Powerlearning > new learning

6 different digital stories

2008-04-13T14:19:00.005+02:00

Stories can be powerful vehicles for information. It can motivate and touch you and can activate you. For learners it seems to be a very natural way to learn.

Pinguin Publishers are presenting 6 online stories. I wrote about the first one on my Dutch blog. This story was created with Google maps. You are following a guy through the city. It is a new way to experience a detective story.

The second story used blogs and Twitter to tell the story and to interact with the audience.

The third story asks questions and in this way you can influence the storyline. Not new but a nice way to involve the reader and make reading a participating activity.

This week Nicci French is publishing a story and it is written live!

It is a nice idea of Pinguin to explore the way you can tell stories by using internet tools. Every story is from a very different writer, in a very different format and in a very different style.

You can get some inspiration about how to involve your audience!

OLPC for the Dutch?

2008-03-25T20:23:00.003+01:00

We Dutch also want our OLPC laptop! While everybody in the world who is slightly involved with e-Learning in a professional way, is playing around with their 100$ laptop, I'm still waiting for mine.

Potential
Also in The Netherlands there is a huge potential for the famous laptop. It ships with a robust OS, a lot of educational content and unique and refreshing networking capabilities. In Dutch schools the penetration of computers in classrooms (especially within primary education) is still not that impressive. In primary and secondary schools, there is one computer for every seven pupils. See a report (867 kB, PDF) about the Dutch IT-situation within primary education.

Goal
And I wrote before about the great initiative to buy two computers: one for yourself and one unknown kid. Simple and efficient system.

But…
Although we ordered 3 (or six as you like) OLPC's back in 2007, we are still waiting. First they messed up with the credit card transaction (to many laptops on the bill). Later it turned out that we didn't order them. After that we received an e-mail that our computers were shipped in December and since that moment we keep trying to contact the organization in various ways, without success.

So if anybody knows how to order them in a successful way: please tell me so we can start creating powerful learning experience, both for our and for other children. As an e-Learning consultant I cannot wait use the OLPC and to develop content for it!

Open source Storyboard tool

2008-03-09T19:51:00.006+01:00

When you are writing scenarios for your educational video or your digital storytelling project I found a nice tool to support you.

The tool, that can be used for Windows, Linux and Mac OS, is available in 20 languages including Chinese, Russian and Dutch. It is free to download.

On the website they say about it:

Celtx is the world's first fully integrated solution for media pre-production and collaboration. It replaces old fashioned 'paper, pen & binder' media creation with a digital approach to writing and organizing that's more complete, simpler to work with, and easier to share.

I'm not sure if they are the first but I know for sure that this application works intuitive and it is a very complete environment. You can even add functionality if you are using the (paid) webservices.

But even without the webservice you get a complete set of useful functionalities. You can use Celtx in the different production phases, the main areas where you can use it:

- WRITING TOOLS (scripting, index cards, etc.)
- PRE-VISUALIZATION TOOLS (storyboarding, etc.)
- ORGANIZATION TOOLS (scheduling, back up, etc.)

So far I used mainly the storyboarding tool and that one is enough reason to download the package.

Mindmapping rules!

2008-02-28T12:36:00.005+01:00

For a long time I'm using mindmapping techniques for professional tasks. When I have to design a course, do a training or presentation or many other things.

Sometimes I'm using MindManager, other times FreeMind but also online tools like MindMeister.

If you are new to mindmapping, do yourself a favor and watch this video with a 28 minute explanation from Chuck Frey (see also his blog). It is a bit surprising that not the format of a mindmap is used, but hey...it's free and holds good information!

Want to be a cartoon master?

2008-02-14T09:22:00.003+01:00

If you have the wish to become a 'Cartoon Master', you can start with this funny and interesting e-Learning module.

You can walk through this tutorial for free and will learn all the basic principles on how to create cartoon like animations. It is a clear explanation with a great use of animations to explain the concepts. The style of this tutorial is fun but it also holds sound information.

So if you are using cartoon animations for e.g. you digital storytelling, this one is for you. If you are interested in the use of animations to explain concepts, this is also an example for you.

They also promise a new tutorial on how to create animations on the computer, I can't wait! Beep beep, here I come!

The Visible Body!

2008-01-26T21:24:00.005+01:00

Thanks to the blog of Jane Hart, I discovered the rich world of the website The Visible Body. The creators saying it "is the most comprehensive human anatomy visualization tool available today."

After registering for free and downloading some Active X controls, the draw back is that it only works with Internet Explorer. For me this is a problem because I cannot get IE stable since I installed 7.0.

But what a rich model of the human body! Especially for students and teachers of biology this is a great resource. It would even be better if you could add some interactivity as a teacher but the creators are promising a lot of more features; one example is the use of quality animations. So who knows what is next.

This site hold a lot of promises. So let's combine it with the ideas within the BBC page about the human body and another powerful learning experience is there!

WBTs on e-Learning for free!

2008-01-11T19:29:00.000+01:00

During the European project Fe-ConE, we developed 6 WBTs about e-Learning. This was not the goal of the project but a way to do research. The 6-week course on e-Learning Fundamentals hold a lot of didactical activities and one of them was a kind of old fashioned WBT.

I host 3 of the 6 WBTs (in English) on my own Dutch Blog, please feel free to look at them. These are not the best I could do (due to extreme time constraints) but maybe you will find it useful.

BTW: all the learning materials are published under Creative Commons licenses so let me know if you want to re-use it. I have the files in native eXe format.

> WBT “e-Learning Basics”

> WBT “e-Learning Tools”

> WBT “e-Learning Trends”

Enjoy!

Number of physicians per 1000 people?

2008-01-02T20:32:00.000+01:00

Data are hard to understand for a lot of people. Above a certain number it is hard to realize what it means exactly. Enormous list and endless graphs clarify it a bit but still…

The website Gapminder presents lots of information in a very attractive and effective way. You will find things like lectures but one of the parts I like the most is the Gapminder World 2006. This website, powered by Trendalyzer, enables you to explore the changing world from your own computer. Moving graphics show how the development of all countries by the indicators you choose.

It is a very flexible and interactive way to explore data. You can compare different countries (look for your own!), you can compare population, number of internet users, physicians per 1000 people etc. And you see these parameters evolve over the years. Great!

Click here to see an example.

New Dutch blog!

2007-12-29T22:29:00.000+01:00

I know there are too many blogs to keep up and still I felt the urge to start another one. Again it is about 'powerlearning' and the main difference between my new blog and the one you are reading now is the language.

My new blog is in Dutch and will also differ a bit because I will also write about specific Dutch issues and news. For the rest I would like to have the same approach as with Powerlearning: I will post on a regular base but not daily and only when I have something interesting to write about. Not because I 'have to'.

For me there are some more differences: I start having my own webspace again. With also another open source application: Wordpress. So far I like it but it is not as user-friendly as Blogger. For the first time of my life I'm into PHP and that's not what I want to learn. HTML and XML is enough for me. I used one of the many themes and designed it a bit further. Only one problem with the language because my installation was an English version and some text is still in English but I don't feel like re-installing again…

So for the Dutch readers: please add www.leerbeleving.nl to your RSS reader. Enjoy!

I want to thank you for reading this blog in 2007 and I would like to see you all back in 2008. Have a nice party and all the best for 2008!

GPS game with runners and surfers

2007-12-21T21:19:00.000+01:00

Yes, it is pretty exiting to walk around with a GPS receiver, towards waypoints to collect some new clues. This week we went with a big group of Stoas to a very nice town called Deventer.

The game was a nice mix of activities. In total we had 4 timeslots of 30 minutes. In the 30 minutes we divided our team in two sub team: 'Runners' walked through the city with a GPS receiver to search for predefined 'waypoints' At certain coordinates there was an object we needed. Via the mobile phone we stayed in contact with our team mates who played the role 'surfers'. The surfers sat behind a laptop and had different assignments. The surfers needed to solve online puzzles and had to answer certain questions. They could use internet to solve things. If they answered a question not correctly, the pages were blocked for a minute. The surfers had to provide the runners with questions that were related to the certain spots in the city. This way the tasks were involving and not boring at all. The runners needed to be back at the base (a warm and nice café of course) on time.

I could imagine that you can turn this quite easily into an educational game e.g. for new hires to explore the company (at least from the outside). You only would like to do a bit more at certain locations so I would prefer to use a GPS enables PDA or iPhone. With that you can do different assignments and use the web for additional info and to enter the answers. But the way we did it (with a collaborative task and a simple receiver) was also challenging and fun. It is motivating to team up with people at a different location and to put together the pieces of the puzzle.

The Surfers are working very hard!

If you want to set up games like this you can use free available software tools, one example: http://www.mscapers.com/

Made to Stick: a book that sticks!

2007-12-18T22:35:00.001+01:00

If you have only time to read one book in 2008 do yourself a favor and buy 'Made to Stick' from the Heath brothers. Even if it is not an e-Learning book you need the knowledge in this book to design better e-Learning. As an experienced instructional designer I thought I knew all the tricks to make my learning experiences lasting ones that will be remembered by my learners. NOT…in Made to stick I found many useful tips and practical guidelines how to create more memorable messages. Time for improvements, no matter if you are a professional copy writer or an instructional designer.

In the easy to read book, Chip and Dan Heath wrote about the reasons "why some ideas survive and others die". Dan and Chip researched famous stories, urban legends, great advertisements and successful political statements. They found out that such powerful messages all have certain aspects in common. They explained their vision and ideas very well and especially the parts with practical examples (with comparisons of well defined and poor defined versions of one idea) are very helpful for a better understanding. It makes it easy to transfer the insights and adapt them to your own working field.

A simple framework is used to explain the ingredients of a sticky idea:

1. Pay attention (come with something unexpected).
2. Understand and remember (be concrete).
3. Agree/believe (make it credible).
4. Care (use emotions to let people care about your idea).
5. Be able to act on it (use the Story format).

Before you start with these ingredients you start with Simple. Together it makes the acronym SUCCESs (Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotions, Story).

With every ingredient they come up with different approaches. E.g. for making your idea credible you can use certain sources with authority ("professor X said…") but sometimes it is better to use antiauthority to get external credibility. E.g. you could get statements from people from the target group because they will accept advise from peers.

This book offers me more innovative insights than many books that specifically target on creating learning materials. Do you want your learning experiences sticky? Buy and read this book!

Webinar "Makin' Movies with Joe Brennan"

2007-12-13T23:48:00.000+01:00

This week I attended a webinar hosted by Discovery channel and through a WebEx environment we got a 1-hour session from Joe Brennan. The title was "Makin' Movies with Joe Brennan". For the people that don't know Joe: he is quite active and has a great blog on Digital Storytelling.

