Learnlets

My parents have had a Mac as long as they’ve had a home computer, thanks to me, as I wanted the easiest interface possible (and somewhat to the frustration of my brother who’s closer to them but uses a PC). However, neither (now, my Mom) really understands what’s going on, and they could get into trouble.

This year I put a copy of Timbuktu on their and my computer. What Timbuktu does is allow one computer to control another, over the internet. Simple, but even I find it amazing and I’m pretty savvy about what these things can do! So now when Mom’s in a bind, she calls me, I turn on Timbuktu and her screen opens up in a window on mine and I can walk and talk her through that I’m doing to make things right. Even though we’re 400 miles apart. I also usually try to explain the underlying model so she’ll get better over time.

It’s not the only solution (and the constant nags to upgrade and auto=opening their web page is annoying), but it works reliably, is straightforward, and lets me solve problems from a distance. I think more and more of us will be in this situation, and having a good tool is a boon.

Well, we had a great trip: 4 passes in 7 days (3 over 10K feet) through beautiful mountains. Sure, I came back sore, dirty, tired, and cut up, but also mentally recharged. Naturally, I had some learnings as well.

The main one is the necessity to be very systematic. For example, I put up my tent with the rain fly on the day we had bad weather, and in the middle of the night wanted to tighten it against the wind gusts. I’d staked it out, but there had to be a way to tighten the line. I tried doing it by feel, and then got out with a light and tried to see how to do it (forgetting my glasses). I was fortunate that I didn’t *need* to tighten it, as I didn’t figure it out that night. Following through in the morning, I saw that there was a tiny little v-shaped gap in the line holder that you could jam the line into to hold it once you’d pulled it tight. What I hadn’t done was notice it the night before when setting up.

We also came across a group of inner-city youth, girls in this case, who were being taken into the wilderness as a path to help them avoid some of the traps they might encounter in their day-to-day environment. We didn’t have much chance to discuss their program, but I recall many years ago that happening in my experience in Outward Bound. There’s something about nature that helps put life in perspective, and about challenge in helping you develop your sense of self.

Overall, I came back with even more commitment to taking the time to do it *right*, and being more patient about things in general. We do have pressures to move quickly, but we need to strike the balance to do what’s necessary, not just what’s expedient.

I hope you have a way in your life to take time off and reflect on what’s important in your life. And, ideally, a way to keep in touch with nature and the rhythms of life and the earth as well.

Don’t be surprised if you don’t see any posts from me ’til after 15 July (in fact, to the contrary). I’m going off the grid on what’s becoming a regular pilgrimage to the wilderness. It’s time to reflect, take in nature’s beauty, and work my, er, backside off carrying a pack miles through the mountains of Yosemite. We have interesting conversations, and lots of time to think, dream, plan, and crack jokes (mostly bad). Lots of the latter.

This trip is with some colleagues and friends; in a couple of weeks I’ll take my family for the kids first trip to actually carry a backpack. That’ll be a learning experience! Stay tuned.

If you ping me in the interim, I’ll get back to you when I’ve returned. In the meantime, as I tell the family when I go: stay safe, be good, have fun!

On ITFORUM, someone asked: “Given the recent discussion about essential skills for the 21st century, I’m interested in what skills teachers need to be effective in the 21st century.” My response:

Oh, what a topic! They need to be facilitators, not orators nor wardens. They need to be learning problem designers, process facilitators, reflection guiders, content searchers. They need to design complex problems that spiral curriculum around the task, they need to model solving the problems, they need to provide opportunities and resources to work on those problems, they need to guide discussion post-hoc to tease out remaining issues and dynamically adapt to the individual outcomes, they need to maintain motivation and interest. They’re cheerleaders, counselors, guides, explorers, and mentors.

And they need to be paid commensurate with the complex skills required.

Of course, we’re not preparing teachers well for this sort of work, and our administrative and political bodies around teaching don’t get this at all. Sigh.

 Am I missing something?

With all the hype around the iPhone, I had a couple of points of concern: things I do with my Treo that I’d sorely miss. These included Dial Up Networking (using my phone as a modem for my laptop, though Sprint shut that off, grumble, mumble), using my phone as a presentation controller (Salling Clicker), and a timer. Well, at least the timer apparently exists, and the DUN definitely does not.   Still, I might be able to cope.

And there were some other concerns, not deal breakers either, but the fact that the web browser, Safari, wouldn’t handle Flash and some limits around Javascript, yet that’s the only way anyone can add capability (another concern, 3rd party development is closed off, at least for now). And no clear information whether Keychain, the Mac’s great way to handle security, would be used on the iPhone or whether you’d have to remember passwords to all the sites.   Yet it’s still worth considering.

On the other hand, I wasn’t worried about the touchscreen keyboard, EDGE network slowness, few buttons, or even too many clicks to get to the phone, things others have been concerned about.

However, there’s an issue that no one seems to be talking about, except one sentence from Walt Mossberg: “There‘s also no way to cut, copy, or paste text.” WHAT? Why isn’t anyone talking about this? I’m always scraping this from here and pasting it there, passing on quotes, rearranging sentences and paragraphs, etc.

