Learnlets

Secondary

Clark Quinn’s Learnings about Learning

You are here: Home / Archives for design

Shaming, safety, & misconceptions

14 May 2019 by Clark 1 Comment

Another twitter debate, another blog post. As an outgrowth of a #lrnchat debate, a discussion arose around whether making errors in learning could be a source of shaming. This wasn’t about the learners, however, being afraid of being shamed. Instead it was about whether the designers would feel proscribed from  making real errors because of their expectation of learner’s emotions. And, I have strong beliefs about why this is an important issue. Learners should be making errors, for important reasons. So, we need to make it safe!

The importance of errors is in the fact that we’d rather make them in practice than when it counts. Some have argued that we literally have to fail to be ready to learn. (Perhaps almost certainly if the learners are overconfident.) The importance to me is in misconceptions. Our errors don’t tend to be random (there is some randomness), but instead are patterned. They come from systematic ways of perceiving the situation that are wrong. They come from bringing in the wrong models in ways that seem to make sense. And it’s best to address them by being able to make that choice, and getting feedback about why that’s wrong.

Which means learners will have to fail. And they should be able to make mistakes. (Guided) Exploration is good. Learners should be able to try things out, see what the consequences are, and then try other approaches. It shouldn’t be a free-for-all, since learners can not explore systematically. Instead, as I’ve said, learning should be designed action and guided reflection. And that means we should be designing in these alternatives to the right action as options, and provide specific feedback.

So, if they’re failing, is that shaming? Not if we do it right. It’s about making failing okay.  It’s about making the learning experience ‘safe‘. Our feedback should be about the decision, and why it’s wrong (referring to the model). We might not give them the right answer, if we want them to try again. But we don’t make it personal, just like good coaching. It’s about what they did, not who they are. So our design should prevent shaming, but by making it safe to fail, not preventing failure.

The one issue that emerged was that there was fear that the designers (or other stakeholders) might have fear that this could be emotionally damaging, perhaps from fears of their own. Er, nope! It’s about the learning, and we know what research tells us works. We have to be responsible to be willing to do what’s right, as challenging as that may be for any reason. Time, money, emotions, what have you. Because, if we want to be responsible stewards of the resources entrusted to us, we should be doing what’s known to be right. Not chasing shiny objects. (At least, until we get the core right. ;)

So, let’s not shame ourselves by letting irrelevant details cloud our judgment. Do the right thing. For the right reasons. We know how to be serious about our learning. Make it so.

Filed Under: design

Competencies for L&D Processes?

1 May 2019 by Clark Leave a Comment

We have competencies for people. Whether it’s ATD, LPI, IBSTPI, IPL, ISPI, or any other acronym, they’ve got definitions for what people should be able to do. And it made me wonder, should there be competencies for processes as well? That is, should your survey validation process, or your design process, also meet some minimum standards?  How about design thinking? There are things you do get certified in, including such piffle as MBTI and NLP.  So does it make sense to have processes meet minimum standards?

One of the things I do is help orgs fine-tune their design processes. When I talk about deeper elearning, or we take a stand for serious elearning, there are nuances that make a difference. In these cases, I’m looking for the small things that will have the biggest impact. It’s not about trying to get folks to totally revamp their processes (which is a path to failure).  Yet, could we go further?

I was wondering whether we should certify processes. Certainly, that happens in other industries. There are safety processes in maintenance, and cleanliness in food operations, and so on. Could and should we have them for learning? For performance consulting, instructional design, performance support design, etc?

Could we state what a process should have as a minimum requirement? Certain elements, at least, at certain way points? You could take Michael Allen’s SAM and use it as a model, for instance. Or Cathy Moore’s Action Mapping. Maybe Julie Dirksen’s Design For How People Learn could be created as such. The point being that we could stipulate some way points in design that would be the minimum to be counted as sufficient for learning to occur. Based upon learning science, of course. You know, deliberate and spaced practice, etc.

Then the question is, should we? Also, could we agree? Or, of course, people could market alternative process certifications. It appears this is what Quality Matters does, for instance, at least K12 and higher ed. It appears IACET does this for continuing education certification. Would an organization certification matter? For customers, if you do customer training? For your courses, if you provide them as a product or service? Would anyone care that you meet a quality standard?

And it could go further. Performance support design, extended learning experience design (c.f. coaching), etc.  Is this something that’s better at the person level than the process level?

