ‘chat pod’.

 Presented by Bob Mosher
15.30 – 16.30 GMT (UK time)

The virtual classroom is becoming commonplace. It offers many wonderful enhancements to the traditional brick-and-mortar classroom. The elimination of travel, the integration into the workflow, and its ability to take advantage of space learning are three wonderful advantages of this emerging medium. The danger lies in the content and context lost over time. Performance support can be the tie that binds bringing everything together and enabling knowledge transfer at a level rarely seen before.

This session will explore a new distance-learning model which encompasses performance support as a critical part of the journey.

In this session we will explore:

The GEAR four step approach to distance learningHow to design performance support to optimize space learningWhat instructors need to do to guarantee engagement

My key content take-away

Introduce Performance Support tools EARLY, don’t introduce it ‘afterwards’. Make them a part of our formal programmes, upfront of when people are having to use them for real

My key facilitation take-away

Bob used quick and dirty techniques for marking up or annotating his slides during the session. This was in stark contrast to the clinical design of the slides. This worked really well and helped the annotations to stand out.

Overall experience

Today was a great experience, I acquired some info in every single session. There were a number of people who attended every session so to a degree my concern over ‘overload’ may be mute… however, I’m not sure that the audience is typical of the majority of learners – after all, it’s our field!

I’m still doubtful that a days worth of online activities could work in the ‘real world’….

What do you think?

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Making Video More "Social"

Sorry, I could not read the content fromt this page.Sorry, I could not read the content fromt this page.

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Once bitten…

I’ve spent the last few nights putting together a few slides to underpin my session ‘Getting started with Learning Technologies’ at the Learning Technologies Conference 2011.

I was the using approach cited by Cliff Atkinson in his book Beyond Bullet Points, to develop a slide deck that uses full screen images to graphically underpin my story.

Whilst the sourcing of appropriate quality images took some time to locate, it took nowhere near as long as setting up the Auto-Tweet function which would allow me to autotweet during my session. So you can imagine the language in my office when I discovered that this presentation had ‘disappeared’ from my USB stick – and for those of you are thinking

“what’s the problem Craig, surely you had backed it up on your laptop or on Google Docs”

Erm… (embarrassed silence)… no I didn’t.

Like I say, once bitten…

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Go Mobile MindMapping (try saying that 5 times, quickly)!

Yesterday saw me attend an Epic hosted event with 125 other people which centered around Epic’s new Go Mobile publishing platform GoMo. There were a number of sessions taking place, but my main reason for attending was to look at the GoMo platform itself.

I normally take traditional ‘list style’ notes in something like Evernote or Notes, but on this occasion I thought I’d try out the MindMeister mindmapping app on my new iPad. I’ve have used MindMeister before from a laptop and on my Nexus S but those instances have always been in ‘ideal conditions’ i.e. sat in the quiet coach of a train or on the loo. They have never been in a ‘live environment’…. until yesterday….

Here is the mindmap I created, the nodes relating to iTune app have links within them, so why not take a look at the apps in question?

I have to admit that as I was new to the User Interface (UI) on the iPad I stumbled quite often and perhaps missed a little of the GoMo session itself, but overall I feel that I captured the salient points from the session. Clarke Quinn seems to be something of a master at this as he regularly produces very rich, informative mind maps during live sessions – I must remember to ask him how he does it!

I’ll try and spend more time practicing on the app before I attend my next session as this should hopefully lead to more fluent use in the session and ultimately result in more information being captured.

Do you take notes during live sessions and if so how?

If you mindmap, what are your ‘top tips’?

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Will an ‘in-house’ un-conference work?… it appears it might!

A few days ago I posted my initial thoughts on facilitating an un-conference based around the theme of using technology to enhance learning. I was at that time a little dubious over the uptake of this, but the pieces seem to be falling into place…

… I’m really pleased to say that the support and interest over the last week has very encouraging, here’s how I did it.

Emailed all internal facilitators to invite them to the un-workshop, including details of the venue and the offer of a Flip Ultra camera being presented to a randomly selected participant on completion of the day (always helps!)Those facilitators that responded positively were sent a link to a Poll Daddy survey asking for them to contribute their ideas and suggestion for the days content. I opted for Poll Daddy over the Survey Monkey licence that we possess, as I will ultimately want to ‘poll’ the attendees and I am unsure if Survey Monkey has that functionality (note to self; look into this functionality). Google Moderator required everybody to have a GMail account, so it was a non-starter.

I have also invited out IT team along, to allow them to see the direction that we are trying to take in terms of Learning Technologies. I am hoping that this will grease the wheels of progress in the future and may allow IT the opportunity to interact more closely with their customers.

Anyway, 6 days after sending out the initial email I have 9 confirmed attendances and 1 tentative, with a week still to go it is shaping up to be a great event.

Picture: Source

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Get your foot in the door – First Aid

I think I’m fairly safe in saying that regardless of what organisation you are in, your employees are just as much at risk of having an accident or an ailment as the next person.

So of course the ability for them to be able to respond accordingly is in everybody’s interest. I’m sure there’s some form of ‘law’ that states that employers should have suitably trained people and that’s all well and good, but how likely is it that that person will be ‘on the scene’ as it happens? When did that person last undertake that treatment for ‘real’ or under assessment?I’m certainly not saying that those roles aren’t important, but why not augment that role by providing First Aid training / performance support to ‘all’ via their mobile devices?

If your employees are as prone to slips, trip, falls, cuts, grazes, (and worse) as the rest of us mere mortals then you’ve got a wonderful opportunity to ‘get your foot in the door‘ and prove the worth of performance support via mobile devices.

Why not take a look at these apps and consider whether you might want to direct your colleagues to them?

First Aid by British Red Cross (iOS) – £FREE

First Aid by British Red Cross (Android) – £FREE

(I have actually downloaded and used this app myself, check out the app store reviews for my thoughts)

Inevitably there will be some people who do not have a mobile device and will bemoan the fact that you are offering their colleagues who do have a mobile device something that they themselves are unable to benefit from, or they will complain over the fact that the apps cost money – don’t let this put you off.