Ok, it’s been mentioned that it’s an updatable software platform, so they could fix that later, though it seems like a) a mighty big elephant in the room that no one’s seeing and b) something that might require an innovative solution (hey, that’s what I do, they should call me ;). I just can’t understand the lack of concern!

Naturally, I haven’t decided whether to get one yet, or instead to upgrade my Treo (it’s got the slowest data capability). So, maybe I’ll hang in limbo a bit longer.

I have to admit that I’ve been frustrated with the Treo, too, that I can’t use the keyboard to select text (there’s an easy interface affordance that would be consistent with other experiences) and have to use the stylus, but not even being able to   select, cut or copy, and paste strikes me as a major interface blind spot. Again, am I missing something?

A few weeks ago or so, the New York Enterprise Report asked me about my thoughts on eLearning implications for small businesses. They’ve now put up the interview, if you’ve interest in the area.

I’m sure I’ve got some things wrong, as it’s not an area where I think there’s much action, but it’s an interesting issue to consider. It’s easy to realize that technology isn’t going away, so what should a small business person do? You may not have distance issues, but can you capitalize on technology for time reasons? There may be a role for shelf-ware, and increasingly you’ll want ways to capture experience before it walks out the door, and of course for any mobile members of the team…

I keep hearing queries and statements about learning styles, so here’s a slightly edited (but still not particularly diplomatic :) response to a recent query about learning styles (as I also posted to ITFORUM, a great discussion list if you like academic discussions on learning technology like I do):

Rubbish. Yes, mix types of media and experiences to match learning tasks and maintain motivation, but not for ‘styles’.

I have very strong thoughts on personality type and learning: I spent 2+ years leading a team developing a system that adapted learning on the basis of individual differences.

I’m not a psychometrician, but I have a PhD in psych, and I studied the learning styles literature (including Jonassen & Grabowski’s non-critical compendium “Handbook of Individual Differences in Learning & Instruction” or somesuch) for several months to create the plan for that systems, and I then got to hire a psychometrician and a senior cognitive scientist (Valerie Shute, who’s work with Patrick Kyllonen at Brooks AFB is probably still the best cognitive psychometrics stuff going, she did her PhD at UCSB with Dick Mayer) to back me up.

Essentially the existing learning styles stuff is not sound, and that’s not just my reasonably-well informed opinion, but the result of a research study (warning, PDF) done in the UK.

And apparently another one as well, check out Wikipedia’s entry, which is pretty good, too.

Great way to raise awareness of differences, don’t get me wrong, but most instruments (that is, assessments) are flawed, and misused. There’s good stuff you can do, but few limit themselves to that. Go to an ASTD conference expo, and you’ll see a veritable plethora of ‘learning styles’ assessments available to ‘improve’ your organization.

My take-home is as with multi-cultural learning: do the best job for the content, and if that’s counter to a person’s learning style, help them learn to process or cope with different modalities.   Your thoughts?

Tony Karrer started a topic on improving conferences at his blog, and Mark Oehlert follows up citing an experience someone had with WiFi at a conference. In the quote, the experience described is attendees locked into their laptops and virtual communities, not joining in the live conference community. The concern is whether having WiFi at a conference is a bane or a boon. My perspective is rooted in an anecdote.

A number of years ago, I talked to some folks at a med school that had totally wired labs: there were power points (er, you know, plugs) and internet connections at every seat, cameras, monitors, etc. The faculty were concerned that the students could be sending email, or day-trading, or all sorts of heinous activities instead of listening. I made the seemingly-obvious comment that if the lectures weren’t perceived as valuable by the audience, they wouldn’t attend (whether mentally or physically).

This did not go over well. They didn’t seem to get that if you took away the internet, they could still play solitaire, and if you took away the computers they could still doodle. To paraphrase Dorothy Parker on horticulture, you can lead learners to learning, but you can’t make them think.

You’ve got to be presenting value! If you are, there’re great reasons to have WiFi: first of all they can ignore the WiFi, or they can look up things you cite that they’re not familiar with, they can share notes, they can blog the comments, etc. I recall Jay Cross blogging someone else blogging a conference (or vice-versa). For that matter, if a small slice of their attention helps them solve a work problem quietly, they may gain more than if they had to leave the room to take/make a call. If you aren’t presenting valuable content, then there’s another good reason for WiFi: to give them something to do besides listen.

So I guess I’m fully on the side of WiFi at venues . If someone can’t wean themselves from their virtual world at a conference, they’re wasting their own money and time, if you’re not wasting it for them.

I just read that Claude Ostyn has passed away. I met Claude through the Learning Object standards work that IMS and IEEE were doing when I led a team building an intelligently adaptive learning system. While I had a couple of my team serve regularly, I did attend a couple of meetings or so, and met Claude at one, and continued to see him here and there at conferences.

Claude was opinionated and detailed and I found him a little bit difficult to work with as I’m also opinionated but more conceptual (it was definitely my problem, not his). He was also brilliant, thoughtful, and committed, and I respected him. He helped refine our understanding of what we were trying (and needed) to do, and his work contributed to better elearning solutions for all of us. His voice will be missed, but his legacy will live on. Rest In Peace.