Should there be certification for compliance with a competency about the quality of the learning design process? Obviously in some areas. The question is, does it matter for regular L&D? On one hand, it might help mitigate against the info dump/knowledge test courses that are the bane of our industry. On the other hand, it might be hard to find a workable definition that could suit the breadth of ways in which people meet learning needs.

All I know is that we have standards about a lot of things. Learning data interchange. Individual competencies. Processes in education. Can and should there be for L&D processes? I don’t know. Seriously. I’m just pondering. I welcome your thoughts.

Filed Under: design, strategy

Reflection on reflection

23 April 2019 by Clark Leave a Comment

Lake reflectionOf late, there’ve been a few dialogs on Twitter. As I opined in the recent podcast I was interviewed in, using Twitter for a dialog is kind of new. I’m not talking about a tweet chat like #lrnchat (which I think is a great thing), but a out-loud dialog with others weighing in. And it’s fun, and informative, but occasionally I need to go deeper. So here’s a reflection on reflection.

In that podcast interview, I opined, as I often do, about action and reflection. The starting point is a claim is that our own learning action and then reflection. What I mean is that we act in the world, and if we reflect on it we can learn.

One of the pushbacks was that we can learn without reflection. And, yes, I agree. We can learn without conscious feedback. In fact, in Kathy Sierra’s insightful Badass, she talks about chicken sexing,  a task which no one’s been able to make consciously accessible. Things can go below consciousness.

This was related to another pushback: do we really learn differently from chickens and rats? And the answer is no, but what we learn is different. And, further, what we can learn is different. I’ve yet to see rats sending rockets up to the moon to see if it’s made of cheese.

Conscious representations facilitate learning, particularly for things we learn that aren’t strongly tied to our evolved survival. Learning about cognition itself, for instance, the ability to think about our own thinking, is just something that separates us fundamentally. And, to do that well, conscious artifacts facilitate it.

We’ve found that creating conscious frameworks to facilitate our understanding and acquisition are helpful. So, specifically, models and examples are two things that help us develop skills. We use models to guide and review our performance, to guide us. M0dels are conceptual relationships that we can compare to our performance. Examples show how those models play out in particular contexts.

There’s a followup: if learning is action and reflection, then instruction should be designed action and guided reflection. That is: do, get feedback, but also more. To me, models and examples are that additional reflection. We can present them ahead of time (but see Problem-Based Learning), but we should use them as part of the feedback, pointing out how flaws in performance didn’t align with the models, and further examples that illustrate those nuances.

Ok, so I may be playing fast and loose with the notion of reflection here, lumping in models and examples and feedback. However, my point is to try to keep learning not being information dump and knowledge test. We know that won’t lead to meaningful change. If I label it action and reflection, we have a better chance to push for an application-based instruction.

So, I’ll stick to my claim about (designed) action and (guided) reflection, with the caveat that my ‘reflection’ is more than just noodling. And, yes, it’s for learning goals beyond ‘hitting your head on rocks hurts’. But the goals I’m focusing on are the types of goals that will make a difference in individual and organizational success in our society.  If I’m pushing too far and too hard, let me know.

Filed Under: design, meta-learning

Exploration & Surprise

17 April 2019 by Clark 2 Comments

Some weeks back, I posted about surprise. That is, a new model that says that that our brains work to minimize surprise. We learn so as not to be wrong. And that made sense in one way, but left another gap. Another article explains (well, partly; the mathematics are more than I want to wade into) further, and that gives me a new handle on thinking about designing transformative experiences. It’s about the value of exploration to accompany surprise.

The problem with the original story of us just minimizing surprise is that this leads to another inference. Why wouldn’t we want to just hang in a dark warm room?  The notion of minimizing surprise did explain people who don’t seem keen to learn, but many of us are. And, as Raph Koster told us in A Theory of Fun, the drive to play games seems to be learning! We want exploration, and the outcomes aren’t certain. This is in conflict.

The new article posits that there’s another factor, the expectation of value. We also want the optimal outcome. The theory says that we’ll be willing to try several relatively equal predicted value outcomes to learn which to choose in the future (if I’ve understood the article correctly). So we will explore even under uncertainty if there’s a benefit to learning.

