Bummed I missed the first part of this live.

Learning Through Social Media

Friday was the last day of the conference. Marcia Conner (who I am interning for at Pistachio Consulting this semester) had asked if I wanted to participate on a panel about learning through social media, and this is actually why I came to the conference. Besides Marcia and myself, Koreen Olbrish and Mark Oehlert were on the panel.

To start off the session, Marcia spoke a bit about what social media is, and what social learning is. Then we broke the room into four sections, since there are four of us, and got everyone to talk about what they do now to facilitate learning with social media. We sat at the tables with everyone and answered questions and tried to act as mentors.

That session went really fast.

New Skills for Instructional Designers

I tried a couple of other sessions before I came back to this session. I forgot that Ellen Wagner had promised to do a Pecha Kucha, and I walked in on the very end of it. I am very sad about that.

Ellen, Cammy Bean, and Koreen Olbrish presented on the skills instructional designers need today. I didn’t take notes (I was actually multi-tasking – listening and doing work email). They talked about how these days instructional designers need to understand educational design, technical design, and business design.

This really reinforced how lucky I’ve been in my career in education. I started as a trainer, and then became a instructional developer, at a company that also expected me to be a technical SME. The systems approach at FSU gave me the education to start looking at things from a higher business level, and my new position has started to give me the practical experience I was looking for in that area.

Keynote

The Keynote was “365 Days From Now: Preparing for the Change Ahead” was given by Leonard Brody (no website or blog? Seriously??).

I did not like this keynote address at all. It was all I could do to hold myself back from standing up and calling BS. In fact, I think this session deserves its own post.

This is my response to last week’s #lrnchat. I was inspired to write it after watching an internal (EMC) discussion about training.

Anyone can perform the ID function

You heard me correctly. ANYONE.

I have to say I was so disappointed in last week’s #lrnchat when everyone kept dissing SMEs.

For my readers who are not education folks, ID means Instructional Designer. In pure Instructional Design, the ID would follow the Instructional Design process to Analyze needs, Design the learning strategy to meet those needs,  Develop the proposed learning strategy, Implement this strategy, and then Evaluate the effect of the learning that was delivered.

That’s right, I said ADDIE.

An SME is a Subject Matter expert who is interviewed (usually in the “develop” stage) in order to get the technical details needed for the instruction.

If you had been a fly on the wall at #lrnchat last week, you may have been surprised to know that typical IDs really do not respect SMEs. They think that SMEs could never understand the complicated science of designing learning.

I have a problem with that attitude. First of all, I am a technical SME, and I am an ID. Second of all, do IDs really think that people who build, implement and manage things like email servers, data center management applications, san management applications, storage arrays, etc are not intelligent enough to learn the science of designing instruction?

Give me a break!!

You can teach people how to design instruction way faster than you can teach them to get around a UNIX operating system or how to get around the insides of a CLARiiON! I have news for you, at least in the technical arena, we don’t need dedicated IDs. Technology moves too fast to be burdened with that extra process. Teach the techies basic principles of instructional design, have some folks with ID background running inteference to get learning assets into the LMS, and then get the heck out of the way!

Should just anyone perform the ID function?

OK, all you geeks who think writing training is easy, now its your turn.

You don’t want to wait for the official training to come out. Heck, you have these cool open source tools that let you create slidecasts that you can post to youtube or slideshare. Maybe you are THE authority at your company on a certain technology and you honestly believe that you will be helping the company by producing your own training.

ID is not that easy. ID should be aligned to the business, so that training reflects that key messages that the marketing, product management, and support teams want to convey. ID should create a learnscape that is easy to navigate, and easy to repeat for each individual learner. That takes time. My degree – Instructional Systems – is an MS (Master of Science) degree for a reason.

There is more to corporate education than recording a knowledge dump and sticking it on YouTube. You have to take all your technical skills to know the product intimately, and then think about how people will use the technology. How “should” people use the tech? Does this change if you are talking to people in different job roles? What is supported and what is not supported? How will this training alignvto their job and more importantly to the overall business?

Do you really have time for that? Aren’t you supposed to be selling, or coding, or something else?

Do you really want to deal with people when they argue with an acronym you used? Or with your spelling and grammar?

No, you don’t. Leave that to us, the folks who think about all these things as we design a course. Let us navigate the instructional design process, but for goodness sake pick up the phone when we need a set of eyes to review what we have created!

Moral of the story

We cannot move to Learning 2.0 (or whatever you want to call it) if there is such disdain for SMEs. Maybe we don’t need the ID function. Maybe we need to teach SMEs to be the IDs. That is what we’ve done at EMC.

July’s big question is very timely for me! Here is the question:

In a Learning 2.0 world, where learning and performance solutions take on a wider variety of forms and where churn happens at a much more rapid pace, what new skills and knowledge are required for learning professionals?

