Friday, April 18, 2008
AG 2008 Day 4 - Things I've Learned in My Life So Far
On the final day of the eLearning Guild Annual Gathering 2008 the keynote topic was Things I've Learned in My Life So Far by Stefan Sagmeister. He is an award-winning, graphic designer who shared some of his observations and life lessons. He shared different graphic arts projects and how they challenge us to look at the things in new ways and use unconventional methods to motivate and inspire people. Some samples he shared are listed below:
- Starting a Charity is Surprisingly Easy
- Being not Truthful Works Against Me
- Complaining is Silly. Either Act or Forget
- Trying to Look Good Limits My Life
I also attended a session called, Informal Learning in a Global Enterprise: The CA Story by Ron Ateshian from Computer Assoicates. He shared how they deployed a custom social networking application created by Q2Learning to support informal learning in the enterprise.
Traditional training had always been a push model.
Catalysts for Change
- SME and Instructor experience was the most critical part of the learning experience
- Silos were competing for intellectual capital and resources
- Competing budget forced program consolidation and efficiencies
- Need to centralize
Learner Breakdown
- Employees - 17,000
- Partners - 4,000
- Customers - 50,000
Mission: Simplify Learning through technology
Vision: Embrace and integrate information and non-traditional learning
What we Did
- Corporate wide LMS
- Ebook platform books 24/7
- Virtual Classroom and Virtual Labs
- Standard development & delivery methods
- Self-service CA TV platform
- CA Learning Collaboration Suite
- Q2 Learning's xPERT eCommunity and eCampus
CA Learning Collaboration
- SCORM Conformant
- Configurable
- Discussion threads
- Blogs
- Wikis
- RSS Feeds
- Resource Library
- Subscription options
- Chat and Virtual Classroom
- Tagging with full-text search capability
- Training Centers
- Wrapped and transitional learning
- Enable push and the pull
Best Practice Tips
- Use the ADDIE model and identify business and learner needs
- Involve stakeholders from the beginning
- Make use of RFP and Test-Case scenarios
- Use seasoned project managers
- Evaluate the effectiveness during and after roll-out
- Create templates
Labels: eLearning Guild
Thursday, April 17, 2008
AG 2008 Day 3 - The Future of the Internet
The keynote, The Future of the Internet, was given by John Patrick author of Net Attitude. He spoke about where trend are going for how internet technolgies are useful to people.The Internet is about PEOPLE. John listed several humorous examples of how companies use technology to benefit themselves which inconvenience the customer (e.g., dial an 800 number, type in your account number, then get connected to a person who asks for your account number again.)
He warned that companies should change their ATTITUDE about how they serve the client/learner. The website is there for the convenience of the learner. The security compliance officer should have to justify why you can't do something --not the other way around as it is now.
He illustrated an example where all of your health care information would be avilable to you and your doctor online. He suggested that security is not a technical issue and that records are unsecure in their current form of manila folders spread all over offices and we don't know who has access.
The Internet is about Lifelong Learning. It is not just about kids. It is about all of us wanting to learn and stay updated. Learning how to learn is increasingly important. Libraries are changing, not necessarily to add more books, but to add more space for gathering and collaborating.
The Internet is EVERYWHERE. John talked about wifi networks and wimax networks. He also spoke about how corporate lobbyists hold back advances in the US whille the rest of the world recognizes the importantance (e.g. high speed internet avilability in France, Korea, Japan, etc.)
The Internet is INTELLIGENT. Information is being delivered in the format of a service which makes it more relevant and meaningful. He discusses the semantice web (lots of tags) and web 3.0 where the data is smart and knows it's own context.
I also attended a session on Designing Business Process Experiential Simulations facilitated by Daniel Campbell from Vangent, Inc. He spoke about using Bloom's Taxonomy in the process of designing the learning experience (pictured above) and how the simulation serves to bring the learning into the Analysis and Application levels.
Later, I ducked out of a session which wasn't too helpful and caught the last part of a session called, Quick and Easy Ways to Get Started with Serious Games facilitated by Anne Derryberry. Anne hosts a blog called, I'm Serious.Net - Serious Thoughts About Serious Games. The section of her talk that I caught was that it is far too expensive to develop a gaming engine for use inside a an enterprise at this point in time. An alternative is to use an existing game architecture and match it to a learning objective. She showed video segments of several games from YouTube like this one for World of Warcraft. Anne mentioned the anecdote of a person listing "Guild Leader" as a skill on their resume and getting hired.
One interesting game that she mentioned was the Glass Bead Network. Each player has a set of beads. Each bead represents a concept. The beads can be placed beside each other if the player can explain the relationship between the two concepts. This game can be used by teams to foster creativity and innovation.
At the end of the day I attended an Espresso Learning Session (40 minutes chatting at a table), Integrating Serious Games and ILS into your Learning Strategy by Clark Quinn. Quin is the author of Engaging Learning: Designing e-Learning Simulation Games. In his book, he maps the similarities between successful learning and engaging games and lays out a guide for creating simulation games that educate and engage. He shared some of the insights from his book.
Labels: eLearning Guild