Simply tell them to carry on using whatever tool or process they have always used – simples!!!

And you know what? Even if people don’t opt for these apps, you may have just sewn the seeds for them to look for an alternative….

Good luck and let me know how you get on

The blog post that started it all

Image source

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An award entry – with a difference

Over the Summer of 2013 I submitted an entry into the LPIs annual Learning Awards in the Learning Professional of The Year category.

I know that’s somewhat narcissistic of me but it was the only category I felt I could provide actual evidence for at the point I wrote and submitted the entry. All the other categories would have, I felt, required me to provide evidence, examples etc that I no longer had access to (I did contact my ex-manager on several occasions, but have yet to to receive a reply……)

I wanted to submit an entry that caught the judges attention, so I used iBooks Author to create an interactive entry using text, image carousels and embedded video. I also provided a PDF version for those without an iPad.

Screenshot of the cover of my iBook submission

I was short listed as a category finalist and presented to the judging panel in November 2013.

I was keen to pitch my entry not just against the Learning and Performance Institutes and my own ‘criteria’ but also against what many of you considered to be indicative of a modern and effective L&D professional.

I’m prepping my @YourLPI awards pitch Can you help me? What 3 behaviours/characteristics/attitudes etc should a modern L&D pro demonstrate?

— Craig Taylor (@CraigTaylor74) November 20, 2013

Here’s what some of you came up with

Learning Awards submission Wordle

What words, behaviours, characteristics etc do you believe are missing from this Wordle?

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Go Mobile MindMapping (try saying that 5 times, quickly)!

Yesterday saw me attend an Epic hosted event with 125 other people which centered around Epic’s new Go Mobile publishing platform GoMo. There were a number of sessions taking place, but my main reason for attending was to look at the GoMo platform itself.

I normally take traditional ‘list style’ notes in something like Evernote or Notes, but on this occasion I thought I’d try out the MindMeister mindmapping app on my new iPad. I’ve have used MindMeister before from a laptop and on my Nexus S but those instances have always been in ‘ideal conditions’ i.e. sat in the quiet coach of a train or on the loo. They have never been in a ‘live environment’…. until yesterday….

Here is the mindmap I created, the nodes relating to iTune app have links within them, so why not take a look at the apps in question?

I have to admit that as I was new to the User Interface (UI) on the iPad I stumbled quite often and perhaps missed a little of the GoMo session itself, but overall I feel that I captured the salient points from the session. Clarke Quinn seems to be something of a master at this as he regularly produces very rich, informative mind maps during live sessions – I must remember to ask him how he does it!

I’ll try and spend more time practicing on the app before I attend my next session as this should hopefully lead to more fluent use in the session and ultimately result in more information being captured.

Do you take notes during live sessions and if so how?

If you mindmap, what are your ‘top tips’?

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Getting Beyond Bullet Points (visuals only)

Once again, I consider myself extremely lucky and privileged to have been asked to speak at the Learning and Skills Group Annual Conference earlier this month at London Olympia.

I always try to facilitate a session that (I hope) has  immediate take-aways for anybody that has attended. I believe that there are enough people speaking at a strategic and theoretical level about L&D and it’s associated disciplines without me throwing my hand in too, so I always try to ensure that I do what I can to offer what I call a ‘Monday morning quick win‘ i.e. something that can be implemented immediately (or at worst very quickly back in the workplace) following the attendees return to the ‘real world‘!

This time around I wanted to offer people the next step in improving their presentations. I get the feeling that there are more and more people who understand the need to move away from bullet-point riddled slides but are not sure exactly ‘what’ should replace them.

It was this uncertainty that I hoped to address during my session by showing some examples. It is these examples that will form the basis of my next few blog posts:

Part 1 – Getting Beyond Bullet Points with visuals only

Part 2 – Getting Beyond Bullet Points with visual and audio

Part 3 – Bringing in the backchannel

Part 4 – The Learners Voice

Part 5 – Getting Beyond Bullet Points live recorded podcast

Part 6 – Tools and resources

But let’s get things started, by having a look at the Slideshare presentation below. At first glance it ticks all the boxes in terms of reducing the bullet points and using images to illustrate my story, but there’s something missing. It would be great if you could take a few minutes to progress through the slides and leave your thoughts in the comments box below……

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Homework time… CWCCM Task 4.3

Podcasting? That phrase has come about as a result of the rise in popularity of the iPod, right?Well actually, No! That is however a popular misconception brought about, more than likely, as a result of the inclusion of ‘pod’ within both terms. The podcasting community generally accepts that the first person to use the term was Dannie Gregoire on September 15th 2004 who took the phrase ‘programming on demand’ and created the acronym ‘pod’ – hence podcast.

I’ve recorded some audio clips and placed them on my organisations intranet, am I podcasting?

Technically, No! A ‘true’ podcast is one which allows listeners to subsribe to it’s feed and subsequently receive updated podcasts from you, as and when you publish them. Just placing an audio clip on a webpage or emailing it to somebody, falls a little way short of a true podcast… BUT… you are doing more than a lot of people, so keep up the good work.

Surely you need a lot of technical equipment to Podcast, I mean just look at a radio studio.

You’d be surprised at how little equipment you need to podcast. In fact, services such as Audioboo and iPadio both offer Smartphone apps that allow you to record audio and then upload it onto their website, which then provides a feed that listeners can subsribe to… Voila! a podcast! For those of you without Smartphones, iPadio even offers a London based number that allows you to ‘dial’ into an audio recording system, which again publishes a feed. So you’ve got no excuse!

I like the idea of podcasting, but I doubt that anybody would want to hear what I have to say.

How do you know until you try? On of the most successful podcasts of all time was the Ricky Gervais podcast in which Ricky and Steve Merchant just engaged in conversation with their radio producer Karl Pilkington. Nobody ever expected it, but that unscripted, conversational, humorous dialogue has proven to be a killer formula. If you’ve got a subject that’s close enough to your heart that you feel passionately enough about it to talk into a phone or microphone for 5-10 minutes every week, then you have enough material for a podcast. Go for it, you never know!

I like the idea, but want to do a bit more research, where should I start?

