Clive on Learning

JULY 23, 2008

In May I conducted an interview Tom Kuhlmann , author of the Rapid E-Learning Blog. Both Tom and I enjoyed doing it and quite a few of you found the interview illuminating, so never one to do things by half, I have decided to create a mini-series of webcam interviews with people I've come to know in the field of learning technologies. So, my second interview is with Patrick Dunn.

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Clive on Learning

JULY 19, 2008

I've got the new Adobe Presenter 7 on a month's trial and have spent the past hour giving it a thorough working over. I'm interested in this sort of PowerPoint-based tool both for myself, because I like to package up my presentations with audio for web delivery, but also because I meet so many trainers who want to produce some simple e-content for themselves and want the process to be as simple as possible.

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Clive on Learning

JULY 18, 2008

I've been catching up on the postings that I had earmarked for further review, typically those that involve listening to a podcast or watching a video. Stephen Downes alerted me to John Medina's 'Brain Rules: 12 principles for surviving and thriving at work, home and school', a book, but also an alluring collection of videos which you can find on John's blog.

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Clive on Learning

JULY 17, 2008

In reading Garr Reynold's excellent Presentation Zen (more about that in a later post), I came across a great idea for conferences and meetings called Pecha-kucha. Apparently, Pecha-kucha (Japanese for chatter) was started in 2003 by Tokyo expatriate architects Mark Dytham and Astrid Klein as an alternative presentation format. Each speaker has 20 slides, each of which must be shown for 20 seconds, with which to tell their story or make their point.

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Clive on Learning

JULY 14, 2008

A survey by Cegos Group , reported in this month's issue of e.learning age magazine, finds that companies in the UK are leading the way in Europe by providing training to some 61% of their staff. In France, Germany and Italy, less than half has any training. Consider also that more companies in the UK are benefiting from technology-driven training programmes than their EC counterparts.

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Clive on Learning

JULY 11, 2008

In my post So what is blended learning? I put forward the following definition: A blended learning solution mixes social contexts for learning (self-study, one-to-one, small group, larger community) with the aim of increasing learning effectiveness, and/or mixes learning media (face-to-face, online, print, etc.) to increase efficiency, in the context of a particular learning requirement, audience characteristics, and practical constraints and opportunities.

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Clive on Learning

JULY 11, 2008

Following on from my posting last week, So what is blended learning? , which attempted to define a workable definition for blended learning, I have been trying to clarify in my own mind whether the issue is of any real importance. Is blended learning useful and, if so, in what circumstances? The argument for blended learning is really very simple. Each of the most common approaches to learning and development has its own extensive array of advantages and disadvantages.

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Clive on Learning

JULY 8, 2008

In the Learning Circuits Blog , Tony Karrer poses a whole series of questions related to the role of learning and development professionals in promoting informal learning / social learning / learning 2.0 within organisations: Q: Must learning professionals be literate in these things? Well I don't know about must , but they certainly should, if they want to remain credible as sources of expertise on organisational learning.

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Clive on Learning

JUNE 6, 2008

As a reader of this blog you are a witness if not an active participant in the dramatic changes that we have seen over the last few years as a result of web 2.0 technologies. Increasingly everyone is a teacher as well as a learner; nobody knows everything and everyone knows something. As George Siemens pointed out in Knowing Knowledge : "Mass media and education have been largely designed on a one-way flow model (structure imposed by hierarchy).

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Clive on Learning

JULY 3, 2008

For some time now I have been unhappy with my own working definition of blended learning: A blended learning solution is an intervention that seeks to optimise effectiveness and efficiency by combining a number of different learning media. By 'learning media' I mean the channels through which learners interact with content, peers and tutors. These include face-to-face communication, a wide variety of online media, print media or telephone networks.

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Clive on Learning

MAY 25, 2006

This blog is supposed to be about learning and I learned something of real significance last week. Apparently, thanks to Google, I'm now a star. I was sitting reading the Evening Argus, the Brighton daily paper, last Wednesday when an article caught my eye. A particularly aged-looking musician was bemoaning the fact that he'd been Googling away looking for things in any way related to himself (as we do) and had typed in the name of a band he'd been part of in the late 60s.

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Clive on Learning

JUNE 15, 2006

Conventional online learning design focuses on self-study and self-pacing, with all the advantages and disadvantages with which these are associated. Yes, students have much greater control over what and when they learn and at what speed, but on the other hand, they have to rely on their own time structuring and self-discipline, and remain isolated from their colleagues.

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Clive on Learning

JUNE 22, 2006

Contrary to popular sentiment, over the years I've been very loyal to Microsoft when it comes to office tools. I've had just about every edition of the Office suite within a few months of its release, regardless of whether it's yet been properly tested and debugged. Although an upgrade of this sort is never as trivial as it's intended to be, I have never experienced any really major problems.