About 80 people participated in his free available webinar. For me it took place at 11.00 pm and it started out with a small problem because for the audio you had to call a US phone number. And it is impossible to call a toll-free number for free. After we started the session people with the same problem entered some questions in the chat-box and they came up with the idea to use Skype. Although I frequently use Skype for chats and audio conference I never used it to call 'normal' numbers so I didn't think of using Skype. It turns out that you can use Skype perfectly for calling toll-free numbers as well.

That was my first learning result and I learned quite a bit more. Joe showed us a lot of nice and simple techniques to create e.g. special effects. By showing us examples he made clear that imagination and some insights can create attractive videos. One of the techniques Joe showed us was playing with the pace in the video. He was talking about recording while one kid was walking slowly and other people were walking at normal speed. Later on you can speed up the video till the speed of the one kid is at 'normal pace'. The result will be exiting. What I liked about how examples was the fact that they were created without a lot of sophisticated technology but with easy to use and free or cheap applications. He was also talking about applications as Microsoft Photo Story. This app can be used for educational purposes very easily. I used it myself a few times and yes: easy and nice. And for the Dutch amongst us: it is free!

For me it was good to use WebEx again, it was already a few years ago, I only expect simple VOIP with such an application. Don't know why it was not possible with this session. I also learned a lot from the discussions that took place in the chat box. It was nice to exchange ideas during the session with the other participants.

Do yourself a favour and take a look at the Discovery site because they organize free quality webinars on a regular base. Enroll and enjoy! You can even watch recorded events.

The Big Question: What did you learn about learning in 2007?

2007-12-07T22:11:00.000+01:00

The Big Questions...asked by The Learning Circuits Blog from the ASTD. The big question is: What did you learn about learning in 2007? You can also answer this question on your blog. Pass it on!

And as we educational people know, reflection is an important 'learning aid'. It can make your learning more explicit and you have to put things in place and while your reflecting, you almost feel the transfer to your everyday life and tasks.

So I decided to grap this change to put my feet on the table and try to get back all the powerful learning insights from 2007.

I used the Pecha Kucha format again because that is such a good way to focus your mind and to force you to stick with the core message.

Please watch it (in English or Dutch) and leave your comments or answer The Big Question on your own blog or in the comments!

English:

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Dutch:

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'De Blob', from a school project to the Wii.

2007-12-02T20:03:00.000+01:00

'De Blob' is a very successful game made by students of the Utrecht School of the Arts (HKU) and Utrecht University. It was created some time ago but I heard about it on the NLGD day two weeks ago.

De Blob

The Blob-game wants to inform the citizens of Utrecht about the upcoming project to redesign and rebuild the area of the main railway station. Great thing about the Blob game is the way you move the Blob, a big ball, through the city. The graphics look detailed and nice. One of the students posted something about their study project and THQ picked it up. The game will be on the Nintendo Wii and the DS in 2008 (of course with some extra features and extended gameplay). The title will be the Dutch one: "De Blob".

Joost van Dongen, the lead programmer, describes the game as:

It is a 3D game in which the player controls a ball of paint rolling through the city. The ball can absorb coloured NPC’s to become larger and change its colour. With the paint, the player can then proceed to paint the entire city. Almost everything is paintable: buildings, trees, cars and using the paint trace even the ground. The main goal of the game is to paint all 17 landmark buildings. Hardcore fanatics can also try to collect all 50 coins that are hidden around the level.

You can download and play the game from the students for free. It is available in Dutch and English and it is a Windows game. It is very playable with a trackball or touchpad. With the mouse is a bit annoying.

I would not consider it as an edugames because the learning objectives are very thin. And even the informative elements are quite limited. But it is fun to play, you can enjoy the graphics and the easy way you can roll De Blob around town. If you are developing games as a student: you see what it can bring you so create a great edugame and share it with us and the THQs of this world.

Some info about the THQ release:

Go download the English version or the Dutch version.

TFT tennis: move your whole screen!

2007-11-25T20:34:00.000+01:00

Today I visited STRP Festival in Eindhoven. This Art & Technology festival offers some great dance concerts (e.g. Chemical Brothers) and it is like they say "an exhibition of about 30 art robots and/or interactive art installations, a lot of video art and artistic video clips, various Live Cinema performances, several film and documentary showings, about ten talks and lectures by artists, workshops, and a number of other projects that fall outside the scope of the above-mentioned categories."

I always like the festivals on the former Philips premises. The atmosphere within the old factory buildings is special and the festivals are often very inspiring and creative.

Today I saw an installation of Dirk Eijsbouts called TFT Tennis. This was a new way of playing a digital tennis game. You really have to move your body and your TFT screen to hit the ball. Nice interface!

Watch this short impression, not a great quality, I shot it with my photo camera. You can find more on his website.

Timeline tool for e-learning?

2007-11-21T21:37:00.000+01:00

When I'm teaching a basic e-Learning course, one of didactical activities I do is creating a timeline with the participants. I provide them with pictures that represent a certain event (both technological as educational) in history that influenced modern e-Learning concepts. It is a great way to get into discussions about learning, about the value of each event and about the link to our learning concepts of today. It is a very interesting way of storytelling.

Recently I was reading a Dutch blog I really like and appreciate of Margreet van den Berg and she posted something about creating online timelines.

I tried one (http://xtimeline.com) and it worked pretty well. You can add events very easily and work on your project in private and when you want to share it you can do it with a select group of people or the world. The timeline can also be embedded in your website of blog (although it is running outside your frames) and your students can work together on a timeline. So it could be an interesting assignment as well.

Take a look at the example of a timeline

Whole Brain Learning!

2007-11-16T21:39:00.000+01:00

At Learning 2007 I joined an inspiring pre-conference session of Ann Herrmann-Nehdi (HBDI) . The last weeks I was thinking about her whole Brain Thinking Model because I'm convinced that it can be a very useful model for e-Learning. I presented the model with the implications for the didactical approach at a client and we both want to use it. The project is a very innovative and challenging one and we are thinking of using learning styles in the design phase to offer the learners an optimal experience. For me the problem of most learning styles models is the limited way it can be pragmatically integrated.

Whole Brain Thinking Model
Ann worked with us on the model for about 6 hours and the whole learning experience was an example of 'teach what you preach'. During the day she was using a lot of inspiring didactical formats and I'm still using the materials she gave us, besides my own profile she also gave us posters, a hand-out, a kind of quick reference table flip-over and a set of cards.

Four different quadrants
When you fill out the questionnaire the results is a visual representation of your preferred thinking style. You will always score on every of the quadrants. On the picture you see that I score heavily on the yellow and red quadrant. There is also a dotted plotline. That is the style you prefer when acting under stress. So if you look at my preferences; I will act more extreme in the red and yellow area.

My own profile!

The graphic representation of the results is printed on a see-thru plastic sheet so you can put this on different papers. That is smart and nice. So you can see typical jobs for certain plots.

You can use the profile of yourself and others in different situations e.g. when you are having a business conversation. Clear example: you are scoring high on the blue quadrant (analyze). This means you are logical and like numbers. If you are selling a car you will talk about the power, the number of gears, the measurements of the car, the costs etc. If the customer scores in the red quadrant (personalize) he/she will not be interested in numbers but in personal stories, feelings, and the story behind the car. You will not sell if you are not aware of the differences.

Whole Brain Learning
The same goes for learning; as an instructional designer I design learning experiences that reflect my preferences. So for me it will be easy to forget to include statistical data, numbers, etc.

Learning design strategies

In the picture you see learning design strategies. Once again: you don't have to choose, you have to combine the aspects of every quadrant to make it a successful learning experience for a wide range of learners.

Stack of cards with instructional design questions

To help you to think about all the quadrants, Ann also gave us a stack of cards in 4 different colors and every card has an instructional design question or hint. If you are designing you can take a few cards from every color to get ideas.

No hocus pocus, very plain and easy to use advice. Digg into it, it will enrich you as an instructional designer and will make your learning experiences more powerful and more balanced!

Thanks Ann!

Ann gave us a lot: inspiration and useful materials!

SlideShare: educational tool

2007-11-09T21:40:00.000+01:00

Normally I'm using SlideShare for my training sessions. It's easier to use SlideShare to publish and share it with my learners than printing hand-outs and send it per e-mail. First I used another website but since it is possible to download the presentation as well I'm a fan of SlideShare.

As a trainer I also use SlideShare for some inspiration. The only thing I missed was the story 'behind the slides'. Most of the time the slides only represent a part of the idea and the meaning. With the SlideCast possibilities it is also possible to share audio (like I did on the previous post). That really enriches the experience.

Let's focus a bit more on this. You can add an audio track to your presentation in a couple of steps. Unfortunately it is not as easy as uploading a presentation.

You have to:

create an MP3-file (for example with the great open source tool Audacity);
store that MP3 on a webspace on the net, it is not possible to store it at SlideShare. You can do this on your own webspace or for example for free at www.archive.org;
point to the url where you put the MP3;
synchronize the audio (line it up with the slides).

This last step works great! It is a very easy to use online tool. For me SlideShare is getting more and more useful. It is easy to embed in online learning environments, you can use full screen mode and the last feature is also nice: you can choose to share your presentation to a limited list of users or even only to yourself. So you can share it only with your learners if you want.

BTW: last week SlideShare put my pecha kucha slidecast in the spotlights and since that moment over 800 people watched it. ;-)

An impression of the audio tooling within SlideShare.

Pecha Kucha in learning!

2007-11-01T21:36:00.000+01:00

Pecha Kucha is an attractive presentation format that originally came from artistic people in Tokyo. It forces you to bring your message effectively and attractive by setting some rules: you have only 20 slides with images and you are only allowed to talk 20 seconds per slide. This way you will finish your presentation in 6 minutes and 40 seconds.

Last week with Learning 2007 there was a Pecha Kucha night with educational shows. I found it a very inspiring format as a teaser for a further discussion and it keeps you from those 4 hours, 96 slides PowerPoint disillusions.

Yesterday I created a Pecha Kucha myself and it took me 3 hours to create it. Quite long and that is not surprising: the format force you to really focus on the essence of the subject. It is not an easy thing to do. I think I'm gonna use this format for my learners at some trainings and workshops.