This doesn’t quite explain things to me. I think it’s missing some emotional aspect.  Why would we do things like try out Escape Rooms or The Void (as I’ve done with colleagues)?  There’s no real outcome, except perhaps to know about such experiences. But horror movies or thrillers? All we know is that we’ll have our emotions raised and then settled. But maybe that fits into a good outcome.

Ready to learnStill, this gives me a new handle. When I was preparing the Learning Experience Design workshop I gave at Learning Solutions last month, I was talking about ensuring surprise. That is, the learning experience should make learners aware that they didn’t know what the outcome would be. But I knew, and suggested, that there had to be more. They had to care about the outcome. And now we have the hook.

They care about the outcome, because it’ll be a higher value situation once they do!  If we do this right, we let them know that they care about the outcome, and they can’t do it now (either they know already, or we have them fail). Then, we can offer them the path to achieve this outcome. If they explore, they’ll learn? If we’ve got a truly meaningful outcome (you’ll now be able to do X) that they truly care about (you do want to be able to do X), you’re now set with emotionally ready learners. Cognitive science models suggest that this should work!  :)

To turn it around. the point is that you should create a goal that they should desire, and then demonstrate that they don’t already know it. It’s simplistic, but I think it’s part of creating a transformative experience, one where they are not just ready for the outcome, but eager. And I think that’s desirable.  What do you think?

 

 

 

Filed Under: design, meta-learning

Quinnovations

16 April 2019 by Clark Leave a Comment

I was talking with my lass, and reminiscing about a few things. And, it occurs to me, that I may not have mentioned them all. Worse, I confess, I’m still somewhat proud of them. So, at the risk of self-aggrandizement, I thought I’d share a few of my Quinnovations. There’s a bigger list here, but this is the ‘greatest hits’ list, with some annotation. (Note, I’ve already discussed the game Quest for Independence, one of my most rewarding works.)

One project was a game based upon my PhD topic. I proposed a series of steps involved in analogical reasoning, and tested them both alone and then after some training. I found some improvement (arguing for the value of meta-learning instruction). During my post-doc, a side project was developing a game that embedded analogical reasoning in a story setting. I created a (non-existent) island, and set the story in the myths of the voodoo culture on it. The goal was a research environment for analogical reasoning; the puzzles in the game required making inferences from the culture. Most players were random, interestingly, at a test, but a couple were systematic.

With a colleague, Anne Forster, we came up with an idea for an online conference to preface a face-to-face event. This was back circa 1996, so there weren’t platforms for such. I secured the programming assistance of a couple of the techs in the office I was working for (Open Net), and we developed the environment. In it, six folks reknown in their area conducted overlapping conversations around their topic. This set up the event, and saw vibrant discussions.

A colleague at an organization I was working for, Access Australia CMC, had come up with the idea of competition for school kids to create websites about a topic. With another colleague, we brainstormed a topic for the first running of the event. In it, we had kids report on innovations in their towns that they could share with other towns (anywhere). I led the design and implementation of the competition: site and announcements, getting it up and running. It ended up generating vibrant participation and winning awards.

Upon my return to the US, I led a team to generate a learning system that developed learners’ understanding of themselves as learners. Ultimately, I conceived of a model whereby we profiled learners as to their learning characteristics (NB: not learning styles) and adapted learning on that basis. There was a lot to it: a content model, rules for adaptation, machine learning for continuing improvement, and more. We got it up and running, and while it evaporated in 2001 (as did the organization we worked for), it’s legacy served me in several other projects. (And, while they didn’t base it on our system, to my knowledge, it’s roughly the same architecture being seen in Newton.)

Using the concept of that adaptive system, with one of my clients we pitched and won the right to develop an electronic performance support system. It ended up being a context-sensitive help system (which is what an EPSS really is ;).  I created the initial framework which the team executed against (replacing a help system created by the system engineers, not the right team to do it). The design wrote content into a framework that populated the manual (as prescribed by law) and the help system. The client ended up getting a patent on it (with my name on too ;).

Last one I’ll mention for now, a content system for a publisher. They were going to the next generation of their online tool, and were looking for a framework to: incorporate their existing texts, guide the next generation of texts, and support multiple business models. Again pulling on that content structure experience, I gave them a structured content model that met their needs. The model was supposed to be coupled with a tech platform, and that project collapsed, meaning my model didn’t see the light of day. However, I was pleased to find out subsequently that it had a lasting impact on their subsequent works!