A great starting point would be to pick up a copy of ‘Podcasting for Dummies’ which provides easily understood, humorous, technical advice for beginners onwards, whilst if you are searching for some good examples of podcasts (particularly if you are responsible for the education of others) then why not have a listen to some of James Clays podcasts.

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eLN Showcase

Yesterday I attended the eLearning Network showcase in London.

This hadn’t been on my agenda, however earlier in the week I received an email from @barrysampson who kindly invited me to attend the showcase as a guest of Onlignment.

Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I found myself sitting at my local train station at 0641hrs waiting for my train (this wasn’t a problem as I my 2 year old son woke me up at 0400hrs, because he was concerned that I might miss the Choo Choo!)

My HTC Desire coupled with Google Maps saw me make the transit from Oxford Circus to the venue very quickly (it always pays to get an early seat, next to the plug sockets ideally!).

The day kicked off with a demo of the Optivote handheld voting system, followed by a demo of a Content Management System called Moose, the morning was wrapped up by an oversight of 2nd Life.

If I have to be honest all of these sessions were very dry and uninspiring. It seemed such a shame that the early spot in the morning was taken up by such uninspiring sessions.

@philipgreen, @cliveshepherd and @barrysampson then entered into a Pecha Kucha head-to-head to determine which (un)lucky soul was then entered into the eLN Pecha Kucha final later in the year.

Phil’s & Barry’s Pecha Kucha sessions can be seen below (sorry Clive I forgot that I was meant to recording!)

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jd7-dKqRtGM]

There was a great pre-lunch Q&A session facilitated by @robhubbard in which attendees pitched their e-learning related questions and problems via Twitter and then received advice back via Twitter. Rob ensured that there was still f2f dialogue in order to probe deeper into each issue – Good session Rob, well done.

Of particular interest in the afternoon was a session by Edvantage which centred around the ability of their CourseBuilder tool to create interactive PDFs, given that my organisations Monthly Brief is disseminated via PDF, this is something that I intend to look into upon my return to work.

For me, the physical networking  of these events is always a MASSIVE advantage to me as it allows me to meet those people who I have networked with throughout the year as well as making new contacts.

Aside from the people I have already mentioned I have enjoyed spending the day with:

@kategraham23

@bbetts

@juliewedgwood

As always I like to wrap my Blog up with a small action plan to help me implement any learnings back into the workplace.

Pass ATA’s contact details on to NSAN.Investigate the interactive PDFs optionArrange storyboarding session with Julie Wedgwood for e-learning authors

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Video ‘enhanced’ the Radio Star…

Today saw me fortunate to attend my first RSC (NW) event on the subject of ‘Using Video Technology‘

The day started off with the workshop being welcomed by Andrew Quarmby from RSC (NW) via Skype, which was a nice touch as it demonstrated the ‘instant’ nature of video calling, whilst retaining the ‘humanity’ of a face-to-face environment.

We were then cautioned over being blinded by any shiny technology, but to always bear in mind whether it added value to what we trying to achieve. A walk-through - talk-through of Skype was provided for those attendees who were not Skype users demonstrating

Video callsRecording Skype calls. (Pamela, Call graph, etc)Exchanging filesSharing desktop

… and for those of us that were using Skype, John Dalziel informed us that the latest beta version of Skype allows for up to 10 concurrent video calls to be made. (of personal use to me, as it will allow me to contact 3 x sets of Grandparents when my 2 1/2 year old is in a rare ‘good mood’).

John also directed us towards a resource that highlighted the environmental benefit of using technology to replace face-to-face events.

After a short break we had a look at ‘Interactive Training & Online Assessment’, with Nicola Harper from KAPLAN Financial providing us with an overview as to how they had used WebEx to facilitate synchronous online learning events to a widely dispersed audience.

What was interesting to hear from Nicola was that WebEx licences can be increased or decreased depending on the perceived need and that any chat-room sessions can be archived and displayed.

S&B Automotive Academy were next up with, what I thought was an exactly cracking example of using ‘live’ webcams

to assess vehicle maintenance apprentices undertaking an assessment whilst providing evidence. The clip below, shows a live stream from a garage servicing bay, the quality, panning and zooming functionality was truly superb.

There were quite a few questions asked such as

Q – “How can a remote video feed provide evidence of something that requires a physical check”

A – During any assessment, the mentor is present to provide any feedback/confirmation etc that the video stream itself cannot validate.

Q - What do External Verifiers (EVs) think of this approach?

A – EVs love the system as the quality of evidence is observable.

Q – How much?

A – £500-600 (although, I can’t quite remember what you got for this) -

I’m not sure as whether there would be any call for this on my site, as it is quite a small site and most of the work that takes place could not be streamed outside of our Firewall, however there could be applications for this to swap working practices amongst our other sites around the world.

RSC (NW) provided a great USB key with an eXe resource on it, to provide further examples and research into the use of video.

So what am I planning to do with all this newly acquired info?

All in all, it was a  great day. Many, many thanks to all of those who contributed to its success (both in person and ‘virtually’) and I’m already looking forward to the next workshop.

Keep up the great work RSC (NW)!

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I got it wrong….. Or did I?

I recent attended the eLearning Network event ’10 things every learning designer should know’ and whilst the event gave me a few ideas to mull over, what really had an impact on me was a chance conversation that I had during the mid-morning break, which if I’m being honest, shocked me a little and distracted me for the rest of the day.

Allow me to explain…

During the first session of the day Bryan Hopkins from UNHCR made a general reference to the fact that “people can’t possibly be learning effectively if they are tapping away on mobile devices“(paraphrased). This led to a few giggles on my table, as at that very moment I was tapping away on my iPad.

During the mid-morning break I made reference back to that incident and drew a parallel to a meeting I was in during the early Summer where everybody was taking notes, however I was the only one taking them on an iPad, whereas everybody else was taking them with pen and paper. The meeting organiser actually stopped after 10 mins and asked what I was doing; when I told (and showed) them what I was doing, they still admitted that the fact I was on a mobile device made them feel uncomfortable.

Now I had expected the people I was regaling this tale to over a cuppa to be sympathetic to my situation however I was wrong!