See my first try about Learning 2007, click on the PLAY-button (and yes, I know it is not the best thing ;-)

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BTW: the audio possibility in SlideShare is great!!

e-Learning for a Worldwide Audience > Learning 2007

2007-10-24T00:18:00.000+02:00

Our session at Learning 2007
Today was the big day for Erika and me because we had our session about multicultural e-Learning. It was great! We had an interesting group of people that discussed with us the implications of different cultural dimensions on e-Learning. As you know we used the model of Hofstede to define guidelines for instructional design of e-Learning for a multicultural audience. You will get more info on this when we will be finishing the Fe-ConE project. I will publish some nice and rich materials on this blog. In the meanwhile you can go to the site of our session today to get the hand-out with some practical information: www.learningwiki.com/739

People working really hard to find out about cultural aspects

Wikinomics
For the rest I went to a session of Don Tapscott. This author of Wikinomics has some interesting points on the netgeneration but it was not really new to me. The new focus was on Talent 2.0. I think this comes very close to the thesis of Joost Robben. Basic message was that for young people there is a thin or no line between work/entertainment/learning. The working environment should be fun, collaborative, customizable, authentic and fast.

Some extra nuggets of info
I went to a nice session on the use of storytelling and in particular about the educational use of Manga. This was a inspiring session and you will see more on this on my blog in the next months. I used cartoons for educational use a few times and we are now working on a cartoon kind of learning for a customer.

Wayne Hodgins was announcing a new and independent organization that will take over the role of ADL. This is the organization behind the learning standard SCORM. Because this is a worldwide used standard the learning community wants to take it away with the defence orientated ADL.

Last thing I visited was a good session (PIT training) that offers a learning experience with a real racecar. I had the same experience at the ISAGA conference. Probable an engaging way of learning although we missed the real debriefing and transfer of the regular training. Check out the video.

Last thing that interest me was the use of HD videoconferencing over the internet that was used by the Manhattan School of Music. They are using this quality connection to teach musical lessons. The called it an export and import of educational resources. Very interesting. They needed high quality because of the importance of the details. Check this student (although this is no HD after YouTubing ;-))

Rightbrainers & Snowflakes > Learning 2007

2007-10-23T06:14:00.000+02:00

Rightbrainers
Today we started at 8 am and it was an inspiring day again. It started with some good sessions, one of the better ones was from Dan Pink (see also his blog). I have read his book "A Whole New Mind" a long time ago and still there are some challenging thoughts. He is telling us that it is time has come for the 'right brainers', he relates the left side with rational ways of thinking and the right side with the more emotional and artistic side. He keeps telling us that we have the focus on jobs and services that cannot be outsourced or automated. And than we talking about right-brain attitude and values. Pink comes up with some ingredients that can make a difference in business and learning:
- design (differentiate one product/service from another);
- storytelling (places facts in context and provoke emotions);
- symphony (focus on syntheses);
- meaning (what is the real value);
- empathy (feel what the user is feeling).

Ann Herrmann-Nehdi had a more sophisticated and sound message but I like the style and way of thinking from Dan as well. So do yourself a favor and buy his book.

Snowflake effect
Two other good moments today: Experiences on Storytelling from Ikea (wonderful examples) and Wayne Hodgings from Autodesk. I saw this guy already a lot of times and I keep visiting his presentations because he is so passionate about learning and he has a good sense of trends. His story today was again about mass personalization of learning. He called it the Snowflake effect. Challeging message with some nice examples that I didn't know. One good one is www.pandora.com were you build your own profile by rating songs. Go see it for yourself. I think his idea can be implemented if we are looking for some help by users when we are talking about creating personalized content.

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Training with your whole brain! > Learning 2007

2007-10-22T01:31:00.000+02:00

Ann Herrmann-Nehdi was catching our attention from the very start of the session on brain-based learning. Today I joined the 6-hour pre-conference session on this interesting subject. A couple of days ago I out a digital assessment (HBDI) on our styles of thinking. Today we got a full report on our own styles. That was very interesting and challenging. She is working for a lot of years in this field and can back-up all her stories with sound research and experience.

She is using the four-colored quadrants that represents different styles:
- Analyze
- Strategize
- Personalize
- and Organize.

My very own profile!

Very good to think about the implications on this for your learning design. In the best training you have to address all ways of thinking. With the help of Ann we discovered practical translation of this model into e-learning reality. They gave us really great goodies (cards, posters, profiles etc.) But please visit her website for more info and great resources.

This night we also had the general opening session. That was also good although there was a (for Dutch) strange thing: 4 veterans walked in with flags and there was a very patriotic song. Mmm, but after that it went better with e.g. a talk from Dr James 'Butch' Rosser, this surgeon, researcher and teacher was explaining his research that shows that surgeons that are playing videogames perform significant better on their job and also surgeons that are playing videogames as a warming-up before the surgery, perform better. See an article about this!

For more info visit the Learning 2007 websites:
- General website
- Learning Wiki (with lot's of resources)

Intercultural presentations!

2007-10-21T02:10:00.000+02:00

At this moment I'm waiting at the airport in Detroit. Tonight we will go to Orlando to be at Learning 2007 from Elliott Masie. I can't wait! My colleague Erika and I are hosting a session with the title 'e-Learning for a worldwide audience', we will use the Hofstede model to explain the design guidelines for e-Learning.

Last week I was in Lituania to present about this issue at well, although this was a small seminar, it was interesting to share thoughts about cultural contexts with people from 20 different countries.

The same week I was working for the Council of Europe, this was a general session on e-Learning but I showed the intercultural course and also here people got really into the subject of cultural dimensions of learning.

I'm wondering how many people will show up at our session in Learning 2007. I am surprised by the many conversations and request for presentations I had on the subject of multicultural approaches in e-Learning. It is certainly hot.

You will find more on Learning 2007 on this blog (daily base) and for the Dutch readers: I will publish a daily post on www.e-learning.nl

Learn how to be creative?

2007-10-09T23:23:00.000+02:00

A two day workshop
Last week we had a two day training/workshop on creativity. Some of our customers took a class on this and were enthusiastic about it. So I contacted a company called COCD (www.cocd.be). First assumption of many people is that they are not creative because they are no artists. Second assumption is that you cannot learn to be creative. Both assumptions are false.

Invention of a new toilet!

Techniques to think out of the box
Problem is that it is hard to think outside the box, and that is what creativity is all about. Everybody thinks in patterns because that helps you with everyday tasks. You can be very creative without being an artist. Everybody can learn some techniques to think outside the box. That was what we did during the training. We learnt different approaches to solve a problem/question. We started with a normal brainstorm session to solve a fictive problem, after that we start using techniques like provocative analogies (take two very different concepts and try to find the elements that are the same). Other ways to extend your view on a challenge/problem: think how your hero would solve this problem, or how a solution will look when you reverse the problem.

A simple but effective way was to write down solutions on post-it's, stick them on your table and after that change seats with people. On your new table you found the ideas of another person and you had to add two new ideas. Then you had to change seats again. It surprised me how many extra ideas were generated this way.

Funny activities to relax

Creativity is hard work
At the end of the first day we used a real question (How can we offer a more powerful learning experience) and nailed down this challenge. There are basically 3 phases in every problem-solving session:
1. Problem Definition
2. Idea Generation Phase (Divergence)
3. Idea evaluation Phase (Convergence)
4. Action plan

If you want to learn the basics of creative thinking, please visit the small but nice online course on this: http://www.cocd.org/international/course.htm

So basically it is easy to improve your process of creation by using pattern-breaking methodologies. No paint; just hard work, an open mind and energy is needed!

Immersive learning simulations webinar

2007-09-27T22:19:00.000+02:00

This week I joined a webinar about IMMERSIVE LEARNING SIMULATIONS by great experts like Clark Quinn (author of Engaging Learning). It was a one hour event based on research findings in a report, that you can buy from the site. Although the way it was done was quite straightforward (slow PowerPoints, audio and a side-chat) the content was interesting. Adobe Acrobat Connect was used. You can see a recorded session at the website.

See for yourself that the content is great but the interaction was poor. I was missing basic things like pictures of the speakers and graphics with an additional value. The start was static with a picture of the frontpage of the report for almost 5 minutes. I would expect more from a fine group of experts like Quinn and Schlenker. Teach what you preach!

The model behind this site is triggering. If you sign up for free as an Associate, you can gain points by filling out your profile and filling out surveys. The outcome of the surveys will be analysed in their reports. For your points (called 'Guilders') you can get all kind of goodies as PDF-version of the reports, coffee mugs, USB-sticks and many more. As an Associate you can download abstracts. Actually there is nothing interesting to see in these abstracts besides a lot of index pages and some graphs. So you have to fill out surveys or pay to get the good stuff.

Go visit the eLearning Guild website for more info.

Virtual fire extinguisher training system!

2007-09-20T19:55:00.000+02:00

Some skills are hard to train within a real situation. Or dangerous, or expensive. We all know the flight simulators and the car driving simulators.

But now it is also possible to train your fire extinguishing skills with a virtual fire. The BullsEye system uses laser technology to simulate the discharge of a dry chemical extinguisher. You will even hear the sound of discharging an extinguisher.

No hassle, no money per training experience and no pollution. Only the stress you feel with a 'real' simulation will be missed. And I think that the experience with and the control over your stress is an important aspect of the level of success within the real situation.

For more info please visit to the website of the company.

Teaching is powerful learning!

2007-09-16T15:45:00.000+02:00

Last week I was facilitating a session about designing effective learning experiences for the Council of Europe. I struck me how much I'm learning from the teaching itself. Even after 10 years of teaching and presenting it is so much fun to do it! And every time I'm picking up new insights because of the interaction with participants. Every time I find some aspects that can be improved the next time. Teaching and presenting is like playing a game. While playing you find the nuances in the rules and you like the game even more than before.

What I also realised was the fact that 'learning' is so personal that you can touch people when you are talking about learning. I did the 'close your eyes' exercise again and I was impressed by the outcomes again. WOW. It is relative easy to create an engaging experience when the subject is 'learning'.

Maybe we have to use teaching as a didactical form(at) more often. Teaching is learning and is remembering. You cannot teach if you don't understand the essence of the subject. Doing a presentation forces you to perform to your limits.

The next months I'm presenting a few public sessions, so feel free to join me and let's learn together!

At Learning 2007, the e-Learning congress organized by the Masie Center, I will host a session with the title: "e-Learning For A Worldwide Audience". In this session I will talk together with my colleague Erika Spoelma, about the cultural aspects that have to be taken into account when you are designing for a multicultural audience. Learning 2007 will be held from 21-24 October in Disneyworld, Orlando, Florida. More details on their website.

At the National e-Learning Congress I will facilitate a session about how to create powerful learning experiences. The three hours workshop will be held at 24 of January (see for details the website).