The point being that, in conjunction with clients and partners, I have been consistently generating innovations thru the years. I’m not an academic, tho’ I have been and know the research and theories. Instead, I’m a consultant who comes in early, applies the frameworks to come up with ideas that are both good and unique (I capitalize a lot on models I’ve collected over the years), and gets out quickly when I’m no longer adding value. Clients get an outcome that is uniquely appropriate, innovative, and effective. Ideas they likely wouldn’t have come up with on their own!  If you’d like to Quinnovate, get in touch!

Filed Under: design, meta-learning, social, technology

Learning Tools and Uni Change

11 April 2019 by Clark Leave a Comment

As part of a push for Learning Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University recently released their learning design tools. I’ve been aware of CMU’s Open Learning Initiative for a suite of reasons, and their tools for separate reasons. And I think both are good. I don’t completely align with their approach, but that’s ok, and I regularly cite their lead as a person who’s provided sage advice about doing good learning design. Further, their push, based upon Herb Simon’s thoughts about improving uni education, is a good one. So what’s going on, and why?

First, let’s be fair, most uni learning design isn’t very good. It’s a lot of content dump, and a test. And, yes, I’m stereotyping.  But it’s not all that different from what we see too often in corporate elearning. Not enough practice, and too much content. And we know the reasons for this.

For one, experts largely don’t have access to what they do, consciously, owing to the nature of our cognitive architecture. We compile information away, and research from the Cognitive Technology Group at the University of Southern California has estimated that 70% of what experts do isn’t available. They literally can’t tell you what they do!  But they can tell you what they know. University professors are not only likely to reflect this relationship, they frequently may not actually be practitioners, so they don’t really do!  We’ve compounded the likely focus on ‘know’, not do.

And, of course, most faculty aren’t particularly rewarded for teaching. Even lower tiers on the Carnegie scale of research institutions dream and hire on the potential for research.  There may be lip service to quality of teaching but if you can publish and get grants, you’re highly unlikely to be let go without some sort of drastic misstep.

And the solution isn’t, I suggest, trying to get faculty to be expert pedagogues. I suggest that the teaching quality of an institution is perceived, except perhaps the top tier institutions, as a mark of the quality of the institution. And yet the efforts to make teaching important, supported, valued, etc, tends to still be idiosyncratic. Yes, many institutions are creating central bodies to support faculty in improving their classes, but those folks are relatively powerless to substantially change the pedagogy unless they happen to have an eager faculty member.

CMU’s tools align, largely, with doing the right thing, and this is important. The more tools that make it easy to do the right thing, rich pedagogies, the better. It makes much more sense, for instance, to have a default be to have separate feedback for each wrong answer than the alternative. Not that we always see that…but that’s an education problem. We need faculty and support staff to ‘get’ what good learning design is.

Ultimately, this is a good push forward. Combined with greater emphasis on teaching quality, even a movement towards competencies, and rigor in assessment, there’s a hope to get meaningful outcomes from our higher education investment. What I’ve said about K12 also holds true for higher ed, it’s both a curriculum and a pedagogy problem. But we can and should be pushing both forward. Here’s to steps in the right direction!

Filed Under: design, strategy

#LSCon 19 Reflections

5 April 2019 by Clark Leave a Comment

It’s hard to think of now, but last week I was at the Learning Solutions conference. And I had a really great time. I didn’t see as much as I’d like (as you ‘ll see, I was busy), but there were some really worthwhile learnings, and some fun as well. Here are my conference reflections.

For the first time, I rented a scooter. That was a learning all in itself. I’d been having pain, and walking was the worst. The scooter was a way to address that, and it did. I scooted around and avoided much walking. Not all, but a lot. And it was fun to zoop around, but…it was hard to maneuver in small spaces. Like the necessary elevators. And my room. I tried to slow down and do it carefully, and that worked to an extent, but it wasn’t pretty.

Decorated mobility scooterThe great part was that, having heard of my plight, some friends descended upon my ride and tarted it up with glitter and dangly things. And, best of all, caution tape. Very appropriate. Very much appreciated!  And it wasn’t even too hard to take off at the end.

Thus, I was happy to zoom to my room to run my pre-conference workshop on learning experience design. It was designed as an integration of Engaging Learning and the Serious eLearning Manifesto.  I snuck a bit of ‘transformation‘ in there as well.  The evaluations aren’t back yet, but I think overall it achieved the purpose. One attendee later suggested an improvement that I’d agree on (allowing learners to choose from the topics to workshop on). Always learning!