Instead 3 of the 4 people indicated that it would also put them off and make them question whether or not I was truly paying attention during the meeting and whether I was genuinely taking notes. We threw this around for a couple of minutes with me even pulling the old “who’s to say I’m paying attention/taking genuine notes, just because I’m using a pen and paper” but even this didn’t sway them.

I quickly popped smoke and withdrew back to the safety of the main area and discussed this back at my groups table, where, you may be surprised (or maybe not) to discover that the majority of those people also expressed doubt/concern/worry/frustration etc over people using mobile devices to take notes during learning events, meetings etc.

Had I been in any other environment than the one I was in yesterday I probably wouldn’t have been overly surprised….

… But this was an eLearning Network event!!!!

Surely eLN members would ‘get’ the advantages of using technology to aid productivity even if it wasn’t in an overtly ‘learning’ context, wouldn’t they?

And that’s what led me to this particular blog title, because it appears I was wrong.

Or was I?

Is it reasonable to expect us and our learners to use technology to aid our/their productivity in areas and in situations that have traditionally used pen and paper?

Should we maintain traditional practices for meetings but attempt to push forward with new practices when the output has an overt ‘learning’ tag attached to it?

Do you use technology to aid your personal productivity or not?

Are you encouraging/discouraging of others to do so?

Oh and for those of you who are wondering exactly what I was tapping away on my iPad for, I was producing this mindmap of the days sessions, which I am now sharing with others.

For those of you I was annoying, why not share your handwritten notes with us all?

Image sources: Click one each image to be taken to the individuals Flickr profile page.

View the original article here

My top 10 Learning Tools for 2011

It’s that time of the year again folks when Jane Hart is reminding us all to submit our ‘Top 10 Learning Tools 2011/of the year’.

This is something that I contributed to for the first time last year and it was interesting to see where my preferred tools came in the ‘Top 100' ranking structure that Jane works out from all of our submissions, it is also a great place to catch wind of any new tools that are out there.

I am once again contributing to this years list, however I have decided to take a different tack. Whereas my list last year probably (I say probably because I can’t specifically remember) contained things like:

TwitterYouTubeGoogle ReaderSlideshareetc

I have decided to approach things from a different angle this year and have decided not to concentrate on the actual platform, but to think more carefully about how I get access to that platform. After all, it’s no good being a member of some of these wonderful online platforms if you can’t get to them. There are also a few in there just to remind us all that sometimes the answer doesn’t need to be a ‘click‘ away at all! I think it’s also worth mentioning that I have only very recently started working in a new organisation, Epic. What better time to consider what tools have been effective for my personal learning, within a real-time learning moment.

So here’s my Top 10 list of learning tools, in no particular order.

1. My phone (this allows me to phone people up and ask them a question, at which point I find Tool No 6 to be particularly useful)

2. My iPad (this allows me to review online information and communications in order to bring me up to speed on a given subject, of course without Tool No 4 I am somewhat limited in what I can do)

3. My laptop (not only can I do everything on this that I can do on Tool No 2, but I can also far more easily create content, which of course allows me to reflect upon what I am creating thus adding to my own personal learning experience)

4. Internet signal – WiFi/3G/4G/Ethernet (come on admit it, how many of you who submitted an entry into Janes Top 100 tools, overlooked the fact that *most* if not all of the tools you suggested rely upon being able to gain and maintain access to the t’internet?)

5. Falling over – not literally of course, I mean making mistakes. What more powerful tool can there be for learning than those amazing synapses in our brains firing adrenaline, emotions such as guilt, worry, embarrassment, shock etc after we have realised we have made a mistake. Sometimes bruised egos, flushed cheeks and yes – scraped knees serve us very well indeed.

6. My ears – let’s be honest, they’re in ‘receive mode’ far more than our Internet signal. Next time you’re amongst your team colleagues just allow yourself to listen to what’s being said….

7. The Epic intranet – a purpose-built repository of the specific ‘must/should/and could knows’ of my organisation. This has been of immense use to me over the last couple of weeks and no doubt will continue to be so in the future.

8. The guy who sits opposite me – His name is Andy Costello and he has been a godsend to me during my first few weeks working at Epic. Not only providing support when I have asked for it, but also providing it when he anticipates I am approaching a ‘just in time’ moment. Truly contextualised, semantic performance support.

                 

9. Books/magazine etc (not fussy about the format)

10. My Son and Daughter – watching them grow up, evolve, learn, make mistakes etc provides me with some wonderful ‘lightbulb’ moments. Seeing how they navigate the challenges and problems that you and I take for granted, like carrying a plate without spilling its contents reminds me that all the learning challenges that you and I face are surmountable, I mean look at everything else that we have achieved in our lives!

View the original article here

Overthinking Slideshare

It seems to be that time of the year when every platform provider under the Sun is emailing me to tell me about my 2013 statistics

How many views my slides have had

How long people watched my videos for

How many bowel movements I’ve made

How many tweets I’ve sent etc

I was reading my Slideshare stats earlier today when I noticed that my number of slides per upload was much higher than the average Slideshare upload!

GASP!

I then noticed that my average number of words per slide was significantly lower than the average \

PHEW!

I guess the Lessig method I use for most of my presentations means that I’m using more slides to tell my story, but with fewer words. Perhaps I’m also overthinking this and need to get out more…

Do you use Slideshare?

What did your annual stats look like?

If you’d like to discuss how I can help you enhance your and your teams slide-based presentations, please get in touch.

View the original article here

Tayloring It is open for business!

Over the past 18 months, I’ve had a number of conversations with various people from around our industry as well as outside of it on the subject of ‘going it alone‘, ‘setting up my own business‘, ‘escaping the rat race’ – whatever you want to call it!

First and foremost, I’ve always been flattered that these people have thought that I had ‘something’ that others would be willing to enter into a contract with me to obtain.

Secondly, I’ve always admitted to those people that I have a fear and a dread of leaving safe and secure roles to enter into what I perceive as a more risky world of the ‘self employed’.

However, I now realise that even full time employment in established organisations is still fraught with risks and that anybody – and I’m probably including you, Dear Reader – who doesn’t have a back-up plan or a safety net of some description is probably not doing themselves any favours.