Close your eyes … story

2007-09-07T21:19:00.000+02:00

Last week I was with a customer for a one-day session. The main goal was to brainstorm about how to take their e-Learning experiences to a new level. It is an international company and they are developing e-Learning for a little more than a year. The development team consist of a few enthusiastic professionals with limited e-Learning experience. They are using Moodle and as authoring methods they using Team (a Stoas tool) and Captivate.

I was thinking about the right way to start the day and was thinking about the power of stories. I asked the participants to close their eyes and think of the most impressive learning experience. This could be anything, from their childhood, a formal or informal experience and any kind of activity.

The results were so inspiring! What a personal stories came up! People where sharing stories about other experiences from journeys to other continents, about kindergarten time, about learning how to fix bikes when you were young and many more. You could feel the energy in the air and everybody was eager to share the learning stories and eager to hear the stories from others.

The great thing was for me the discovery of the power of personal learning stories. If you remember a learning event from 20 or 30 years ago, it has to be a strong one!

It was easy to distil the important ingredients for a powerful learning experience. It worked, touched people and gave inspiration and a framework for the rest of the day. We were together with 5 people, I think it will be harder to do this with a bigger group because it is important to keep it personal.

Thesis: "Learning environments for Net-generation learners"

2007-09-03T23:04:00.000+02:00

Last week Joost, a colleague of mine, got his masters degree. If you are interested in Net-generation learning, this thesis will be useful for you.

Based on a written questionnaire among 224 students of preliminary vocational education in The Netherlands, the paper explores the use of digital media and web technology and the characteristics of Net-generation learners as being the next generation of workers. Two developments in digital media and web technology have been taken into account: 1) virtual social networks and 2) multi-user virtual environments.

Although it was a scientific research the approach was very practical. And we can use a bit insight in these field because you cannot project the US based research findings that easy on a Dutch situation.

For me what was new to hear was the penetration of the use of instant messaging amongst this target group, it was almost 100%. The target group comes from a lower socio-economic background (below average) and you could expect a lower use of PC's at home. This was not true.

I think Joost did some nice research and he answered some interesting and relevant questions. For me the remaining questions are:

What will happen if we use the Net-gen methods within a corporate learning environment? Will it lose its positive impact?
What is the importance of the learner as an active creator?

Maybe some new research questions?

Congratulations Joost!

Check his research: Learning environments for Net-generation learners

Check his presentation:

For more, please visit his blog.

Free -non OSS- authoring tool

2007-08-26T21:59:00.000+02:00

A new and very nice piece of software is hitting the streets. It is a Russian tool to create WBTs and it is fast, easy and it is for free. I tried to contact the vendor but my mail came back with an error message. The tool is called CourseLab.

So it is free – I guess it is limited?
Actually, NO! This application is quite advanced. There are a lot of functionalities and templates you can use. The course can be exported as a SCORM package (both 1.2 and 2004), as an AICC package or on a CD. There are no limitations to the number of screens and you don't see a watermark. No idea why they are using this model but as long as it works, it is fine to me.

What about the functionalities?
It is an advanced authoring tool to create WBTs. With a lot of ready to use templates and a various set of didactical interactions. From simple questions, to interactive conversations. It is even possible to create simulations (although you need to buy an additional module). And it is very easy to use movies or Flash/Shockwave elements. Every instructional designer will be able to create pages at a fast pace.

Is it hard to use?
No, the user interface is very clear. If you know how to use Microsoft applications, you can use this one as well. The same menus, the same buttons. You can even move objects to a different layer in exactly the same way. The learning curve is not steep at all. Without any help I created a simple interactive conversation within 5 minutes. You can even import current PowerPoint presentations (although this will be a very bad starting point!). If you need additional info you can use the solid build in help.

So?
Just try this one. And if anyone can tell me about their business model...please let me know. I'm curious.

Capture and share your applications

2007-08-16T22:43:00.000+02:00

When learning to work with a certain application I like to watch some screen casts. I bought Final Cut some weeks ago and it helps me to understand some of the more complicated features.

And within Stoas we are using simulations a lot for our customers who want to train people how to use a certain application. Or to support them on the work place with small simulations. Some times we just do this the hard core way with programming it in code, sometimes we use screen capturing applications like Captivate. With this application you can do almost everything you want.

Now I'm also using a very simple application: Jing (from TechSmit, who are also selling Camtasia). You can download it for free for both Mac and PC and you can create screenshots (a window or part of a window) or screen casts. You can just hit the record button and it is capturing the action including the audio. The special thing is that you can share the picture or movie right away. It is published on the server and the url is copied into your clipboard. Just send the url and your friends can watch it. Easy and fast way to explain something fast.

Just watch this (bad) example: http://www.screencast.com/t/NWEWnIftj4

Game based learning with a bite!

2007-08-09T20:10:00.000+02:00

The game
On the Discovery site you can play a special edugame. For free. Just bring your courage with you.

"Sharkrunners is a game of oceanic exploration and high stakes shark research. Players take on the role of sharkrunners: daring and adventurous marine biologists who seek to learn as much as possible about sharks through advanced observation techniques."

Does this sounds tempting to you? It becomes more interesting if you take a look at the nice merging of real and virtual life within this game. Although your boat and crew is totally virtual, your sharks are not!

"Real-world telemetry data provides the position and movement of actual great white sharks in Sharkrunners, so that every shark players encounter corresponds to a real shark out in the actual ocean."

Game play
Within the game you will face a lot of choices, it begins with the choice of the group you want to be in. Do you like to join a group of extreme activists or a more conservative group of biologists? As a player you can define you own route. With every encounter with the (real) shark you can choose to go on a Zodiak and stay on the surface. In that case the risks are low but also the data gathering will be limited. Or you can go for a dive. If the dive is OK you can improve the skills of your crew. After that you define the direction and speed of the boat.

Interaction design
The game can be played by people with limited IT-skills. The navigation is straightforward and clean. The messages are clear and a decent help is presented. The game is using engaging text, graphics, audio and video in a functional way.

Communication
If you are close to a shark and an encounter is possible, you will receive an e-mail and/or text message on your phone (depends on your preferences). After being notified you have 3 hours to login and to take action. Within the game you also receive messages and your progress is tracked and presented by a 'shipslog'.

Conclusion
This is really a game with a bite. Educational and exiting. Because the fact that you are playing with real sharks makes it a different sensation. It is not as exiting as the time that I was diving with sharks but it comes close!

Play and learn, if you dare. Visit the website, sign on for free and enjoy!

SPORE: "toys can change the world!"

2007-07-27T17:02:00.000+02:00

Will Wright previews his new and exiting game, 'Spore'. Maybe the name doesn't ring a bell but sure 'SimCity' and 'the Sims' does. The creator of these sims is working on his new baby. Last year within Saganet we were already talking about this new concept.

Few interesting things:

this is a new example of participatory learning, you create your own universe;
Wright starts talking about his Montessori education;
he sees this as a learning toy;
the game holds some nice and easy object authoring tools;
Wright sees his new game as a way to educate young people about long-term effects of your actions;
nice saying: "Toys can change the world".

See this great TED-video:

Looking back at the ISAGA conference

2007-07-16T20:30:00.000+02:00

Gaming is fun and involving and so was the ISAGA conference. The motto of this 5 day conference on gaming and simulation was 'learning by doing'. ISAGA 2007 was held from 9-13 July 2007 in Nijmegen - The Netherlands.

FIVE days?
I think it was great that it was a full week. This gives you the change to focus on the subject instead of your daily activities. And it gives you the opportunity to get a lot of insights and reflection moments.

Atmosphere?
With 200 participants it was a rather small conference (a slightly different than some of the Masie conferences I visited with 3500 participants). It was an informal gathering of game researchers, developers and players. Some were experienced in F2F simulations and games (what was called First Life during the conference), others only knew the digital counterparts (Second Life). It was an inspiring atmosphere with lots of experts. The limited number of people made it possible to have interactive sessions with room for discussion and participation.

Inspiring things?
Well, the level of the presenters was quite OK. Most of them were bringing a lot of enthusiasm and experience to the table. Especially the people who were not from my field (digital learning) offered me some new insights. Most things I saw where not new to me but they gave me some food for thought and I changed some of my views.

Top 5?

Inspiring person: Albert Angehrn, this charismatic guy from CALT in France (http://www.calt.insead.edu/) told us in a very touching way about his experiences in simulation and gaming. Both offline and online they share a few things: they where putting participants in an involving experiences full of emotion and possibilities to get a taste of failure. Albert told us that he thinks failure is important for people to learn. His story about a simulation where a team of managers did a pitstop with a Ferrari formula 1 car made me want to join his team. It was not only a nice marketing concept but it had a very strong scientific base. A true visionair!
Session with customer – a session with a real customer (www.nbc.nl) about a gaming question. Interesting to brainstorm with some other specialist on a specific topic. What was also interesting was the focus on design instead of analysis. The facilitator was pushing a bit to skip that phase. Nice outcome was that gaming was only a part of the solution and the advice was to put more effort in building an interactive community (within a virtual learning environment).
Session on virtual worlds. Igor Mayer told about the experiences of the technical university of Delft with virtual worlds. He showed some examples of students who created content in Second Life and Active Worlds. In SL students imported a floating building (from a 3D graphic application) to start discussions about their design and in AW students played with a simulation of the restructuring of the railway area in Delft.
Gert Jan Hofstede showed us why we play. In his session it becomes clear that playing is essential for living and it is in our genes for quite a long time. Interesting to put the motor behind game based learning in a historical, cultural and biological perspective. Play is not just for fun only; it has a function! It makes you as human happier and with playing you improve your skills.
YY Cai from the Singapore Science Center showed us the cutting edge examples of virtual reality. He talked about the various input devices and he even used music in a totally new way (to explain biology subjects he synced music with structure of enzymes).

Some more?
Well besides the five sessions I went to a great explanation of Paul Maharg of the Law simulation 'Ardcalloch' (a 12 week intensive online simulation, an OSS tool to create this will be published: 'SIMPLE'), a session about a game design software tool ('CAGE' from an university of Finland) and I had a lot of nice discussions during diners and in between sessions.

Next year in Lithuanian!

A computer program that reads human expressions

2007-07-16T19:58:00.000+02:00

Used for marketing reasons
Dutch researchers from Unilever using software that reads human expressions recently for a consumer test project seconded what wise men have always known: Sweets are the surest way to make a woman smile. Marketers increasingly use technology to determine what gives consumers bliss. Food and consumer goods giant Unilever, which used brain scans to demonstrate why we all scream for ice cream, hired software developers Theo Gevers and Nicu Sebe from the science department of the University of Amsterdam to run the European tests after reading about their experimental work deciphering the Mona Lisa's smile.

