Workplace Learning Today

Read Write Learn
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Read Write Learn Technology
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Greg Green, principal at Chintondale High in Michigan is in charge of a financially challenged school. He is trying to provide his students with the best education possible. The students that attend Clintondale are all on different skill levels. With the economy today the students have limited resources to do their homework at home. With the students in mind Greg wanted them to become excited and to show interest in school, thus the flip model was integrated into their school by the help of Tech Smith. Tech Smith helped us create a flipped classroom structure through the use of their screen and writing software. Teachers than record their lectures and the students watch these lectures at home as their homework. When the students are in classroom they then have the available resources to do their homework, including the help of their teacher. The flip model has made inequality no longer an issue. If educators can come together and work toward a common goal of fixing the education system, education could be changed forever. Thanks to the flip model every student can have a chance to succeed. To read the full Flipping The Class Article click here.

First day at my new job… I learned lots…
1: Easy to use is also easy to demonstrate
2: Computers and phones have a way of levelling the playing field. Today neither my android or my Outlook wish to be configured, it happens
3: Learning a new product is tiring and motivating all at the same time
4: It is about the people as much as the product…

Feel I still have some learning to do after the house goes to bed tonight !

RWL Technology

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Many students aren’t willing to admit in class that they don’t understand the material being taught. But for one Utah classroom that isn’t an issue anymore. New technology is making it possible for students to input their response into a handheld device called the SMART response device. This device sends the students answer directly to the teacher’s computer allowing the teacher to know if she needs to recover the material or if her class understands and its ok to continue with the lesson. The teacher also no longer needs to spend hours grading the tedious assignments the teacher’s computer will keep track of all the scores.

For resources on SMART Devices:

http://smarttech.com/us/Solutions/Education+Solutions/Products+for+education/Complementary+hardware+products/SMART+Response

For the Utah Classroom story:

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=18915170&title=smart-technology-enhancing-classroom-learning-experience

Do you have full access to online learning modules with assistive technology? Are they tedious and time consuming to navigate? RWL Tech, Inc. has created a new tool that allows you to efficiently navigate online learning modules and have full access (not separate but equal access), even if the module has complex Flash interactions. Read more here and sign up to be a beta tester. We LOVE having your perspective and feedback. Course Power.

RWL Tech
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RWL Tech- Facebook
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Making Learning 508 Compliant and Accessibile
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In Kelly Gallagher’s new book “Teaching Real-World Writing Through Modeling & Mentor Texts.” He focuses on this topic of why reading is a problem of how it is taught in schools. He turns his attention to writing instruction, which he believes is in a state of crisis. Gallagher states reading/writing as a subject “seems to have gotten lost in many of our schools, it has been buried with curricular pacing guides, huge class sizes, worksheets, and over-the-top testing. When writing is taught at all, it is often subject to “prescribed school discourses” that limit students’ development and fail to capture their imagination.” It’s been estimated as many as 70 percent of students graduate from high school with inadequate writing skills. Are you one of those? Gallagher’s book consists of how he teaches to write six different real-life discourses, and after that he provides a series of writing prompts. Kelly Gallagher is prepared to get you or your class back on track. Click to read more on Kelly Gallagher’s new book.

Teaching, Training, and Learning
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Making Learning 508 Compliant and Accessible
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Interested in stimulating your kid’s brains and making them
smarter? Ken Gibson and Tanya Mitchell created a free list to help parents shop
for toys, games and brain activities that will help improve your children’s
learning. The list describes the games and its cognitive skills. Cognitive
skills help children learn auditory, visual processing, memory, logic, processing
speed, and attention. Ken and Tanya have listed 10 games that can stimulate
your child’s brain.  They are:
1-Acuity
2-Blokus
3-BrainBox
4-Inchimals
5-Labyrinth
6-Pentago
7-Quad Doku
8-Scavenger Hunt For Kids
9-Square Up!
10-Tri-Spy
You can find the description and games at the Learning Rx website.

Teaching, Training and Learning
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Making Learning 508 Compliant and Accessible
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Are You serious
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RWL Tech
http://readwritetechnology.com/

Teaching is all about the relationship between teacher and students and the tools the teacher uses to help impart knowledge. Thousands of teachers across the world have been using screen casting and mastery learning for many years. With the turn of the century brought upon a new idea of teaching, this new way of teaching was called “The Flipped Classroom”. The flipped classroom is about making connections with learners and differentiating your instruction. Students are now presented with video material for learning; this can provide auditory and visual explanations and can remediate the students ways of learning.