That’s why I’ve decided to take Tayloring It to a slightly different place than I had originally intended when I first started blogging 3 years ago.

I’ve decided to start up my own small consultancy ‘Tayloring It’. Before you ask, “No“, I haven’t left my current role and nor is the writing on the wall - I’m probably happier in this role than I have been in any role since I left the Army in 2006. But that doesn’t mean I can’t start establishing contacts along with developing a portfolio of work and business accumen just in case my world looks different in 12, 24 or however many months in the future. Plus, I’m pretty sure I can help some people/organisations with what they’re trying to achieve too – without it interfering with my day job.

My plan is to offer down to Earth advice on the subject of Learning Technologies and their application in today’s work place.

This advice won’t be based on past glories from years ago or from being a member of elitist Industry ‘think tanks’ – No! – My consultancy will be based upon recent and current experience of deploying learning technologies and the associated aspects within conservative and risk averse industries such as the Nuclear, Rail and Financial sectors.

Recent experience within the eLearning vendor industry has also provided me with fantastic opportunity to become involved in a large number of industries, organisations and projects, the experience from which has only added to my own workplace experiences.

My website is currently being built by a fantastic supporter of my idea, Zak Mensah and will be launched in the next couple of weeks explaining how I might be able to help you out in more detail, but in the meantime here’s a short explanation which will no doubt feature on the website:

Tayloring It is a consultancy that works with individuals and organisations to practically apply technology as a solution to real-world challenges. It could be large scale projects or supporting everyday tasks, but our team has successfully created new approaches that maximise the use of technology while actually saving money/reducing spend. We enhance
communication, learning and performance in the workplace, focusing on outputs not inputs. There are no other services like ours.

Tayloring It aims to change the face of learning technology in practice, one solution at a time.

I’ll be attending both days of Learning Technologies Conference & Exhibition 2013 and will be armed with my rather natty business cards

Tayloring It business card

so if you’d like to find out more about what my plans are the future, why not track me down, have a chat and grab a business card?

Alternatively, if our paths don’t cross, my details are on the card above.

View the original article here

Some upcoming sessions

I’m pleased to say that I’ve got a couple of sessions coming up in July in which I’ll be taking a look at that much hyped phenomena of ‘mobile learning’.

The sessions are almost identical, (with the only changes to design being to cater for the difference in dynamics) however they bring some additional challenges in that

a) 1 of them is face-to-face and the other is online
b) they are less than 24 hours apart

Meaning that it will be a challenge to incorporate any feedback or observations from the first session into the second session, not impossible, but quite possibly a late night is in store!

The first session will be a webinar for Citrix UK and the second session will be at an eLearning Network event.

I have prepared a short video in order to maximise the time during the sessions by asking the attendees to consider 3 questions. If you’re attending either of the sessions (or even if you’re not) then why not view this short video and consider my questions…

If you hover over the video, you’ll notice the ‘scenechat’ toolbar appear at the bottom. Why not leave your responses to my questions using the ‘scenechat’ tool? (I must admit to being quite impressed with this to being with and then it disappointed me by not allowing me to see the ID of the people posting comments, or indeed ID the comments that I made!?)

View the original article here

Homework time… CWCCM Task 2.3

As part of the Certificate in Web Content Creation & Management (CWCCM) programme I am undertaking, I have been asked to expand upon the following in relation to the Internet or intranet website on which I am working/intend to work.

The goals for website.Describe the important characteristics of the target audience for this site.

Given that I am interested in developing both this blog and my organisations intranet pages, I have provided responses below for both areas:

My Blog

Goal

Having reviewed the stats for my Blog since I launched it in April 2010, the average views per day has been 10. It is my goal to increase that figure by 50% to an average view of 15 per day by August 2011.

Important Characteristics of Target Audience

My target audience for this Blog are Learning & Development professionals, with a slight bias towards those who are involved in using and promoting current and emerging technologies. I surmise that this group of people are looking for content which will provide them with an initial perspective on a subject or an innovative approach to undertaking an activity. I also suspect that they are looking for content that will showcase the tools that are available in an integrated manner. i.e. Twitter feeds, embedded media, tags etc

My Organisations Intranet site

Goal

The goal for this site is a little more difficult to define as I am not the ‘owner’ of the site, this is held by an individual within our overall Group. I am also unable to define simple, low-level goals such as ‘increase site/page traffic by ?% as there isn’t a hit counter/statistics functionality within the platform. Instead I have taken it upon myself to offer what advice and support I can to the intranet authors within my organisation by way of forming peer support groups, arranging formal training on the platform for new authors and creating an online library of screencast ‘how to’s‘ as a performance support tool. I am also investigating the possibility of the CWCCM programme (or similar) being delivered as a closed programme to my target audience.

Important Characteristics of Target Audience

The target audience for this intranet site are employees within my organisation who work on my geographical site. They are aged between 17 up to statutory retirement age and have varied levels of IT competency.

View the original article here

WANTED: Blogging Discipline

I get the benefits of blogging…

I get that it enhances the learning experience by providing an environment in which to reflect…

I get that it provides others with an opportunity to learn from me, as I do on many occasions from them…

I get that it is a wonderful networking opportunity…

I get all of this and yet, despite the promises I made myself to blog on a fortnightly basis (as a minimum) I have failed to do this!

Is it down to a lack of time?

No! I spend a significant amount of time online, idly browsing my life away so I can’t use ‘lack of time’ as an excuse.

Is it down to being paranoid over my digital footprint?

No! I regularly Tweet, post vids to YouTube, send photos to Picassa & Flikr so I can’t huddle under that paranoid blanket.

Is it down to a lack of content?

Hmmm, probably not. I’m heavily involved in L&D on a daily basis, I work in a challenging environment, I’m starting to get more and more involved in Learning Technologies so I feel I’ve got a lot to Blog about (whether anybody wants to read it, is another matter!)

Is it down to a lack of personal discipline?

Probably! I just can’t get myself into a routine to push this content out. I’ve got the time, I’ve got the content, I’ve got the skillset so I’m turning to you

Dear Reader… if you are a regular blogger, how do you manage it, how do you discipline yourself to put fingers to keyboard and push your valuable content out?