Emotions in learning experiences
Although this computer program is used for marketing reasons this could be an interesting tool for learning as well. I'm convinced that (e-)Learning can only have a learning effect if the learning activity is very involving. Emotions are important. Most self study e-Learning courses don't pay attention to the emotional needs of learners.

What is the learning experience you remember?
Probably it made an impression in different ways, not only on an academic level but it also moves you on an emotional level. It touched you. A great teacher can do this. Great e-Learning course as well but this kind of emotion recognition software could help us to optimize the interactivity. It could make the computer more human and make the learning experience more adaptive and memorable.

Live broadcast: exciting learning!

2007-07-11T22:40:00.000+02:00

During the last week of the international 'e-Learning Fundamentals' course I decided I wanted to have an extra presentation about designing educational games. A few weeks before I found out about the possibilities to host a free streaming video broadcast. I used Ustream.tv. You need a web cam and a mike and that is it. After registration you can set up a live show within 1 minute. You can send around a url or you can embed the code in your weblog or learning environment (like you can do with a YouTube video).

My own 30 minutes of fame
I scheduled a 30 minute show and embedded the screen in Moodle. During the show you can chat with your audience. I downloaded an additional application that offers me the functionalities to share images and to add titles, a count down timer etc. It seems to work fine although some people couldn't connect to the server. You can also record your show. Great that you can sign up for free, bad thing is that it was not functioning as expected.

operator11
Another variation of this is operator11. This website also offers you free streaming shows. But you will have some different functionalities. As a host you can give the stage to other participants (colleagues or learners) and they can present.

Exciting for learners and you
These websites are promising for education. I really want to use it again with a group of learners. It is exited to have your own show and to be 'on the air'. Everybody dreams to be on TV while growing up. Feel the energy and try this with your students. The synchronous aspect really add some excitement to your learning experience. Get envolved!

ISAGA conference

2007-07-09T22:13:00.000+02:00

Today the 5-day ISAGA conference started. This yearly event about gaming and simulation takes place in Nijmegen, The Netherlands.

I'm there with a colleague of mine, Yvonne, who is a graphic designer. The conference is using the concept of 'Learning by doing'. You can choose between different kind of activities. One of the things you can do is to create a game for War Child. Parallel to this you have thematic sessions (3 hours) or single paper sessions. After these there are open sessions: anybody can initiate that.

We went to a thematic session about designing educational games and simulations. For me this was too much a learner oriented approach. We did all the work even without much feedback or reflection from the facilitators. It left me with an idea that I could do that without them. The good thing was that we defined the criteria for a good game from many different perspectives (designer, client, player, victim, etc.). After that I went to a session in where a real client with a real problem asked for some input about how to use gaming to solve his problem. This was a very interesting session. We ended up with a solution with only a small emphasis on gaming but with a strong community with all kind of collaborative learning activities (based on a VLE instead of a virtual world or game).

I'm feeling lucky to focus a whole week on GBL and to share ideas with gaming professionals from 20 different countries!

PeaceMaker: great educational game

2007-07-02T19:47:00.000+02:00

Gaming is bad?
After all the discussions in the media about Manhunt 2 (see an article in USA Today) it is good to talk about all the strong and significant positive effects of games. It is a pity that media are not focussing on the game PeaceMaker. The first time a game really forced me to think about my own values and attitude was when I played September, 12th. This great game was developed after the terrorist attack in New York City and I used it a lot during presentations on game based learning because for me it shows the strong potential of educational games.

The same feeling was there when I played PeaceMaker. On their site you can read:

PeaceMaker challenges you to succeed as a leader where others have failed. Experience the joy of bringing peace to the Middle East or the agony of plunging the region into disaster. PeaceMaker will test your skills, assumptions and prior knowledge. Play it and you will never read the news the same way again.

Which president do you want to be?
It is true. For only 19,95$ you can be either a Palestinian or Israeli president trying to cope with the complex situation. You decisions are based on your knowledge and attitude. You can make different choices (although it is not really possible to behave in the worst and violent way when you are playing the Palestinian president). This game is very well developed. It is a straightforward game with basic but nice graphics. You don't realize it is quite simple while you are playing the game You are not running around in a 3D world but you don't miss it any moment. The designers used movement in a very subtle way. The game play is very well balanced (attractive and challenging). The interface is well designed, clean and simple. You just start playing without worrying about how to do it. You find out how to do it while playing. The real multi media footage is giving the game its urgency and realistic atmosphere. It pulls you into the game and it will get you some shivers as well.

Learning different things
While playing this game, you learn about the different issues like security, national and international partners, the national and international politics, about natural resources and many more. It puts you in the middle of the action. The feedback is well presented and is adding a lot of flavour to the game. The developers surely know how to use gaming principles.

PeaceMaker make you think about the complexity of the situation and it is great that you can play both sides. That forces you to look at it from different points of view. It will not only learn some new facts to you but probably will change your ideas and gives you a deep understanding of the conflict in his historical context. It will shake up you emotions as well. But, hey…that is a small price for learning this kind of lessons.

Get the demo or just buy the game at their website.

Watch the game play trailer:

Review eXe authoring tool

2007-06-25T23:50:00.000+02:00

I already posted about the eXe authoring tool for creating WBTs. The last 6 weeks I developed 6 WBT's with the tool. This review is about version 0.24, on both the Mac and the PC. This week version 0.95 was released.

Ease of use
The tree structure on one hand side and the edit pane on the other one makes it a clear and clean environment. eXe opens in FireFox. If you have a basic understanding of Windows or Mac OS it will be easy to start with eXe. A basic knowledge of HTML comes in easy because although it is a kind of WYSYWIG editor sometimes you need some code to clean things up or to correct some flaws. For the rest it is not hard to work with eXe. It speaks for itself and it is consistent. Creating a structure is the same as creating folders, three levels can be used. Moving pieces of the content to other places is very easy. That is sufficient for most content. There is a help function but that is quite limited. If you need to know more you can visit fora. Adding metadata and exporting the content into SCORM packages or other packages.

Functionalities
With eXe you can create attractive WBTs. You can easily add different and attractive learning interactions. You can add some question types, some reflection activities, images, add RSS, you can integrate web pages, MP3 and also video. And many more. Video has to be in an flv format. In the version I used (0.24) it was kind of a hassle. And for my Mac it was not available. Still the Windows version has the most functionalities but with the 0.95 version, the difference is not that big anymore. The so-called iDevices do the things they are promising. Sometimes they can be improved, e.g. the one where you can show a row of images. First of all you have to select and upload them one for one, but if you open them in the WBT you need to click twice to enlarge them. Some learners even didn't find the second click.

I also miss some basic functionalities. I missed simple things like anchors. It would have been nice to be able to create anchors (e.g. you sum up some subjects in a list and you want to jump to a certain point on the page of you click on subject 1, 2, etc.). This can be done now but you have to use HTML. I also missed hotspots.

But hey, with some smart things you can do a lot. You can copy code from different places. I embedded code from YouTube, Zoho polls and Blip.tv. I also tried to use HotPotatoes but that didn't work.

Technical performance
During the hundreds of hours I worked with it, I only had one crash. The first weeks I made a stupid (?) mistake by closing the FireFox browser when I wanted to close eXe. That causes a crash. You have to close the application by using the menu.

I was using a standard standardwhite style. That worked fine. Only a few flaws where some white space was added between the iDevices. I still don't know what happened and I couldn't correct it because in the source code I couldn't see.

Version 0.95
In this mayor update the possibilities seems to be significant improved. The simple thing I like the most is the possibility to embed images within text fields (wish I had that a few weeks earlier). Also the video and SCORM-quiz possibilities are available for the Mac OSX version. New is also the JAVA-applet iDevice.

Conclusions
A nice and easy to use application to create your own WBTs. It doesn't has the possibilities (yet) as some of the commercial applications like Lectora or AuthorWare but if gives you the opportunity to develop interesting e-Learning modules in a fast way. Especially if you are new to e-Learning development I would like to advice you to start with eXe. And if you are an experienced instructional designer: keep an eye on this project because during the 6 weeks I was using it, 2 updates were introduced. eXe is becoming a mature tool.

New interface, new learning?

2007-06-21T20:19:00.000+02:00

Microsoft is catching some attention by their new interface: Surface. Actually for me it was not such a revolutionary interface because I saw a presentation on TED with the same ideas.

Anyway, it could be a nice interface for learners as well. It looks quite easy to use, I think it will get high scores on usability tests!

But I also see the limitations. For pictures and stuff like that it looks great and it is easy to see the additional value. The same for drawings. But what if we want to use a learning environment? How can we do that? And how can text be entered? Can it work for video editing as well? And would it also be useable if the screen was not the size of a table?

Some critic is also shared by a guy who put a parody on YouTube:

If you want to see Jeff Dan on TED last year with a great (life) demo, please watch the video!

176 $ laptop will boost education world wide?

2007-06-08T18:33:00.000+02:00

'One laptop per child' is a non-profit organization founded by Nicholas Negroponte. They were planning to give the world an easy to use, 100$ laptop.

Their goal:

To provide children around the world with new opportunities to explore, experiment and express themselves. The further say that the laptop is a potent learning tool created expressly for the world's poorest children, living in its most remote environments.

The machine is using open source software (e.g. it is using elements of Red Hat's Fedora Core 6 version of the Linux operating system) and is promising a very user-friendly experience. The laptop creates its own mesh network out of the box. Each machine is a full-time wireless router. Children in the most remote regions of the globe—as well as their teachers and families—will be connected both to one another and to the Internet.

This week Negroponte was speaking at a Harvard University conference and he talked about the groups of children in Nigeria, Thailand and Uruguay who are using the laptop already. At the end of the year the plan is that 1.000.000 laptops are produced every month. The price has to reach the famous 100$ level in 2009 again.

Love this initiative and I hope this will bring a lot of joy and learning to kids all over the world.

Please visit the website or the wiki to see if you or your organization can support the project in any way.

See http://www.laptop.org/
or the wiki: http://wiki.laptop.org/

In the wiki you can also help the project by creating content!

Learning creators → LearnTube?

2007-05-29T21:39:00.000+02:00

One of the learners from the course e-Learning Fundamentals (the course we designed for the European Commission) was talking about the big IT hurdle: teachers still are lacking some IT skills that are needed to implement e-Learning.