Watch the video below of Aaron Sams’  classroom as he explains why he flipped his classroom.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2H4RkudFzlc

Today’s learning was results based. Today I learned that persevering, focus, hard work and following your instinct pays off, … I also relearned that procrastination comes in many different disguises… Time to evaluate training strongly … is it training for the sake of training? Who does it benefit? Why is the learner doing it? Are your staff doing their jobs in a robotic way or are they using their common sense… when dealing with the public training staff to obey rules can be detrimental to their objectives, training staff to understand their goals and teaching guidelines is more productive.

Over the past three days I realized that, while I learn lots every day, over the past few days I realized that tests enable the learner to acknowledge what they learned. Today I learned many things. Through ‘research based learning’ I learned how the National Park Service manage their tenanted properties, through ‘reference based learning’ I learned what was in mixed herbs, through ‘on the job training’ I learned the associations between different parts of a database.
What I relearned today was just how much difference a ‘subject matter expert’ can make by giving their learner 5 minutes of their time.

Today, as tablets are rapidly spreading into our lives, the validity of using PDAs, desktops, netbooks, or laptops is  decreasing. As expected, this rapid change in technology directly affects educational technologies.
10 years ago, we used only computer-based distance education; since then distance education has been offered through both synchronous and asynchronous programs via a variety of mobile devices, such as mobile phones, PDAs, portable music players and etc. Training designs need to be developed for mobile environments, as this medium is quite different from e-learning. But, this also shows why ubiquitous learning still has not been realized. Due to the constraints of being on a mobile device, mobile content cannot yet provide ‘desktop like’ rich experiences.

So, how should we place tablets in our learning environments? How do they affect learning?

Tablets are positioned between desktop computers and mobile devices based on user experience. Basically, they offer a desktop experience in a mobile environment. Because of this, the training designs will need to be specially developed for tablets. Here’s how.

Mobile learning is good at providing important knowledge in small chunks such as ”pills” or “nuggets”. Mobile environments should be designed as user oriented, where participants can easily obtain the information or learning materials they need . Learning materials should involve 5-10 minutes of the learner’s time, for each item viewed. You can then learn while waiting for a bus, standing on the subway, or even while you’re traveling. Desktop training provides more interactive environments for users than mobile learning.

So when you design training for tablets, it would be useful to remember the nature of the tablets (between being as rich as desktop training, and as mobile as mobile phones). In summary:

- Tablets are mobile devices. For this reason, training time should be kept under a certain upper limit (about 15-20 minutes)

- Rich media content can be used more than with mobile learning on phones, in preparation of training content. (Videos, animations and etc.) But the mobility of users should not be forgotten, using long videos should be avoided.

- Thanks to the capacitive touch screens found in tablets, use interactivity more than with traditional mobile learning.

- Quick access routes to content should be created when using the native applications for each brand of tablet.

Thanks to tablets, we can now experience a degree of rich and interactive learning that mobile learning couldn’t provide us before. Enjoy!

RWL Tech
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Teaching, Training and Learning
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Making Learning 508 Compliant and Accessible
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Recognizing True Creativity By: PSY Blog

Are we part of society that finds it hard to recognize a true creative idea? Do you find it scary, or hard to achieve a new task that has a creative background behind it? It’s been pointed out that creative ideas are now rejected for in fovour of uniformity and conformity. Unfortunately our public education systems as also followed along with the role that creativity is not the way to go. They believe we need to stick to lessons, and test passing for the guidance of our children’s education system, instead of allowing some creativity. If you would like to read more about this article or about Jeremy Dean’s book of: Six psychological principles of creativity.

When Gary asked me to be a contributor I was both excited and nervous, after an initial flood of ideas I started to realize how random and unconnected they were, I felt that I couldn’t find a continuity, several drafts later I realized I needed a new approach.
For the next 45 days I have tasked myself to make a short post highlighting just one thing that I learned that day and how the knowledge was transferred. I invite you to join me on my journey of self observation.

Over the last two months, I have been completely engaged in writing a book for ASTD press on what a next generation learning system is going to look like. I have trolled through dozens and dozens of articles, read books, spoken to some very bright people and all these resources support this grand vision of an adaptive, on demand, networked system able to deliver real time, contextualized personalized learning. Halleluyah! And then a conversation last night stopped me in my tracks. The question asked “How do you structure serendipity?”, “How do you program a system that can provide information to people who don’t want that information to initiate a change in viewpoints?” – Serendipitous indeed.