Please leave any and all suggestions below and I hope you’ll shortly see an improvement in my Blogging activity.

View the original article here

Small Chunks…

Wednesday of this week saw me fortunate enough to attend the IITT National Conference & Exhibition.

As always these ‘physical’ activities provide me with a great opportunity to further cement friendships made online as well as to make new acquaintances.

I have been guilty when attending previous conferences and workshops of trying to absorb as much of the content as possible, only to find that when I return home that I have a mass of notes and scribbles that even when deciphered produce an almost insurmountable ‘to do’ list. So I decided to take a slightly different tack with this particular conference and that was to limit myself to 1-2 action planning points/quotes per session, this I hoped would allow me to stand a greater chance of transferring any learning back into my workplace.

So here we go…

The New Blended Learning – Clive Shepherd

Your chosen method(s) will maximise the effectiveness of the learning. Your chosen media(s) will maximise the efficiency of the learning.

Create all elearning as either a Story, Scenario or Simulation. Ensure that I consider the Affective Context Model when creating any future learning activity.

Break up online synchronous activities by asking delegates to move out of the virtual classroom and undertake ‘other’ related activities before returning.Ask my IT Department to provide any facilitator with ‘admin rights’ to the virtual classrooms website to allow them to update any settings without creating a burden on the IT Department.

All in all, some great ideas and wonderful conversations coupled with my new approach to gathering ‘small chunks’ provided another wonderful CPD opportunity.

View the original article here

Mobile Learning Boot Camp

Twitter provides me with many benefits, one of which is a forecast of events that are taking place that I might be be interested in. Several days ago I picked up Tweet from @James Clay, who was conducting a Mobile Learning Boot Camp. One email later and I was buying my train ticket to Gloucester. I was a little reticent over attending the event as I work in neither HE, FE nor a work-based learning provider; I do however work for an organisation that delivers an incredible amount of training due to compliance and regulatory driven needs. Upon arrival at the College my rather tenuous attendance was greatly reinforced by seeing a National Skills Academy Nuclear plaque on the wall in the foyer…

what better justification behind attending (at least that’s what I convinced myself).

The day kicked off with James explaining that we would be looking at some current and emerging mobile technologies, before creating some content for ourselves. He even offered a tour of the college to view the approach that they had taken to implementing learning technologies. We then went on to review a whole host of mobile technologies. Of particular interest to me was an application called audioBoo and Posterous. I hope to introduce these free tools to my organisation as a small step towards implementing podcasting and blog. My first attempt at an audioBoo can be heard here.

http://audioboo.fm/boos/149575-you-ve-got-to-listen-to-this

I hadn’t expected to be asked to create my own content during the day, so I hurriedly decided to put together a short movie using my Flip HD camera that I would then push out to my colleagues via YouTube in the hope that it might spark their interest in using mobile technologies to enhance the learning events they deliver. The whole movie took approx 10 minutes to film and put together and probably the same time again to upload and publish. All from a network and Flip camera – very mobile!

Whilst the ‘technical’ side of the day was extremely useful, for me the overall impression  that the day left me with was one of concern over how disconnected my organisation is in terms of utilising technology (let alone mobile technology) for learning activities. This concern has led me to commit to the following when I return to work next week:

Provide feedback to relevant personnel as to the ‘disconnect’ that people would experience when leaving a college such as Gloucester and entering our workplace, in specific relation to the learning tools/materials/environment that are (un)available.Liaise with our IT Department as my organisation will shortly be purchasing new phone handsets for all employees and I hope to be able to convince them to consider additional functionality beyond just ‘making calls’.Push the YouTube video (above) out to our internal Learning Facilitators in the hope that they will consider a greater use of technology (mobile or otherwise) within their learning events.Investigate and promote the use of QR codes around my organisation.

All in all, another great learning experience which will undoubtedly add to my effectiveness within my new role as a Learning Technologist and once again… Cheers James!

View the original article here

Designing #mLearning Book Review – Chapter 1

As I mentioned in my previous blog post, I intend to provide a brief synopsis of each chapter of ‘Designing mlearning‘, but more importantly I intend to answer the questions that Clark poses at the end of each chapter and then pose those same questions back to you ‘Dear Reader‘

;

Chapter 1 – Overview

OK, so I’m off to something of a false start here as I’ve just realised that there are no questions asked of ‘The Reader’ at the end of this short introductory chapter, but we are provided with a list of very realistic and pragmatic situations in which a range of ‘everyday’ roles and occupations can/could/do harness the benefits of a mobile device to increase their performance and value.

And guess what?

Only one of the examples is to undertake a compliance ‘course’! This (thankfully) fleeting mention of a ‘course’ provides me with a warm, fuzzy feeling that the rest of the book won’t be trying to convince me of the benefits of shrinking down desktop learning onto a smaller screen.

He also provides us with a definition for mlearning that he admits the eLearning Guild mobile learning research team struggled to come up with:

“Any activity that allows individuals to be more productive when consuming, interacting with, or creating information, mediated through a compact digital portable device that the individual carries on a regular basis, has reliable connectivity, and fits into a pocket or purse”

(eLearning Guild 360 Mobile Learning Research Report, 2007)

He finally reminds us that the pace of change in this area is so fast that any suggested, specific solutions would be unlikely to stand the test of the publishing process time, so instead explains what the book is really about; preparing the reader to take advantage of the mobile revolution.

I’m hooked.

I’m reading on…..

View the original article here

Engaging The Unwilling Learner – Live Blog from #LT12UK

Mark Berthelemy – Capita

Poor outward comms from ‘us’

Poor intrinsic motivation to listen to the poor comms (from the learner)

We put too many infrastructure blockers in place!

Possible solutions to that, may be?

Leave blockers in place and put support in placeuse simpler systems

Push people towards intrinsic motivation

Don’t we want learners to pull content down because they want to?

We may be good at designing the intervention, but we aren’t so good at communicating around the intervention. We should take a leaf out of our Comms department book, maybe even merge the departments, after all aren’t we trying to achieve the same goal?