Wow, I remember I was facing the same problems 10 years ago. How slow and frustrating this can be! In the meanwhile the learners don't even understand what we are talking about. What hurdle? One big example is the use of video. I love the way people are using video nowadays. When I was creating instructional video's (and CD-i) for the first time you needed a serious analog editing set. Very expensive. Now you just need a PC or Mac. Your build in cam is there, iMovie or Microsoft Movie Maker is there to assist you. Combine the editing possibilities with a platform like YouTube and you have a powerful learning tool.

People start creating videos, they are telling their stories. People like to learn each other something. People like to share their passion, their experience, their feelings. HOW GREAT!

See for example the next movie, one of my favourites. Watch how well this guy explained his story. What a didactical genius! Who wants to hire him as an instructional designer? Check his graphics!

Or look at these two people, they are showing us how to play guitar! People asked them to explain how to do it. Enjoy your free course.

Or learn how to Jump. If you like a different style of music:

For me what is amazing is that YouTube doesn't really has a category 'Education'. Or maybe that's why there are so many educational videos ;-) As long as we don't call it 'education' or 'learning' people are just doing it!

Now a site is filling that gap and offers a kind of educational interface for YouTube content: http://www.teachertube.com/ And don't forget to visit http://www.teachers.tv/

But one of the sites I love the most is VideoJug where you can learn how to unblock a toilet and many more things.

If you finding this boring and you want to add some spice to the learning process and you like nice ladies you should check out a silly site: http://www.frenchmaidtv.com/.

Learning is about emotion! And fun, and passion. It can be easy, rewarding and fun to create, and share, and learn. Maybe somebody can explain on VideoJug how to get over the IT hurdle? Or just forget about technical stuff and start focussing on didactical power?

The passion of Nick van Dam

2007-05-22T21:55:00.000+02:00

Nick van Dam is author of The e-Learning Fieldbook and the Global Chief Learning Officer of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu. It is an organization of member firms around the world. Member firms offer services in audit, tax, consulting and financial advisory. With access to the intellectual capital of approximately 150,000 people worldwide, member firms focus on client service through a global strategy executed locally in nearly 140 countries.

Nick @ Learning2005 talking about e-learning For Kids.

Nick was with the special guest at our (Stoas) e-Learning Round Table event. A recurrent event with CLOs and HR presidents of big international organizations and governmental organizations. It is a selected group of about 10 people. It was a privilege to join this group of visionaries.

Nick has a nice and sound story about development of talents and learning within big organizations. Beside this he is the founder of e-Learning For Kids, a non-profit foundation to support learning amongst youngsters.

One of the challenges of Deloitte is to attract new talent. As the say in their 2010 Talent Vision: "To be the first choice of the most coveted talent-the place where the best choose to be." Nick told us that new employees are really looking for personal learning and development possibilities. On the other hand: also Deloitte and their customers are looking for people with better competencies every year. A great employee is not necessary a great employee in 3 years. The world and the demands are rapidly changing.

For me the interesting part was that Deloitte is a very service based organization where human capital is all there is. In that case I think that a lot of other companies and institutions will feel the same urge as Deloitte to attract the talented people. In Europe we will face (and for some professions this is the case already) a shortcoming of talented people. So within Deloitte learning is a way to empower talent and to empower the business. Their solution is to create a very powerful learning atmosphere and environment. A very varied and blended one with formal and informal learning and all kind of didactical formats you can name. They team up with Harvard to give credentials and are not afraid to loose people after they finished the course. Their solution is fluid: Books24x7, podcast, vodcast, TC network, communities of practice, EPSS, intelligent knowledge management and more. Podcasting was considered as a very popular learning tool (I'm glad I just finished the course on pod/vodcasting). One more thing: in the US the ratio F2F & classroom = 50/50, in the Netherlands it is 20/80.

For me the thing I enjoyed the most was the true passion Nick was showing. He loves learning. And only then you can perform that way. Passion combined with knowledge, experience and vision is a very strong accelerator for a truly learning organization with (learning) professionals.

Great (and free) meeting tool!

2007-05-07T13:50:00.000+02:00

With Fe-ConE we have regular online meetings. We are from different countries so an online tool is great. We don't have to use a tool like LearnLinc or other environments with lots of functionalities.

Since one year we are using FlashMeeting. This is a simple and clean tool to have meetings, it is developed by the Open University in the UK and it available for free. FlashMeeting is an application based on the Adobe Flash 'plug in' and Flash Media Server. Running in a standard web browser window (not only IE but also FireFox and Opera + it runs without problems on the Mac), it allows a dispersed group of people to meet from anywhere in the world with an Internet connection. Typically a meeting is pre-booked by a registered user and a url, containing a unique password for the meeting, is returned by the FlashMeeting server. The 'booker' passes this on to the people they wish to participate, who simply click on the link to enter into the meeting at the arranged time.

The mean features:
- video and audio;
- visual overview of the participants;
- raising hands;
- chat;
- sharing url's (and open a webpage on other machines);
- sharing whiteboard;
- vote.

And as an extra you can even review your meeting because it it recorded. It has some great ways of visualizing the meeting.

The quality is good, you only have to be careful with the serverload. But you can check that when you plan the meeting. I'm also using Skype for meetings with a small group but I miss the video recording. Also on the Mac there are less functionalities compared with the PC-version of Skype. So if you have a need for online meetings, just try FlashMeeting and let me know your experiences.

Overview of participants

Voting functionality and emoticons

Managing files and whiteboarding

Overview of session, ready to replay

Pod/vodcasting course by Wim de Bie

2007-04-26T22:33:00.000+02:00

This week I had the privilege to join Wim de Bie for a workshop on pod/vodcasting. De Bie is working for the VPRO (a Dutch broadcast channel) and is well known for his great TV programs with Van Kooten. He was also the first professional weblogger in the Netherlands. On his blog ('his personal TV-channel') he is reflecting on personal things and all kind of things within the society with a great sense of humour. You can also see this in his pod- and vodcasts.

The interesting part for me was to hear about his way of working but also about his unique position within the VPRO. He has given carte blanche for his weblog. No restrictions, not to worry about the number of visitors (like his colleagues who are still in the TV business), he is picking his own subjects, no matter if they are popular amongst his visitors. He is driven by his passion, not by statistics.

I was there with my colleague Pierre to find out how to use pod- and vodcasting within educational settings. Although I love video and audio I'm still not sure about the value of pod/vodcasting for educational purposes. OK, I also listen to educational podcasts, especially when I'm travelling by plane or train I love to learn something via my iPod. I love 'EduKast' and also 'Stof'. But to make it successful you need to offer new casts on a very regular base with high quality. I believe more in pod/vodcasts created by learners. Just buy a couple of MacBooks and start creating learning content! This is the best way to learn. If you can explain a concept, you understand a concept!

A last remark came from the other trainer, Frithjof Kalf from the VPRO. He stated that maybe the technical way we are distributing video and audio though pod/vodcasts is temporal. How long will it take before we can use streaming audio and video at any moment at any place without downloading?

In two weeks we will have a second session and we are going to create pod/vodcasts with nice apps on the Mac like GarageBand, Audacity (open source, also for Windows and Linux) and Videocue. Will be continued....

Intercultural Learning!

2007-04-19T19:55:00.000+02:00

The last days we (Luuk and I) have spend in Rome with the Spanish/Italian/Dutch development team. Our task and mission is to create a feasible and powerful course on e-Learning Fundamentals for a varied group of learners. We are aiming at 250 learners, all over Europe.

The course will be build using the cultural model of Hofstede. With the course we are testing if the variables of Hofstede are also suitable when we are talking about e-Learning and a young, globalized population.

The development team

E.g. to explain it a bit: Hofstede is using Uncertainty avoidance as a differentiator for intercultural audience. People from a culture with a high score on uncertainty avoidance will prefer highly structured and leading learning content with a clear and straightforward language. People from cultures with a low uncertainty avoidance will prefer more explorative, open learning situations and content. An example of a country with low uncertainty avoidance is The Netherlands (score 51/100), a country with high uncertainty avoidance is Greece (score 95/100). We will create the course in such a varied way that the preferences will lead us to the conclusion if the Hofstede model is suitable for e-Learning and new generations as well.

The course will start on 21st of May and will have duration of 6 weeks. Every week will have a Teaser, a WBT, a learner generating content activity and a Reflection activity. We will use Moodle as the learning platform and eXe as the WBT creation tool.

If you are interested in participating in the course, just drop a mail or reaction.

Google Maps for learning!

2007-04-07T15:24:00.000+02:00

It was already possible to create your own Google Maps. But some programming skills were needed.

Not anymore. With the new Google Maps it is a piece of cake to create your own map. You can draw lines and shapes, you can add your own text, photo's and video's and you can publish your map to the web and share it with your friends.

Or with your learners?! Kids can bring their own neighbourhoods to life with pics and explanations. Let them give their own view and let them enrich the Google map in their own way. This could be a fascinating learning experience. Geography can be learned from a total different perspective. You can learn about different countries in a truly constructivistic way. And why not a project with kids in different countries? Let's exchange images and ideas.

WOW, wish for a moment that I was an elementary school teacher again!

Please check the English or Dutch website.

Web news readers have greater attention span

2007-04-01T23:06:00.000+02:00

The Poynter Institute (US based), did some research about reading online and offline and the study involved nearly 600 US readers. Two small cameras were mounted above the subject's right eye to monitor what they were reading. Some of the outcomes are contrary to the insights from other studies so far.

They only real surprising fact for me was that they found that online readers read 77 percent of what they chose to read while broadsheet newspaper readers read an average of 62 percent, and tabloid readers about 57 percent.

Some outcomes that match with the current understanding:

The study also found that people paid more attention to items written in a question and answer format or as lists, and preferred documentary news photographs to staged or studio pictures.

Quinn said a prototype test also found that people answered more questions about a news item correctly if the information had been presented in an alternative manner rather than traditional narrative. This could have been a question and answer format, a timeline, short sidebar or a list. "Subjects paid an average of 15 percent more attention to alternative story forms than to regular story text in print. In broadsheet, this figure rose to 30 percent," the study said.

This stress the fact that we have to focus on a different representation of information. In a more visual and triggering (and emotional?) way.

The report will come out in April. More info can be found at Reuters.

Philips 3D display: stunning simulations?

2007-03-25T21:45:00.000+02:00

Philips presented a new technology: a 3-dimension display. Of course you all know the 3D experience where you need the special glasses, e.g. with green/red glasses or green/violet. So why is this something new?

Well, you don't need any glasses to see the 3D environment with the 3D display. Without any extra things, you will see the images/video or any other multimedia.

Philips says: "3D is the next big thing since the introduction of color displays. 3D provides a richer, more exciting, more informative, and more entertaining end-user experience in various fields!"