My answer, which was completely unsatisfactory, was a two part answer. 1) Semantic web technology is about defining relationships as opposed to classifying things as what they are. In a system that is adaptive through analytic engines and such, those relationships will continue to evolve and over time, serendipitous relationships will be created. 2) Providing learning that can change someone’s beliefs or viewpoints is not something we do very well today, so why are we expecting our future learning systems to do any better?

Here’s the thing. If I were to characterize learning in a Platonic sense, that is look for the essence of learning, I might arrive at this idea of being able to generate change in somebody’s belief system. So when we talk about learning, and we talk about building systems, should we not set for ourselves the goal of generating learning that is able to challenge one’s viewpoints and ultimately drive change for the better? I think we’ve become accustomed to the notion that learning is meant to simply fill a gap. You don’t know this or that, you can’t do this or that, let me teach you. Its time to set our goals where they should be.

We do need a system where serendipity happens. It is through the serendipitous relationships where we have our aha moments. Its the unexpected fact, or connection that causes us to reflect and ultimately evolve and change who we are as people. We don’t need this change in the future. We need this change now! We need an education system that strives to challenge students at the earliest age. We need a workforce that can evolve and think ‘outside the box’. Setting our sights on the prize – ‘serendipity’ – striving to make it happen is a worthy pursuit.

The past 11 months have seen every major authoring tool vendor announce or release support for creating e-learning content in HTML 5 format. For those of you not in tune with what’s been happening in the e-learning world, here’s a very brief summary:

Flash has long been the primary format for e-learning content and up until the incredible (and fairly recent) success of Apple’s i/OS devices (iPad, iPod, iPhone) this was fine because both PCs and Macs supported running flash in a browser. Flash was great because it was relatively efficient. You could have otherwise HUGE videos and animated content stream effectively over the internet quite nicely, which meant that e-learning content could get pretty sexy (or interactive and multi-media based, if you prefer).

This was all fine while we were e-learning at our desks, but the fact is that mobile devices still have nowhere near the computing power of desktop or laptop computers. Techy people have known for a while that Flash on mobile devices is problematic; the main problems being that Flash drains batteries and can cause systems to run “hot”. You can read a lot more about this situation here on Gary’s post.

Still, even though developers acknowledged the challenges of running Flash on mobile devices, you need to get all the major players to support this shift. This has  now happened. Adobe has announced an end to their development of flash on mobile browsers. Watch this short video from Gadget Lab explaining the news.

Given this major shift, it’s time to think about future-compatibility of your e-learning content. Most of the major authoring tool vendors now offer an author-once, publish-to-many (devices) capability. This will allow you to use a single tool to create content for multiple target platforms.

A new report has been issued, ‘The Future of Learning: Preparing for Change,’ has just been released by Institute for Prospective Technological Studies.

This report aims to identify, understand and visualise major changes to learning in the future. It developed a descriptive vision of the future, based on existing trends and drivers, and a normative vision outlining how future learning opportunities should be developed to contribute to social cohesion, socio-economic inclusion and economic growth.

The overall vision is that personalisation, collaboration and informalisation (informal learning) are at the core of learning in the future. These terms are not new in education and training but will have to become the central guiding principle for organising learning and teaching in the future.

The central learning paradigm is thereby characterised by lifelong and life-wide learning, shaped by the ubiquity of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). At the same time, due to fast advances in technology and structural changes to European labour markets that are related to demographic change, globalisation and immigration, generic and transversal skills become more important, which support citizens in becoming lifelong learners who flexibly respond to change, are able to pro-actively develop their competences and thrive in collaborative learning and working environments.

Many of the changes depicted have been foreseen for some time but they now come together in such a way that is becomes urgent and pressing for policymakers to consider them and to propose and implement a fundamental shift in the learning paradigm for the 21st century digital world and economy. To reach the goals of personalised, collaborative and informalised learning, holistic changes need to be made (curricula, pedagogies, assessment, leadership, teacher training, etc.) and mechanisms need to be put in place which make flexible and targeted lifelong learning a reality and support the recognition of informally acquired skills.