That evening, we did something I’d never done, Presentation Roulette. The speakers (I agreed to be one, without having seen it before; I do like experimenting [read: living dangerously]) choose a random title out of a sock (well, it was clean) and are then given a deck that Bianca Woods of the Guild had developed for that title, including the silliest pictures she could find on the web. As she describes it, a mashup of presentations and improv comedy.  It was very fun, and in particular extremely funny; the other presenters did great jobs. I’ll attend again even if I don’t present!

Tuesday was a normal day (e.g. I didn’t present). As usual, I mindmapped the keynotes (several posts back), cruised the floor, and attended some sessions. The panels were good. I attended the one on the Future of ID, and the comments were insightful about how the tools and goals were changing. Similarly the one on the Future of Work had a convergent message I resonated with, that we need to focus on using tech to augment us on the stuff we’re good at, not try to fight off automation of rote tasks. I also took some time off for calls and work.

That evening, after dinner, some friends and colleagues (they’re the same folks) came over to my suite. (I have gotten lots of accommodations for my situation; and I’m very grateful.)  Fueled by libations, we proceeded to gin up an evil plan to control the world (or at least the market).  Politically correct it wasn’t, fun it was.  Too late to bed.

The next day I was part of the Guild Master panel with about 14 participants. Too many!  Great thoughts, and I tried to stifle myself and only make the most cogent points. Apparently I still spoke a little too much. I blame it on this blogging, it gives me lots of thoughts. :) The points I wanted to make were, not surprisingly, about the need for getting back to basics in learning design, and to look beyond optimal execution to continual innovation.

I also sat in an ARK Kit presentation. It made AR seem almost within reach. At this time you still do need some coding, but if it progresses like many tools, much will soon become at a higher level of ability to describe what you want and make it so.

I still wasn’t done, as later that day I also gave my ‘professionalism and myths’ talk. The audience was small but enthusiastic. I do believe we made some converts. I added in not just debunking myths, but how to talk to folks who buy into it. There’s a little learning science in it as well. We really do need to be on a sound basis before we can have credibility.

I have to say, delightedly, that I continue to have folks say that my books have helped them. Different books for different folks, but something I love to hear. As an author, you get some idea of the sales, but none of the impact. Some of these were small effects, and some were “I’ve used this to change my/our practice.”  That’s what it’s about, after all, you write a book to effect change. I’m grateful for those who share this insight!  In particular, I hear lots of folks using the Myths book in their orgs to counter employees/customers’ misguided intentions. The Revolution book still (or, perhaps, now) has influence. And I still hear about the Games book!

I also slipped away with some more conspirators and experienced The Void. It was hard on my legs (I went with cane, not scooter), mostly because they didn’t have anywhere to sit while you waited!?!?!  (I gave them a serve in the too-long post-experience survey.) However, it’s very cool: a compelling experience and great implications for learning. Embedded performance? That would be ‘yes’.

The keynotes, by the way, were excellent AND…  I’ve heard over the years that conference organizers say it’s hard to have diversity in speakers. All white males (e.g. me ;), or at least white.  This time, there were two women, and two blacks, out of three people. With good messages.  It was inspiring to hear and to see!  Kudos to David Kelly and the Guild for managing to debunk the barrier.

There was some discussion of whether there was a place for those who proselytize learning science or it was all going commercial and cheap. I feel like there’s a growing interest in the science, but I’m frequently a year or several ahead of the market. In this case, I want to yell “make me right!”  This is a field I care about, and we can be doing so much good. I want us to capitalize on that potential. There were new folks looking for solutions and the opportunity to grow. I hope we can make that happen in a positive direction.

Overall, it was a success. I had time with smart colleagues, saw interesting sessions, and met new folks. I presented and got feedback, which is a great cycle. And it was another chance to immerse myself in the state of the industry. Here’s to continual improvement.

 

 

Filed Under: design, meta-learning

Violating Expectations

4 April 2019 by Clark Leave a Comment

As some of you may know, last week I had a surgical procedure. I don’t want to share details, but while it was non-trivial, it went fine. (I’ve talked earlier about the situation beforehand.) What did not go fine was the recovery. I’m good now, but there were a harrowing few days. And I think the reason is of interest, and there’s a lesson. So I thought I’d share.