I say: this can have a huge effect within learning situations. Think about easy to view 3D simulations. Content developers will have a powerful tool to enrich the learning experience and to make it more involving and memorable. Content can be created by several tools, one of the ones is 3D Studio Max.

We contacted Philips about this product and I'm very anxious to create some good e-Learning content. Hope to be back with you with some news about the educational possibilities and user experiences (content developers and learners).

New category of learning objectives needed!

2007-03-18T19:57:00.000+01:00

The categories of learning objectives are not complete. We (teachers, trainers, educational scientists) often are talking about the acquisition of:

knowledge;
skills;
values/attitudes.

Most of the time you can put all kind of learning objectives in one of the three categories. But for me it is not sufficient anymore.

I started to think about this when I was reading a great Dutch book 'Imagineering' about the leisure industry (see bol.com). It is explaining the shift from a services industry to an industry where memorable experiences are important. A famous example is Starbucks. You are not just buying a coffee, you are buying an experience. Companies like Disney and the Efteling are other strong examples. In the book Nijs & Peters are telling us that the American model has to be changed, it is not just about adding some theatre and a theme but it is about authentic experiences.

Is that not what learning should be: a memorable experience? Let's be honest: how many times are we succeeding as learning designers? Sometimes people forget about the course when they are leaving the classroom or closing the internet browser. We have to be more focussed. Let's create strong experiences, which are hitting people's hearts as well as their minds!!

Let's start with asking ourselves what kind of memorable experiences this course will create. Let's put in another category: experiences. Make it part of your learning objectives. In every course or other learning experience.

Mindmapping tools helps you learning

2007-03-10T13:41:00.000+01:00

An old but still very impressive method that can be used within learning situations is Mindmapping. It visually represents a semantic network or mental model. The technique can be used by learners e.g. to make notes during college and I'm also using it as a trainer when I'm want to have a fast and clear image of the prior knowledge of the learners. For the last matter I'm using it with the whole group together on a whiteboard or beamer.

I'm facilitating the process with electronic tools since 5 years. I started with good old MindManager. A very sophisticated piece of Mindmapping software. You can easily relocate branches and it can be exported as HTML files and also it can be used during presentations instead of PowerPoint. With the extended version of MindManager you can connect to Outlook, Word, PowerPoint and Project.

With the Mac I was using MindManager again. But the functionalities of the OS X version where much more limited compared to the Windows version I was using on my other laptop. Now I found a better solution and it is one of the many open source Mindmapping tools. It is called FreeMind and it works just fine. For Windows, OS X and Linux. You can do almost everything and it can export to almost every possible format. And…it also imports MindManager files.

If you want you can also use online Mindmapping tools. The great thing about that is the possibilities to work together with your colleagues or co-students on the same mindmap. A good online tool is Mindomo. So, if you never used one of the Mindmapping techniques and/or Mindmapping tools: give it a try.

You can find more on Mindmapping on wikipedia.

Open content!

2007-03-05T14:49:00.001+01:00

Open source is hot. You cannot start a conversation about e-Learning without the magic word. But what about Open content? It is definitely not really 'the new kid on the block'. In educational settings Open content could be the thing we are missing the most. There are to many learning environments without good and challenging content. Open content could be the break thru for e-Learning.

When we look for a definition Wikipedia tells us: "Open content, coined by analogy with "open source", describes any kind of creative work (including articles, pictures, audio, and video) or engineering work (i.e. open machine design) that is published in a format that explicitly allows the copying and the modifying of the information by anyone; not exclusively by a closed organization, firm or individual." Most of the time the Creative Commons licenses are used.

Under the Creative Commons license you can chose different options. MIT for example defines that you cannot modify the materials. MIT started the OpenCourseWare initiative in 2001 already. In 2007 MIT will offer all their 1800 courses online. Sometimes it is just a summary of a book or a PowerPoint presentation, sometimes it is multi media material. Another recent initiative is from the Open University in The Netherlands. They are offering extended online courses with some great quality. The number of courses are limited but growing every month. Visit their website and enjoy the courses.

Open content is not the same as free content. Free content can be closed in a way that it is not possible to modify it. But also free content can be interesting. MERLOT is probably the first repository for educational content (at least the one I know). It started in 1997 and contains more then 16,000 materials for higher education. But MERLOT owns the material. You can use it. There is some really good material and because of the peer reviews and ranking it is easy to get your hands on the right stuff.

Also on a national and local level, all kind of initiatives to share free (and sometimes open) content are started. Sometimes from universities, sometimes from branch organisations.

One of the most positive initiatives is the "e-Learning for Kids". This foundation from Nick van Dam wants to offer good quality e-Learning courses for kids, for free. There are various materials, from various developers with various quality.

So if you feel like learning or like creating and sharing; make Open content the best performing and nicest kid of the block! The best friend of learning people.

Game based learning seminar

2007-03-01T18:11:00.000+01:00

Stoas is organizing free seminars for quite a long time. During several years we had interesting sessions, mostly about developing e-Learning content. In about 3 hours we presented cases from customers (and by customers) and explained all kind of didactical models and methods and we discussed it with the participants. It is always a great opportunity to meet other professionals and discuss all aspects. Only in interaction you are changing and 'upgrading' your own mental model. Every time it is with a small group of people (20-25) and we are closing the sessions with an informal lunch. For the participants it is interesting to get some information and to meet other people to hear their experiences with e-Learning (especially during the breaks and lunch). They are always rating the event positively. And for us it is a great opportunity to hear what the wishes, dreams and concerns are from our (potential) customers.

Now we are starting with a seminar about game based learning. Many times the term GBL or serious gaming is misleading and is just an excuse to cover up a bad designed e-Learning product. That’s why we started this seminar, to evaluate this phenomenon and to talk with people about the positive and negative aspects. I will also talk about the ingredients of a good and usable educational game and how to implement it in your environment. From a critical, educational point of view. Other colleagues of mine are presenting research results about GBL.

If you are interested to join us on for this free event on Friday the 13th. Do you dare?

To subscribe please go to the website

Click To Play

Video impression of our GBL seminar.

Learning machines!

2007-02-21T19:57:00.000+01:00

Stanley Portier (http://stanleyportier.blogspot.com) talked about a book of Dr. Marcel Mirande. I bought it and it was a nice book to read in the plane on my way to the EU project meeting in Innsbruck.

This book (only available in Dutch, see the website) is a lean and mean book about the 'learning machines'. In about 60 pages Mirande shows and analyse the development of the integration of technology in the timeframe 1925 – 2005. Actually he starts with one of the oldest examples of the use of a technical innovation in educational situations: the use of learning materials by the Romans (200 AC).

Romans with their learning machines.

The first modern learning machine was the one designed by Pressey from the Ohio State University. He created a testing machine. A Questionmark Perception avant la lettre. The machine even was able to keep the scores of the multiple choice questions. The next example is the machine of Skinner. As we know this was a bit more successful. It was a machine with a kind of adaptive presentation of learning objects.

Pressey's machine (1926)

It goes on and on. The most interesting is the way people perceiving these technologies. Till now the most inventions became never a solid and accepted tool. The reason was not the technical problems or difficulties but rather the fear of teachers and schools for the assumed replacements of teachers by machines.

Mirande state that the tipping point is now reached. With the implementations of learning environments like BlackBoard for the first time of the history of learning machines, the penetration is a successful and serious one. You can discuss the effectiveness and the additional value of the use of the learning environments but at least there is a solid base of users. Both within the group of teachers as within the student population.

Now it is time that we (all the people involved in learning) start to optimize the use of learning tools. Because the quality is still not in the tools but in the learning process!

Intercultural learning

2007-02-15T23:06:00.000+01:00

On Sunday I'm flying to Innsbruck (Austria) to have a meeting with an international group of people from the Fe-ConE project. The participants (from Spain, Italy, Greece, Lithuania, Poland, Austria and the Netherlands) are coming together for two days.

Fe-ConE is a 2-year project funded by the European Commission about intercultural e-Learning. Actually, within the project we want to develop a model and decision making tool for the development of e-Learning courses. We are convinced that although e-Learning suppose to fit easily into a world wide audience, there are some significant differences between learners from different cultures. And what kind of didactical form is working for what population?

Within the project we are using the models of Hofstede. He defines culture as:

"The collective programming of the human mind, which distinguishes the members of one society or group from those of another."

Hofstede distinguishes cultures by the following aspects:

Power Distance [this dimension indicates the extent to which less powerful people in a society accept that power is distributed unequally].
Individualism [this dimension indicates the degree to which individuals are required to look after themselves and their direct family only].
Masculinity [this dimension indicates the degree to which achievement and success, in contrast to nurturing and family orientation, are important societal values].
Uncertainty Avoidance [this dimension indicates the extent to which people feel threatened by uncertain situations].
Long-term Pragmatic Perspective [this dimension indicates the extent to which society displays a pragmatic, future orientated perspective rather than a normative historic or short-term point of view].

Later on I will explain more about the implications on learning because all these aspects are influencing the way learners are working together, the way they react on a teacher, the way the are used to reflect on the learning process and so on. E.g. an American teacher will introduce himself with his first name (just call me Ed) while Japanese learners will find this very inappropriate and are used to a more formal way of communicating. This kind of differences can disturb the learning process or can even keep learners from learning.

Within the next months we will deliver a course on e-Learning content development and this course will be available for free (under creative common license) for everybody. Will be continued.

More info about the project see the website, for more info on Hofstede model see wikipedia or the Hofstede website.

Learning in Second Life?

2007-02-09T21:48:00.000+01:00

Today I thought my mind was following his own plan. Well, I visited the "Virtual Hallucinations Center" of UC Davis and University of Queensland in Second Life.

This is one of the many spots, which are build with an education reason. The center is created to let you experience the daily life of a schizophrenic patient. In this center you can walk through a building and find yourself in certain unpleasant and depressing situations. You start your 'trip' with choosing a male or female voice. During the experience some scary voices will pop up into your head. You will get some orders to kill yourself or pick up a gun. You will also experience what it will mean if you encounter visual distortions.

For me this is just a simple educational experience but it shows a little bit about the potential. It can give you an experience, which is otherwise difficult to obtain. For some visitors the experience can have an emotional impact but for me the experience was not that intense. The reason is that the quality of the graphics is from a 1985 level. And the user interface is keeping me from a total and overwhelming involvement. Too much attention is needed for navigation and interaction with the environment. For me it would be more valuable to have the same info from their website, with a nice video or a great animation.

It reminds me of the first days of streaming audio on the web: you were feeling that something special was happening but the quality (due to bandwidth limitations) was too bad to get the message straight. Now we can enjoy streaming audio to the full extent and we can focus on the content.