Management should set:

And set the vision that learners are expected to identify and source their learning opportunities

Gareth Williams Cambian Group and Information Transfer

Branded their training using the word ‘achieve‘

Poster campaignsMerchandiseBrochure for all sitesPromos movieRoadshow presentationsArticle in company newslettersRegular board reports

Here are the results so far

View the original article here

Oh no, not another ‘getting started with mobile’ blog post…

…. well….. Yes and No.

“Yes” in so far as it is about introducing the concept of mobility into your L&D approach…

…. and “No” in so far as it’s not about a lengthy, decision riddled, strategic approach, it’s about simple, pragmatic approaches that you can adopt (and indeed may already be doing) that can help you get your foot in the door, prior to moving onto other things.

Most of the slides used in the screencast below were inspired by the JISC Mobile infokit by Doug Belshaw – so thanks to Doug and JISC for providing the inspiration for this.

View the original article here

Virtual Learning Show 2013 – Day 2

As mentioned in a previous blog post, I’m participating in the 2013 2-day Virtual Learning Show. Whilst I was directly involved as a panel chair on Day 2, I also attended as a participant .

Here are my reflections on Day 2 and in particular each session, with a particular focus on:

A key ‘take-away’ from the sessions content itselfThe way in which it was facilitated (in part or in whole) with a view to what can I re-use/build upon for myself.

 Presented by Matt Turner
 11.00 – 12.00 UK BST

In many organisations, Virtual Classrooms are accepted as an efficient, powerful and flexible way to deliver learning. However, the tipping point has not yet been reached and some decision-makers still appear fearful, confused, or even downright scared of adopting VC, leaving L&D practitioners puzzled at the challenge of the internal sell-in.

“Fear and Loathing in Las Virtual” will be an enjoyable and frank look at why some are slow to move into the Virtual Classroom and what others have done to introduce it successfully.  The session will use a variety of examples, scenarios and tips on what works well, touching on content, communication, attitudes, terminology, sell-in and more in the process. As part of a collective responsibility to ensure VCs reach their potential in the UK, your experiences and contributions in this session will help its success!

My key content take-away

There was a great deal of discussion around what we ‘call’ this approach to delivery. There seemed to be a split between those who thought we shouldn’t worry about the language we use to describe it and those (myself included) who thought that it was worth the effort to get the ‘language/terminology’ correct.

I’m always conscious over the language that I use when talking within my organisation, but I’m going to check with the rest of my team to gain their perspective.

My key facilitation take-away

Matt asked us to post any links we had to the host ‘privately’ so that she could put them up at the end of the session. I’m not sure that I’d ever ask this…. surely if a person posts a relevant, contextual link into the slide panel there and then it provides an opportunity for people to immediately take a look ‘outside’ of the session and potentially bring a different perspective into session?

There’s also the distinct possibility that some people may leave the session early, so any links that are dropped into chat at the end of the session will be missed.

 Presented by Claire Line
12.30 – 13.30 UK BST

Claire Line is Learning Technologies Manager at global law firm Hogan Lovells. As part of that role, she has carried out extensive research into virtual classroom and online learning technologies.  Since 2004, she has introduced a number of learning technologies for IT training and legal learning, including virtual classroom, web conferencing and video production.

In this discussion-based session, Claire will take you through her journey of how virtual learning was implemented at Hogan Lovells and will discuss the successes, the barriers she encountered, and some of the key points she has learned that will help you in your project to implement virtual learning in your organisation. Be sure to bring your questions to ask!

My key facilitation take-away

No matter how much you are rushing for the start of the session ALWAYS undertake any audio setup process. Claire was very muffled at the start of the session which led to me stepping away for some time and by the time I got back the microphone issue had been resolved and I’m missed a good chunk at the beginning.

 Presented by Julie Dirksen
 14.00 – 15.00 UK BST

Game designers have been using concepts like a structured flow of goals, levels, and accomplishments to create a sense of engagement and efficacy in players. One of the key elements in creating fully engaging game experiences is the psychological concept of flow-creating game environments that keep players in tenuous balance between their level of ability and level of challenge. Learners should have the same sense from learning experiences. The speaker will take a look at the way games and other forms of entertainment media create flow states, how to create that in learning environments, and why the act of learning is crucial to this type of engagement.

In this session, you will learn:

What we know about attracting and maintaining learner attentionHow game designers create sticky and compelling experiencesHow to structure learning experiences that will engage learners

My key content take-away

People’s personal challenges will ALWAYS be better than anything I can come up for them. I need to make sure that this is carefully woven in to the upcoming ‘campaign’ that I am working on.

My key facilitation take-away

Julie invited us to tell her what the ‘most boring subjects’ were that we had been asked to create training on. She then (bravely) used those topics to craft a significant chunk of her session around. This is something that I’d be keen to explore.

I found that there was a lot of talking at the beginning of Julie’s session and limited interaction, coupled with the somewhat scientific content and it being immediately after lunch led to a reduced level of concentration on my part. I need to think about the scheduling of any online sessions in the future taking part immediately after lunch (just as I should in a f2f environment)

Chair: Craig Taylor
Panellists: Bianca Woods (Canada), Koreen Olbrish (US), Barbara Thompson (UK), Ryan Tracey (Australia)
15.30 – 16.30 UK BST

You’ve probably seen, attended or perhaps even participated in ‘panel discussions’ before, but how many of them have been online? That’s why we thought it was time to extend people’s perceptions as to how online classroom tools can be used. In this session you’ll have the opportunity to participate in a live online panel discussion which will include workplace L&D practitioners from 4 countries and 4 time zones!

This is your opportunity to hear the thoughts and opinions on how emerging tech can be used to enhance and enrich our offerings and ultimately add value to our businesses? Perhaps you’d just like a second (or third!) opinion on a plan you have. Maybe you’re struggling with a particular aspect of a solution and would like to hear how others have approached it or would approach it.

My key content take-away

Here’s a blog post from Jo Cook who’s done a great job of capturing the essence of my session.