Now, my only previous experience with surgery was outpatient knee surgery. And it was amazing; I went off pain killers the 2nd day, and recovery was rapid. This, too, was outpatient, and while not as ‘micro’ as the knee surgery, I had no other frame of reference. And that caused a problem.

So, the day of the surgery went about as you might expect. I went in, lay down, woke up somewhere else, and was told things went well. With the benefit of meds, I let folks know I’d lived :), and proceeded to sleep away the afternoon. Come the evening, I was more clear-headed. With good meds, I looked forward to a night’s sleep, and better in the morn.

That night’s sleep was not good. I couldn’t get comfortable, and so couldn’t sleep. Specifically, my left (not bad) side was uncomfortable and so was my right side that was supposedly fixed. I was awake all but maybe 2 hours. Yet, I’d gotten used to sleep deprivation.

I was bothered that the side that had had the surgery, that was now supposed to be free of the cause, still hurt. Differently, perhaps, but still hurt. This was dismaying (to put it mildly). I called Saturday night, and was told that the right side could still hurt for some days. Er, okay…

Saturday night wasn’t really better. I slept maybe 3-4 hours, but lack of comfort meant I was still worried and in addition now sleep-deprived. This wasn’t all, but worth recounting is by Sunday, my whole right leg wasn’t working. Any sort of moving but standing hurt.  Not good.

This continued into Monday. Little and bad sleep meant I was going into a mentally challenging state of sleep-deprivation. The lack of right leg action began to make me feel like the whole experiment had failed, and I was going to have to face this again. I put in a call, but my doctor was in surgery. You can imagine I was discouraged and distressed. I was headed to bed when my doctor finally called. They’d scheduled me to see him the next day, and I hung on to that.

When I got to see him on Tuesday morning, I was a wreck. Spaced out from lack of sleep, distressed about my leg, and so on. I first talked to the PA, and then the doc came in. And, I found out a lot more. They’d completely removed the material pressing on the disk, but in so doing they’d likely irritated the nerve. And there could be some bleeding doing that, too. So, my leg hurting was explained. When we talked about meds, they were reminded what I had been on, and how the sudden cessation of that could be problematic. With explanations, and revised recommendations for medications going forward, it seemed promising.

Low and behold, after the visit, things began to fall into place. The medication revisions kicked in, and I felt a lot better. Not good, mind you, but many times better. Finally, I could see how this was all working, and I was progressing!

I awoke this morning and verified that yesterday wasn’t a fluke; I’m on a path to recovery. I still have a backlog of things to deal with, but I can get on that now.  And I still hurt in various places. But it’s the right hurt, I now know.

The short version of all this is that expectations matter. Stephanie Burns did her Ph.D. research on the people who succeeded with their goals (vs those who don’t), and found it was the ones who managed their expectations appropriately. Set goals, rewarded them, realized it was a long haul, etc. Similarly for learning; you want expectations to match experience. A mismatch can induce barriers to successful learning. If the experience will be typical, it may not matter so much, but you want to be wary of any ways in which people can find their expectations mismatched. Yes, you want some surprise, but you don’t want people to lose their comprehension of who they are and where they’re going.

I don’t actually blame the doctor. I think they could’ve set my expectations better, but I fear I come across as someone who has an idea of what’s going on. And I should’ve asked more questions. Further, I think there weren’t any flags that I needed such support. Still, it perhaps ought to be automatic. So consider setting expectations. Deliberately. Systematically. You can let them know there might be some surprise, without giving it away. Don’t leave people open to making inappropriate expectations, or you might be unpleasantly surprised.

Filed Under: design, meta-learning

Sarah Prevette #LSCon Keynote Mindmap

28 March 2019 by Clark Leave a Comment

Sarah Prevette closed the Learning Solutions conference with a rapid fire overview of Design Thinking and a passionate case for making the success skills of the future to be entrepreneurship. Starting with her experiences, she laid out success factors, and suggested that these skills were learnable and should be the curriculum.

Filed Under: design

Curriculum or pedagogy?

12 March 2019 by Clark Leave a Comment

In a conversation today, I mentioned that previously I’ve thought that perhaps the best next ‘man in the moon’ project would be to put an entire K12 curriculum up online. And, I’ve also thought that the only way to really fix things is to train trainers of teachers to learn to facilitate learning around meaningful activity. And, of course, both are needed. What am I thinking?