Your image in the mirror is dying and a voice is
telling you to kill yourself

The floor at first sight....

..and after a moment the floor changed into
water with stepping stones.

If you want to visit the center, just search for "UC Davis".

Informal Learning in 10 minutes

2007-01-28T17:34:00.001+01:00

One of the aspects of learning, which are proven to be important but are lacking attention is Informal learning.

Wikipedia defines Informal learning as:

Informal learning is to be understood as unorganized and not formally defined learning at home and at work. It is how you learned to speak. Some people say it is the basic "natural" self-learning of human beings, characterized as follows:

• It does not take place in special educational establishments standing out from normal life and professional practice;

• it has no curriculum and is not professionally organized but rather originates accidentally, sporadically, in association with certain occasions, from changing practical requirement situations;

• it is not planned pedagogically conscious, systematically according to subjects, test and qualification-oriented, but rather unconsciously incidental, holistically problem-related, and related to situation management and fitness for life;

• It is not unrealistic stockpile-learning, but is experienced directly in its "natural" function as a tool for living and survival.

Maybe it is not popular because the educational companies cannot make enough money out of it? And schools find it hard to discuss there own importance and role in the learning process? I'm not sure. Of course the kind of paradox is that you cannot really structure and organize informal learning because the pitfall is that it becomes formal learning when you institutionalize it. But I think it is worth thinking about ways to facilitate informal learning. Web 2.0 tools can play an important role in this process. To be honest: I'm learning more from podcasts, edublogs, reading books and conversations than with formal courses. What about you?

One of the people who are working in the field of informal learning is Jay Cross. I met him a few times and he can make his point clear. Watch his 10-minute video or visit his website on informal learning.

Media experience: learning is fun!

2007-01-22T19:32:00.000+01:00

Last Saturday my wife Laurence, my son Midas and I visited the Media Experience. It is a museum in Hilversum (NL) where you experience the world of TV and radio. More than 700,000 hours of television series, radio shows and movies are opened to the public. Not just in an ordinary way but they created a real interactive and involving experience.

You can create your login account from home. When you enter the building you need a ring with a chip. That ring holds your personal data like your name and date of birth. The last one is needed to offer you the right television shows. And at that moment I realized that this is a powerful concept. A conversation between people from the same age often turns into a talk about TV-series. “Do your remember XXX, what year was that exactly….”. Sharing memories is a strong way of connecting with people. Even at the museum people started to talk to each other about their shared memories. At a lot of places you had to touch a screen with your ring and automatically the TV-series of your time was showed.

It was not only about watching but also about creating new content. Every visitor was able to try to do a screen-test, to edit film and to set up the best light arrangements. You could even tag the favorite parts of multimedia your created during the experience and download them from the site when you are home again!

A couple of things came up into my mind:

it is all about experiences (you are only learning when something moves you);
story-telling is a strong memory buster;
images are very strongly related to emotions;
interactivity is something natural;
creating content is great (and sharing also);
learning without realizing you are learning is easy.

Interested: visit the Dutch website or the limited English website.

Great open source e-Learning authoring tool: eXe

2007-01-12T18:53:00.000+01:00

Since a few weeks I have a nice app on my computer: eXe. A great and simple tool to create e-Learning content. eXe stands for e-Learning XHTML Editor.

It's available for Windows, Mac OSX and Linux and it ships with some solid documentation. The downloading and installation of the tool is just a matter of some clicks. No technical expertise is needed. This is also the case for the authoring process.

It is available in several languages (over 20!) and it is using the tool Reload. It combines a simple and clear user interface with the basic needed functionalities to create a webbased training. As an author you can use 20 different templates for your pages. Navigation buttons are created automatically and you can select the skin you want. Examples of templates with technical/didactical interactions are:

- case study;
- objectives;
- multiple-choice question;
- RSS;
- reflection;
- Wikipedia article;
- activity;
- image with text.

These templates (called 'iDevices'....maybe Apple is behind this ;-)) can also be created by authors, without any technical knowledge.

It exports to some nice packages like SCORM 1.2, IMS content package, website, single webpage and a text file.

For instructional designers who want to create technically basic but didactical powerful e-Learning this can be a useful tool. Of course because you are using templates you will possible face some restrictions when you compare it to the freedom you have with tools like Lectora and Authorware but it will speed up the development process like crazy. When you combine this with the possibilities of a learning environment like Moodle you will have educational gold in your hands!

Check the Dutch site for downloads or the English site.

Some screenshots:

Authoring environment

Authoring environment

Published WBT

Published WBT

Happy & powerful new year!

2007-01-02T14:48:00.000+01:00

Dear co-learners,

I would like to wish you a great 2007 with a lot of powerful learning experiences.

This holidays I got my new MacBook and it was fun learning how to use this machine. It was such a nice experience that even my wife looked over my shoulder and when she saw how easy it worked and how much fun functionalities there were available, she starts playing and her conclusion was:

"I also want a MacBook!"

E-learning from the start?

2006-12-27T19:34:00.000+01:00

When my wife was pregnant I was looking for all kind of kids-stuff. And because I'm working as an e-Learning consultant I was looking for e-Learning products for kids as well.

And I found a DVD serie called "Baby Einstein". I got some dark thoughts about young children in Japan who had a pre-kinder garten course and remedial teaching at the age of 5 to get better than the neighbour kid.

On the other hand why not? Growing up is learning. Every day, every moment. But there is a thin line between natural, informal learning and structured formal learning. When do you cross the line?

Now my kid is 3.5 moths old and he is learning like crazy! And yes, I bought Baby Einstein. But only showed it to my wife so far.

Check out some previews of the Baby Einstein 'courses'.

Your own educational Second Life?

2006-12-23T17:24:00.000+01:00

Active worlds is an online environment where you can walk around like in Second Life. The company is positioning themselves as an educational solution as well.

They say:

"The 3D classroom -
Students no longer have to be physically sitting in front of you to learn. Instead, you can create a 3D classroom in which students are present in the form of an avatar (virtual body). Once everyone’s online, you can teach them using chat (typed or VOIP), audio and visual aids including pictures and streaming video. Just like in a real classroom, your students can see and hear what everyone else is saying. But unlike a real classroom, our 3D Web Worlds can be instantly entered by students living all over the world. Once your students have downloaded the browser, they can open it in just one click from the icon on their desktop. Virtual classrooms are the learning tool of the future. What could you achieve in yours?"

You can have a private or public world. Just tried a demo. You can use an integrated webbrowser and links from within the world can be viewed in one half of the spilt screen. Works OK. The performance was not that good. Walking around means that I had to download the whole time and my graphic card of my laptop hold me from enlarging the window.

The costs are OK if you start, a piece of land is 80 euro a year, if you want to upload your own items (like video) it cost an extra 120 euro per year. For 5 extra users you pay 50 euro a year. Don't know if these are named users otherwise it is quite an expensive class if you have to pay for every learner.

I'm having serious doubts if this kind of virtual worlds are as useful as the classical 2-d virtual classrooms like LearnLinc or open source ones. And why would you like to use this Active Worlds environment instead Second Life?

More info at their website.

Wii-learning?

2006-12-19T23:14:00.000+01:00

After the battle of the game consoles has started I was wondering if the Wii from Nintendo has some promising potential for learning. With the controller you have to use your whole body/arms.

When we look at different ways we are remembering things, one of the memory types is the physical (bodily-kinesthetic) learning style (see also wikipedia about Kinesthetic learning). You use your body and sense of touch to learn about the world around you.

Would it be possible to use the Wii for more than just gaming? Maybe it would be possible to design some gamebased learning with the Wii? Can it be used e.g. for a course where you have to learn how to use certain physical machine. Or to extinguish a fire. Or....

Why not....put some extra flavour. Also a simulation used by pilots to learn how to fly is using this bodily-kinesthetic learning style to create contextualized, powerful learning.

Update: today Opera and Nintendo announced a webbrowser for the Wii. Download the browser from the site.

Kid using the Wii in a boxing game...what a joy!

Book PricewaterhouseCoopers

2006-12-16T13:54:00.000+01:00

PwC released a report about the ways entertainment and media are going to be developed in The Netherlands. It is a research report which presents annual historical data for the 2001-2005 period and provides annual forcast for 2006-2010. It has a lot of numbers and some in-depth interviews as well. It shows us the trends of the use of things like tv, filmed entertainment, radio advertising, book publishing and video games.

Do you know for example that the Netherlands has the highest internet and broadband penetration in Western Europe (77.8% household internet penetration/54.9% broadband penetration).

In the section about educational books it also give some relevant insights. PwC expects that the spending of educational books will expand at a 1.8% compound annual rate, rising to 378 million euro in 2010.

What happened to electronic books? What happened with the complaints about youngsters with too heavy backpacks full with books (their poor backs!)?

PwC don not anticipate e-books to play a significant role in the consumer market. Only a 2.6% of the print sales in 2010. Also an interview with Joachim Driessen from Malmberg (one of the important educational publishers) shows that e-Learning is only one of the channels and methods. He stated that school want to have both traditional and digital resources. He estimates that it will take about 5 years before some of the printed resources become redundant.

Pfff....the future is arriving at a slow pace... ;-)

To get (download or send for free with snailmail) you can visit the website of PwC. The Trends report is in English.

Game event with presentations

2006-12-09T22:15:00.000+01:00

Yesterday and today (and don't forget the nights!) there were different kind of activities around Gaming.

I skipped the LAN-party but joined some presentations to see if they were coming up with some valuable insights about gaming which can be used within game based learning situations.

Yesterday I saw a presentation about the history and future of gaming by Wouter Baars. Interesting but not that new to me. He is a technical guy and didn't have a lot of presentation skills.

Today I went to listen to Jeroen Jansz. A very interesting researcher from the University of Amsterdam. He is doing research about gaming for 3 years now and with a involving way of presenting he gave us some clear insights. He is proving what Steven Johnson is telling everybody: that gaming is not such a bad activity and can be very benificial. Keep an eye on his research...it is impressive!

For the Dutch readers: he also wrote the chapter about videogames in the excellent book from the SCP: Jaarboek ICT en samenleving, de digitale generatie (zie ook www.uitgeverijboom.nl).

Welcome!

2006-12-08T08:51:00.000+01:00

Glad you found your way! With this blog I'm gonna reflect on new experiences, research, news about new ways of learning.

PowerLearning is the word I'm using to create powerful learning experiences with using the best available insights in the world of learning. Cutting edge instructional design, best of breed techniques and a lot of fun! Learning has to move you.

Marcel