My key facilitation take-away

Don’t be put off by what other people tell you can/can’t be done. The use of 5 webcams simultaneously, across 5 countries and 5 time zones is something that many people will tell you is a foolhardy exercise within an online classroom. Well we did it today and it worked! Admittedly there were 2 occasions where there was a short ‘freeze’, however I’ve been in sessions that are faaaaaaar less webcam dependant and the same thing/worse has happened, so it’s not going to put me off in the future.

Did you participate?

What did you take away from the day / each session?

View the original article here

“My favourite elearning interaction is”….

…. was one of the questions that was posed by Saffron Interactive at their stand during Learning Technologies 2011.

It was a novel idea to capture exhibition visitors ideas around certain L&D topics by asking them to pick a question from a list of questions which included:

Mobile LearningSocial learningFavourite elearning interactionsEffective compliance training

point a Flip camera at them and ask them to answer it.

Simple, quick and effective!

Anyway, here’s my response

Which leads me to ask….

What are your fave elearning interactions?

Are you so passionately opposed to elearning that there is no possible interaction that would float your boat?

Do you have simple tastes and would be happy with any interaction?

Why not let me know in the comments box below?

View the original article here

Overthinking Slideshare

It seems to be that time of the year when every platform provider under the Sun is emailing me to tell me about my 2013 statistics

How many views my slides have had

How long people watched my videos for

How many bowel movements I’ve made

How many tweets I’ve sent etc

I was reading my Slideshare stats earlier today when I noticed that my number of slides per upload was much higher than the average Slideshare upload!

GASP!

I then noticed that my average number of words per slide was significantly lower than the average \

PHEW!

I guess the Lessig method I use for most of my presentations means that I’m using more slides to tell my story, but with fewer words. Perhaps I’m also overthinking this and need to get out more…

Do you use Slideshare?

What did your annual stats look like?

If you’d like to discuss how I can help you enhance your and your teams slide-based presentations, please get in touch.

View the original article here

Podcast #24: Books and ebooks

Sorry, I could not read the content fromt this page.

View the original article here

Think campaign…

Regular readers will know that my previous Organisation made the transition from outsourcing it’s self-paced elearning modules to bringing them ‘in house’ almost 2 years ago.

Once we had sourced the software my Head of Department insisted that we launch the system with a fanfare etc and advertise it’s existence. Now I must admit that at this stage I was a little reluctant to follow this course of action because self-paced elearning was nothing new to my Organisation, it was just that we had decided to bring the development in-house; I even quoted the old “YouTube was never launched line“, but he was having none of it….. so it was off the the PR & Comms department (which is ironically where I ended up working) to ask for some advice.

Rather than waffle on about the advice that they provided, I thought it would be far more interesting to show you….

They advised that I should ‘brand’ the elearning. Not from a screen layout, fonts etc perspective but from a ‘logo type’ angle; this is what we came up with

It plays upon the ubiquitous ‘e’ that many people associate with online activities as well as the ‘swirls’ which were a part of that organisations branding.

We then discussed how we could use the info-screens that are situated around site to enhance our campaign and settled upon what my colleague  called a ‘sting campaign‘. If you are unsure as to what this is, then think about the run-up to Big Brother every year. Channel 4 ran a ‘sting’ campaign consisting of 1-2 second pieces of footage showing the Big Brother eye, usually with a few beats of the Big Brother music.

I decided that I also wanted to take this ‘teaser’ approach too, but more importantly wanted to get people talking about the campaign whilst still maintaining an air of mystery….. very much like the British Gas “tell Sid…..” campaign from yesteryear.

This is what we came up with, as you can see we have used the elearning logo to maintain the ‘branding’ of the campaign…

and I don’t actually mention what the hell it is that is coming. This was something of a gamble, however it really got people talking about the ads and what it was and when it was coming.

Our campaign was working.

Towards the end of the campaign we started to reveal a little more about what it was via a poster & flyer campaign.

The posters were placed in all the usual places

stairwellsnotice boardsKitchen areasBack of toilet doors…………. Above the urinals

I was shameless!

I also took a leaf out of McDonalds book and placed the posters on the trays in our on-site, self-serve restaurant to…. well… ram it down people’s throats even more (pun intended)

Once we had launched the system we then followed it up with an interview to fill in the gaps that the marketing campaign had been unable to do (this was one of our first recorded interviews and we were still learning the ropes (as you’ll be able to see), but it got the message across)

So folks, that was how we launched the in-house elearning system in my previous organisation.

Would I have chosen to do it that way?

No.

Am I glad that I did it that way?

Yes.

Why?

Because it taught me a great deal about thinking about the bigger picture around a single initiative. Although this was a piece of software and subsequently multiple self-paced elearning modules I would still choose to take this ‘campaign’ approach to the implementation of almost anything.

Granted, the effort involved may vary, but certainly from the perspective of a learning resource I’ll always try to ensure that it is only ‘part’ of a much bigger picture.

So that’s what I did, but what about you?

Have you ever mounted a campaign as part of a learning initiative?

Did it work?

What did you do?

Have you tried this but found it to be a waste of time?

Why not let us all know via the comments box below……

View the original article here

Get your foot in the door – Leadership

Let’s be honest, Leadership programmes are a ‘must have‘ component of any successful organisation – (or so the many vendors who sell them will have you think)

So if your organisation is conducting such a programme (or even if it isn’t, but is keen to develop it’s leaders) then you’ve got a fantastic opportunity to get your foot in the door with the very people who are likely to have/will have a key role to play in any future decision making process around the use of mobile technologies.

Why not take a look at these apps and consider whether you might want to direct your colleagues to them?

GoodPractice Top Tips for Managers (iOS) – £1.49

Leadership Performance (Android) – £1.82

Inevitably there will be some people who do not have a mobile device and will bemoan the fact that you are offering their colleagues who do have a mobile device something that they themselves are unable to benefit from, or they will complain over the fact that the apps cost money – don’t let this put you off.

Simply tell them to carry on using whatever tool or process they have always used – simples!!!

And you know what? Even if people don’t opt for these apps, you may have just sewn the seeds for them to look for an alternative….

Good luck and let me know how you get on

The blog post that started it all

Image source

View the original article here