So, there are huge gaps in the ways in which folks have access to learning. For example, I worked on a project that was trying to develop some K12 curricula online, to provide support for learners in HS that might not have sufficiently capable learners. The project had started with advanced learners, but recognized that wasn’t the only gap. And this is in California!  So I have argued for a massive project, but using advanced curricula and pedagogy.

And, at the other end, as I spoke at a conference looking to talk about improving education in India. There, they have a much bigger need for good teachers than they can reach with their education schools. I was arguing for a viral teacher prep. The idea being not just to train teachers, but train the trainers of those teachers. Then the training could go viral, as just teaching teachers wouldn’t go fast enough.

And both are right, and not enough. In the conversation, I resurrected both points and am now reflecting how they interact. The simple fact is that we need a better curriculum and a better pedagogy. As Roger Schank rightly points out, things like the quadratic equation are nuts to keep in a K12 curricula. The fact is that our curricula came from before the  Industrial Age and is barely adequate there. Yet we’re in an Information Age. And our pedagogy is aligned to tests, not to learning nor doing. We should be equipping kids with actionable knowledge to make meaningful decisions in their lives, not with arbitrary and abstract knowledge that isn’t likely to transfer.

And, of course, even if we did have such a curriculum online, we’d need teachers who could facilitate learning in this way. And that’s a barrier not just in India. The point being that most of the world is suffering with bad curricula and pedagogy. How do we make this change.

And I don’t have an answer. I think we should put both online, and support on the ground. We need that content, available through mobile to reach beyond the developed world, and we need the facilitators. They can be online, as I think about it, but they need to understand the context on the ground if they’re not there. They are context-specific necessities. And this is a massive problem.

Principle says: start small and scale. There are institutions doing at least parts of this, but scaling is a barrier. And again, I have no immediate solution other than a national (or international) initiative. We don’t want just one without the other. I don’t want teachers facilitating the old failed curricula, and I don’t want current pedagogies working on the new curricula. (And I shudder at the thought of a pre-college test in the old style trying to assess this new model!) I welcome your thoughts!

Filed Under: design, strategy

  • « Previous Page
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • …
  • 58
  • Next Page »

The Author

The Company

Search

Never miss a post
Your email address:*
Please wait...
Please enter all required fields Click to hide
Correct invalid entries Click to hide

Pages

  • About Learnlets and Quinnovation

The Serious eLearning Manifesto

Manifesto badge

Categories

  • design
  • games
  • meta-learning
  • mindmap
  • mobile
  • social
  • strategy
  • technology
  • Uncategorized
  • virtual worlds

Blogroll

  • Bamboo Project
  • Charles Jennings
  • Clive on Learning
  • Communication Nation
  • Conversations
  • Corporate eLearning Development
  • Dave’s Whiteboard
  • Donald Taylor
  • e-Clippings
  • eeLearning
  • Eide NeuroLearning
  • eLearn Mag
  • eLearning Post
  • eLearning RoadTrip
  • eLearning Technology
  • eLearnSpace
  • Guild Research
  • Half an Hour
  • Here Comes Everybody
  • Informal Learning
  • Internet Time
  • Janet Clary
  • Kapp Notes
  • Karyn Romeis
  • Lars is Learning
  • Learning Circuits Blog
  • Learning Matters
  • Learning Visions
  • Leverage Innovation
  • Marcia Conner
  • Middle-earth
  • mLearnopedia
  • Nancy White
  • Performance Support Blog
  • Plan B
  • Sky’s Blog
  • Sociate
  • Value Networks
  • Will at Work Learning
  • WriteTech

License

Previous Posts

  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010
  • December 2009
  • November 2009
  • October 2009
  • September 2009
  • August 2009
  • July 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • March 2009
  • February 2009
  • January 2009
  • December 2008
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • July 2008
  • June 2008
  • May 2008
  • April 2008
  • March 2008
  • February 2008
  • January 2008
  • December 2007
  • November 2007
  • October 2007
  • September 2007
  • August 2007
  • July 2007
  • June 2007
  • May 2007
  • April 2007
  • March 2007
  • February 2007
  • January 2007
  • December 2006
  • November 2006
  • October 2006
  • September 2006
  • August 2006
  • July 2006
  • June 2006
  • May 2006
  • April 2006
  • March 2006
  • February 2006
  • January 2006

Copyright © 2019 · Agency Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in