This week my Web 2.0 Learning and Performance started. I’m keeping a blog for the course, as are most other people. Someone is already asking about what are the most important things to know as educators about Web 2.0.

The Technology

I think there are some basic technology tools that need to be mastered. These include:

• Simple HTML: for example creating hyperlinks
• Screencasting software: You should be able to create a screencast (using something like Camtasia) and post it to the web
• Feed aggregation: You should be able to harness information into one feed. Lots of very simple tools exist for this now. I use newsgator as an RSS aggregator, but even tools like FriendFeed can help pull different feeds into one stream

Learning to Surf

You have to be able to surf the web. By this I mean, you need to be able to ride the waves of information that may be connected to a learning topic without getting swamped and pulled under by the sheer volume of information.

You also have to be able to show learners how to surf as well. Teaching someone to surf is not easy at all. OK, let me be truthful I’ve only taught people to body surf, but that is still hard. You can’t get inside their body to make them understand how to hold themselves so that they jump at the right time to catch the wave. All you can do is model your technique for surfing, they have to adopt their own style.

Its the same when you teach someone to web surf. You can show someone how you do it. You can show them the end goal, but they have position themselves so that they are comfortable with the wave of information.

Don’t forget about ID

I think ID is very important in the case of Learning 2.0. There is so much information to be consumed that there has to be some design involved to ensure that learners don’t become so overwhelmed that they aren’t able to master tasks.

All of the rules of doing analysis of what the end results should be are still very important, as is doing formative and summative evaluations during learning events to be sure that learners are at least moving towards catching a wave.

I’ve posted before about the Dick & Carey method of instructional design – while I was taking a class based on the Dick & Carey method. This method of instructional design is very popular because it represents a systems method of designing instruction. Click on the image below to see a diagram of how this method works:

But what does a systems method of designing instruction actually mean?

The definition of system is:

A group of interacting, interrelated, or interdependent elements forming a complex whole.

from thefreedictionary.com

What are these “interacting, interdependent elements” that may affect the development of instruction? Here’s a list from The Systematic Design of Instruction (Dick, Carey & Carey) along with my comments based on my experience in the world of designing technical instruction:

Individual Components of the System

• The instructor: What sort of training do they have? How much experience do they have with the product? How about the protocols, or the environment in which the product will be used?
• The learners: What sort of training do they have? What sort of information do they need about the product – will they be selling it? Will they be installing and configuring it? Will they be answering support calls from customers about it? Are they the customer? Or will the learners be a combination of all of these groups? Are they being forced to come to training, even if they think they don’t need it? Will they still have to answer customer calls and emails even if they are slated for training?
• Materials: What materials will be created for instruction? I develop training for software products that have some sort of revision every three months. Do we update our materials for each update of each product? What if a critical update is sent out for a product two weeks after we finish the materials?
• Instructional Activities: What instructional activities are needed? With software training, most of these activities are hands-on practice in labs built with the product being taught. But what should the activities be? How detailed should the lab instructions be?
• Delivery System: How should the instruction be delivered? Instructor led? Asynchronous eLearning? Synchronous eLearning? M-Learning?
• Learning Environment: In what kind of environment will the students be consuming the training?
• Performance Environment: In what kind of environment will the students be performing the activities that are taught during the training event?
• What have I forgotten?

Changing one component will impact the whole system

Each of these individual components work together with the other components. This means that if you change one thing midstream (lets say you make the decision to move from Instructor-led to eLearning, changing the delivery system), this will mostly impact other components of the overall system (the instructors, the learning environment, the materials, the learners all will most likely be impacted by the move from an Instructor-led to an eLearning delivery system).

And what happens if there is a component of the system that you haven’t even identified?

The systems way of thinking and performance

The systems way of thinking about instruction has been attributed to Larry Israelite (see Elliot Masie‘s Learning Rants, Raves, and Reflections 2004, review here). This way of designing instruction helps find performance problems so that the appropriate instruction can be designed. It provides a framework for systematically looking at a performance problem, and designing instruction so that the performance gap can be closed.

One reason it is important to apply a systems approach to instructional design is that one of the goals of instructional design is to  close human performance gaps. According to another one of my books, Mastering the Instructional Design Process (Rothwell & Kazanas) some of the things to consider when trying to lose those gaps are:

• Individual Performance: Does an individual worker have the right skills? Do they want to perform well? Do they have the tools to perform well? Do they have the ability to perform well?
• Work Group Performance: Can people work as a group? Is there a clear leader (that people are willing to follow?) Do individuals understand their roles? How do group members feel about the methods prescribed by the leaders to achieve group goals?
• Organizational Performance: Does the organization anticipate change? Does the org react well to change? Is there a culture of sharing in the organization? Is work being done in the most up-to-date fashion for the organization’s field?