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Clive on Learning

JUNE 28, 2006

There's nothing quite so discomfiting as a challenge to your view of the world, particularly when it comes armed with a multitude of solid references and what seems like 'conclusive evidence'. So this paper, WHY MINIMALLY GUIDED INSTRUCTION DOES NOT WORK , by Paul Kirschner, John Sweller and Richard Clark, must have put quite a few liberal educational noses out of joint when it was published in Educational Psychologist in January of this year.

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Clive on Learning

JULY 24, 2006

In hindsight I approached the e-learning site Nuvvo with unrealistic optimism. I was keen because Nuvvo has a modern, Web 2.0 feel and ethos. Its aim - to provide a way for those who wish to teach online to reach those who want to learn online - seems attractive, even laudable. If you're an expert on something, use Nuvvo to put together a course incorporating simple online materials and collaboration; offer this free or charge for it if you wish/can/dare.

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Clive on Learning

JULY 27, 2006

Text chat would not be many learners' medium of choice for synchronous communication with their group during a course. The order of preference probably goes: Face-to-face communication. Web conferencing that includes a visual dimension (webcams / graphics, etc.) and an audio dimension (VOIP or acccompanying teleconference). Teleconferencing or instant messaging with VOIP.

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Clive on Learning

AUGUST 2, 2006

E-learning people don't agree on much. We don't even agree on the term e-learning. But nothing gets a community together more effectively than a common enemy, and now we've got one. It's called Blackboard. I'm not going to tell you about how evil this company has become. I'll let you find out for yourself about their ridiculous patents on virtual learning environment technologies and their action annoucned a couple of days ago to sue one of their closest competitors for, you guessed it, also sel

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Clive on Learning

AUGUST 9, 2006

Sunday August 6th saw the 15th anniversary of the World Wide Web, which was released to the world in 1991 by Tim Berners-Lee (now Sir Tim) when he posted the code to the WWW on the alt.hypertext discussion group for others to download and play with. Now, of course, 95% of the public regard the WWW and the Internet as synonymous (although the Internet does, of course, have much earlier origins.

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Clive on Learning

SEPTEMBER 5, 2006

This week I had the job of setting up a new Moodle site in order to run a course for a European Union project I am involved in. The people hosting the site (the very capable and modestly-priced pteppic.net , asked me what domain name I wanted for the site. I hadn't really given this any thought, but made a bit of an effort to come up with something that meant something - at least to me.

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Clive on Learning

SEPTEMBER 17, 2006

Donald Clark has set the cat amongst the pigoen again with his posting about subject matter experts (or egomaniacs as he calls them). I have to say I'm on his side with this one. It's not often that SMEs contribute anything that a learner would want to learn from, although I'm not sure learning designers always ask the right questions (which may be why learning designers don't always produce anything anyone would want to learn from either).

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Clive on Learning

SEPTEMBER 28, 2006

Elliott Masie has been getting quite aeriated recently about overblown certifications - see Tougher certifications please. He writes: "I am quite concerned about assessments and certifications that are too easy! We have been tracking the rise of certifications that are really just 'Certificates of Sitting'. And, some corporate assessments are starting to feel like "Everyone Gets a Trophy" exercises.

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Clive on Learning

OCTOBER 5, 2006

On October 3, Web 2.0 learning pioneers Nuvvo announced that it was for sale. Nuvvo styles itself as the 'eBay of online learning', because of its 'vibrant e-learning marketplace where online courses are promoted and purchased'. Back in July I posted Nuvvo: good idea, but needs good content. My argument was that I couldn't see them succeeding without seeding the system with a few gold nuggets (can you seed nuggets?

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Clive on Learning

OCTOBER 13, 2006

I've been having a great deal of fun with shelfari , a new site that allows you to share with the world what sits on your bookshelf. Basically, you enter in the details of your books (ISBNs or titles and authors) and shelfari adds these to your 'shelf' along with cover pics and descriptions drawn from publishers' databases. The end result looks fantastic, which is what makes it so satisfying.

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Clive on Learning

OCTOBER 18, 2006

What is the connection between computer software and women's clothing? No, idea? Let me tell you. With the costs of manufacture tumbling as retailers source from the Far East, along with a general easing of import restrictions, the costs of clothing in the high street have fallen to almost unbelievable levels. This is most evident in women's clothing, where at shops like Zara, Mango, H&M and Top Shop, clothing is practically given away.