For more information, check out the report: http://ftp.jrc.es/EURdoc/JRC66836.pdf

Teaching Training and Learning
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Making Learning 508 Compliant and Accessible
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Technology seems to have finally come together with our educational system. A recent article posted by Emma Brown, In the Washington Post newspaper on Oct 2 talks about how teachers and schools have started to adapt with the idea of textbooks being digital. Yes, I said digital. In Fairfax County, middle school and high school they recently spent $5.3 million dollars towards the digital project. “Officials describe it as the first step toward a profound digital transformation of the Washington region’s largest school system.” When students don’t have access to a computer at home, the school has setup after school extended computer lab hours which includes a late run bus for that schedule. Also the school is renting out laptops to students for an individual night use basis. The positive step towards having textbooks with digital access is when upgrades or errors need to be fixed with the laptops it can be done with less hassle. No more having to use the same text book for 5 years to wait for a new release issue to print. To find out more about this article go to: http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/online-textbooks-moving-into-schools/2011/09/27/gIQAwn0KGL_story.html

Teaching Training and Learning
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Making Learning 508 Compliant
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One of the world’s leading thinkers of how children think. Dr. Howard Gardner believes and talks about in his latest book “The disciplined Mind” determines how college student’s admissions is based upon. Just by looking at their back ground what the family lifestyle is like, what their cultural history is, also where the student live plays a big part of their learning: school environment for example the wealth of their family plays a big role also how well the student is educated. In one of Dr. Gardner interviews he mentions, he can tell you how well a college student will do on an entrance exam to a college/university just by the student’s home zip code. This fact he uses just based off how many resources are available to the students for example how many resources would be available to students in “Beverly Hills, CA verses a student in Watts or Compton CA.”
Dr. Gardner’s suggestion is to create an entirely new SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test) each year. His idea is supported because the students would have no way of practicing for a new version of these tests each year. So the students would really be tested for their abilities and knowledge of what they really knew. We would finally know what the children are capable of testing for. So why don’t we create a new test every year? Universities and colleges plus students don’t like the idea of having a new test each year. They like the idea of having a standardized test so they can practice, so their test scores will keep improving. You can read more of Dr. Howard Gardner YouTube Interview at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBknM7-AkAM&noredirect=1

Teaching Training and Learning

http://www.facebook.com/RWLLearning

Making Learning 508 Compliant and Accessible

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Making-Learning-508-Compliant-and-Accessible/95298389507

One of the world’s leading thinker of how children think. Dr. Howard Gardner believes and talks about in his latest book “The disciplined Mind” determines how college student’s admissions is based upon. Just by looking at their back ground what the family lifestyle is like, what their cultural history is, also where the student live plays a big part, their learning: school environment for example the wealth of their family plays a big role also how well the student is educated. In one of Dr. Gardner interviews he mentions he can tell you how well a college student will do on an entrance exam to a college/university just by the student’s home zip code. This fact he uses just based off how many resources are available to the students for example how many resources would be available to students in “Beverly Hills, CA to students in Watts or Compton CA.”
Dr. Gardner’s suggestion is to create an entirely new SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test) each year. His idea is supported because the students would have no way of practicing for a new version of these tests each year. So the students would really be tested for their abilities and knowledge of what they really knew. We would finally know what the children are capable of testing for. So why don’t we create a new test every year? Universities and colleges plus students don’t like the idea of having a new test each year. They like the idea of having a standardized test so they can practice, so their test scores will keep improving. You can read more of Dr. Howard Gardner YouTube Interview at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBknM7-AkAM&noredirect=1

Teaching Training and Learning
http://www.facebook.com/RWLLearning?ref=ts

Making Learning 508 Compliant and Accessible
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Are You Serious
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When it comes to getting your brain awake and alert, the suggested way is it to play a game. At least YawnBuster Blog believes in that. “Its suggested that games work as taskmasters and get us thinking and acting simultaneously. Games are engaging and interactive to the core. Even when lesson are embedded into games, it is easy to decipher the meaning and retain it.” Learning by games has helped teachers in their classrooms for many years. It allows a teacher to explore and reach out to a student and see how a student can excel by making learning fun.

The next time you sit down to play a computer game or video game, you’re actually unleashing many opportunities for your brain to learn and think not just sitting down to play a game. You’re actually exercising your brain. The blog also pointed out that the popular World of Warcraft video game has an average subscriber spend around 23 hours per week playing its online game. You can read more of YawnBuster’s blog at: http://blog.yawnbuster.com/