If the real goal of “training” is to close performance gaps and enable a state of readiness in an organization, then it becomes pretty clear you have to think about a little bit more than creating power points, designing a lab, scheduling a classroom and sending invitations to students. A systems approach of designing instruction must be applied so that the effect on each individual component as well as factors affecting human performance are considered.

I have to start by saying this: It’s hard for me to be in an eLearning course because of my technical skills. I realize that most people in my major have not created websites, administered servers and networks, etc. So I’m glad that my major has courses to get people who will be designing eLearning up to speed technically. But reading about “the wonder of TCP/IP” is so boring for me. There is no good way for me to skip those classes, since the Instructional Design part for eLearning is built into the class.

OK, enough whining, onto my review of this week’s materials.

This class so far has had lots of reading: two textbooks and links about Instructional Design. There are also podcasts of the Instructor explaining the readings. The one thing I am missing is the ability to interact with my classmates on a discussion board, via blogs, twitter SOMETHING. (darn you CCK08!!)

This week we started reading Advanced Web-Based Training Strategies: Unlocking Instructionally Sound Online Learning by Margaret Driscoll and Saul Carliner.

My instructor doesn’t think that a constructivist learning environment can be implemented; she is a behaviorist. This is probably why I am a little frustrated with the way the course has been designed: I am definitely a constructivist. I need to interact with others to pour over ideas I have read (or heard on a podcast) to try and make sense of them. I wonder what she would think about trying a connectivist approach!

This book is very interesting, it seems to me that the pragmatic approach the authors discuss is really a way of saying business needs are the most important part of instructional design. The first chapter is dismissive of the ideas of learning theory, instructional design, and educational research.

One thing I disagree with from a corporate perspective is the idea that a person’s philosophy on education will affect the way they design education. Really, the organization’s philosophy on education will dictate how an individual designs education. It is possible for your philosophy to differ from that of your organization.

Also I don’t think adult learners, especially the highly technical learners that we teach, expect to have instruction spoon-fed to them. In a technical training environment, you may have a learner who knows more about a subject than everyone else in the class. That person may just need a tech refresh (feature/functionality info), hands on training, or positioning information. They may need to know how a new product fits into an existing information management system. I can’t even imaging trying to spoon-feed information to some of our folks in the field, or even our customers for that matter.

I’ll spend time thinking about this, but what does a constructivist learning environment look like? What would a constructivist eLearning environment look like? How about learning and eLearning environments for the other types of learning theories?

From this BoingBoing post, which was written by Clay Shirky, introduced me to a new term. Tesla, or “time elapsed since labs attended” refers to testing software applications. Clay gives this definition for tesla:

a measure of how long it’s been since a company’s decision-makers (not help desk) last saw a real user dealing with their product or service

The goal behind having a low tesla number is getting near real-time data on what users are having problems with, with the goal of real-time continual improvement of the product.

So can this be applied to education? Going back to this semester’s study of the Dick and Carey Instructional method, we’re supposed to be collecting this sort of learner feedback at different points of development. One of the biggest criticisms is the time that it takes to collect this feedback, and actually lack of time is why some of the feedback is not collected.

As instructional designers, if we have a course that is out of the design process and into a state of “production”, should we be concerned with that Tesla number? Or is this too much of a reach?

This semester I am taking a class called “Introduction to Instructional Design”. We are stepping through Dick, Carey & Carey’s textbook The Systematic Design of Instruction. The book examines the Dick and Carey model of instruction in detail. Here’s a diagram of that model (click the picture to see a larger version):

As with all models of instruction, the diagram shouldn’t be interpreted as a lock-step process. It is pretty fluid, you can go back and forth between steps as needed. The main points I take from the model is that you do constant analysis to ensure the instruction you develop is going to satisfy the instructional goal.

My degree program teaches instructional systems to people working in every sector: K-12 professionals, higher ed professionals, military folks and corporate professionals. Most of the corporate professionals develop training usually associated with HR, there aren’t many of us who do technical training. So while it’s good to have a map to ensure the effort and expense put develop training isn’t wasted, I have to wonder if this model is agile enough for a fast-moving technical education organization.

There are other instructional models that were developed specifically for technical instruction. Maybe I’ll write a post on that another day, it would be interesting to see if one has been developed to specifically fit in with Agile sprints and scrums.

We actually follow many of the steps in this model. One thing I (as a courseware developer) think we are missing is the learner and context evaluation. We use program managers to get that information to us from the managers of the students. Those managers deliver what they think the students should be able to do after consuming training, which is very important. It helps us set the correct performance objectives. But I have never been seen any learner or context analysis.