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Clive on Learning

OCTOBER 23, 2006

E-learning does, of course, take many forms, but for most corporate users the predominant usage is of interactive self-study materials, what used to be called CBT (computer-based training). Now interactive self-study does not have the best of reputations, with too many students complaining of the tedious, over-structured and impersonal nature of so many of the materials.

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Clive on Learning

NOVEMBER 9, 2006

Today I sat down to write a short column for a magazine on the use of Flash as a delivery medium for e-learning. While searching for some history, I came across this Flash History by Rick Waldron. It seems Flash has its origins in a product called SuperSplash Animator, based largely on the work of graphics enthusiast and programmer, Jonathan Gay. Anyway, Macromedia acquired this product, renamed it Flash 1.0 and launched it in November 1996.

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Clive on Learning

NOVEMBER 15, 2006

David Freedman took the brave step of challenging some pretty widely held beliefs with his September article in Inc magazine, The Idiocy of Crowds. In case you missed it, this is what he is saying: "In the age of instant messaging, wikis, social networking sites and videoconferencing on cell phones, collaboration and consensus are gaining yet more currency.

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Clive on Learning

DECEMBER 1, 2006

I'm writing from Online Educa 2006 in Berlin. This is the second time I've been to this event and if this current experience creates as great an impression on me as the first then I will have indeed learned something profound. My first experience was, I believe, Online Educa 2003. I was invited to speak on some aspect of online learning and was pleased to accept on the basis that, although I had no idea what Online Educa was all about, I had never been to Berlin.

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Clive on Learning

DECEMBER 4, 2006

I've just subscribed to Patrick Dunn's Networked Learning Divide blog. I'm glad I did, if just for his posting on 'bridging the great divide' between e-learning specialists and traditional trainers. A brief extract: "What each side has to stop doing: E-learning professionals have to grow beyond the Efficiently Engineered Content (EEC) stage. The culture of the e-learning industry is dominated by technological and engineering values and beliefs.

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Clive on Learning

DECEMBER 7, 2006

I was going through my notes from Online Educa when I spotted a reference Jay Cross had made in his session to a site called Authentic Happiness , run by the Positive Psychology Center of the University of Pennsylvania (can you believe). Always up for a survey, I tried their Authentic Happiness Inventory Questionnaire. Well, you can see the results on the pic above and they are, to say the least, conclusive.

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Clive on Learning

DECEMBER 7, 2006

Learning Circuit's big questions for December are: 1. What will you remember most about 2006? For me, it will probably be my first complete year of blogging. I have learned absolutely masses from both the process of blogging and from the content of my colleagues' blogs. It took me a while to develop my own blogging style - I have for years written columns in training magazines and I thought this would be the same.

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Clive on Learning

DECEMBER 21, 2006

Phil Green, Chairman of the eLearning Network has twisted my arm (once again) and persuaded me to take a trip in a balloon with seven of my e-learning colleagues. The trip up is likely to be smooth enough - it's the accelerated descent I'm more concerned about. Phil has organised an 'eLearning Balloon Debate' as an invitation-only event at Learning Technologies 2007 in London.

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Clive on Learning

JANUARY 1, 2007

I am Spider-Man According to the Superhero Personality Test: "You are intelligent, witty, a bit geeky and have great power and responsibility. You are Spider-man." Spot on, I'd say! But what type of superhero are you?

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Clive on Learning

JANUARY 2, 2007

Still basking in the official recognition of my exceptional happiness (see It's official - e-learning makes you happy ), I was particularly interested in the Happiness and Economics feature in the Economist of December 23rd 2006. The following extract caught my eye: "To clamber up the pecking order, some people slave away nights and weekends at the office.

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Clive on Learning

JANUARY 26, 2007

Now I've spent more of my valuable time than I would like over the past ten years explaining to those in the corporate learning and development community what e-learning is, more specifically what else it is over and above packaged self-study courses. Those with an educational perspective on the subject are completely familiar with the opportunities that online learning provides for making connections, collaborating with peers, engaging with tutors and subject experts, and contributing to the cr

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Clive on Learning

FEBRUARY 5, 2007

Back in December, in my posting Up, Up and Away , I told you about the balloon debate in which I was due to take part, in an event organised by the eLearning Network at Learning Technologies 2007. Let me remind you of what this entailed: "The island people of Elernia have calculated that if only they can introduce e-learning, they must take their rightful place as a major economic force in the World.

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Clive on Learning

FEBRUARY 7, 2007

Video is a powerful medium, it's also more accessible than ever before with cheap camcorders (even mobile phones) and editing software. I've been spending a fair bit of time recently editing a personal video project and I've discovered just how much I can do without help from any so-called experts. Considering how little involvement I've had with video over the past 15 years or so, you might be surprised to learn that I used to manage a video facility at American Express in the early 80s and was

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