I can write courseware all day long, but if the students are starting from a different place than I thought they were, or if they can never get to training because they are too busy, does it matter how well the instruction is missing?

The biggest concern I have about the Dick & Carey model in a fast-moving technical area is that it takes alot of time to do the Analysis. The way we are learning this model, you have to be in the same room with learners to do the analysis and formative or summative evaluations. That would never fly with us, people at our company are just too busy. Not only that, but traveling all over the place do the analysis is too expensive. Besides, by the time we got back and compiled all the data, there would be a new version of software and we’d have to start all over again.

Why couldn’t I form a small community to pull all these steps together? The analysis would be there for all the stakeholders. The students could pop in and participate in guided discussions so that I have a real analysis of what it will take to get them to where their managers want them to be. We could pilot the materials in the community and get real-time feedback.

I think I know the drawbacks: people are still too busy to participate. People don’t trust online communities. Do we really need this extra step.

What do you all think? Does the Dick & Carey model move to slowly to be relevant for a fast-moving technical organization? Could it be modified and modeled in an online community? Do we really need to do so much analysis?

My son, who is a sophomore at Bridgewater State College, texted me Friday. He was fuming about an incident in his Intro to Communications class. The teacher has a strict attendance policy: if you miss more than two classes you have 20% deducted from your final grade. My son attends class once a week for three hours (on a Friday, no less). He makes sure he is there.

On Friday, he had his laptop open to take notes. It should be noted at Bridgewater the students are required to purchase a laptop. The professor told Kenny he would be marked as absent for using the laptop to send an email during class.

I’m not sure how this will end. Kenny has an appointment to speak with the Dean of the Communications School. As a parent, I am annoyed that he can be in a Communications course that is being taught by someone who doesn’t know how to use the tools required of the students to teach about communication. As a mother, I am annoyed that Kenny couldn’t just wait till after class to send the email. As an educator, I am dumbstruck that a professor of communications believes this extreme use of control over 19 and 20 year-olds in a 3-hour Friday class is the best way to transfer knowledge. (Surely she understands filters, barriers, etc?)

Those of us who understand the connected nature of the Internet know that it’s possible to pay attention to a lecture and send an email or even IM at the same time. (For the record, Kenny swears he was not IMing, he just had to send an email for his duties as the Student Government Secretary). If this professor was smart, she’d foster the use of a backchannel during her lectures, especially during these marathon Friday sessions. Let the students discuss what you are talking about, be part of the discussion so you can see where you need to adjust your methods.

I can’t do much but encourage my son to use the channels available to him. It’s a real life lesson: sometimes you have bosses that are just like this controlling professor. At least it’s only for one semester. It hardly seems fair that he was actually in class, paying attention and taking notes for three hours, and all that is negated and he doesn’t get credit for it because his duties outside of class required him to send one email.

Here are some questions for all of you:

How would you counsel Kenny to deal with this situation? What should he say to the Dean? How should he act in that professor’s class?

How would react as a parent if you were required to purchase a laptop for your child to attend a state school, just to have teachers discourage them from using the laptops? How would you react if someone was teaching your child the basics of communication theory but they had no insight into the communication methods used by new media? (I have to say for me, this professor’s credibility is definitively suspect.

For my CCK08 friends, how does my son’s situation illustrate the topic of control?

For any of Kenny’s friends who may get here, have you experienced anything similar from this professor?

I am going through one of the CCK08 readings for this week, “Cloudworks: social networking for learning design”. (I would reference the author but I can’t find one on the given materials – only clue is the document title conole_ascilite). The paper provided a quote from Engestrom that really struck me:

The term ‘social networking’ makes little sense if we leave out the objects that mediate the ties between people. Think about the object as the reason why people affiliate with each specific other and not just anyone… The fallacy is to think that social networks are just made up of people. They’re not; social networks consist of people who are connected by a shared object.

I love the idea that social networks require a shared object, in other words they need a theme . If you are building something electronic to facilitate a social network, what is it that binds the social network together?

I am working on a new project at work (I’ll be able to talk about it soon!), but there was some difficulty with the project precisely because of this issue. Why would people want to come? Why would they participate? During a brainstorming session yesterday, this “shared object” of the network was surfaced, and I think the “how” to get people to come and participate became much clearer.

The Cloudworks paper discusses this term social objects. It references the following authors when searching for a definition of social object:

• Weller who said a social object is “something (it can be real or virtual) that facilitate conversation, and thus social interaction”
• Demsey, who said “The linking theme is that people connect and share themselves through ‘social objects’, pictures, books, or other shared interests, and that successful social networks are those which form around such social objects.“
• McLeod, who said “The interesting thing about the Social Object is the not the object itself, but the conversations that happen around them“.
• Fraser who defines profiles as social objects: Profiles ARE social objects. They’re not a real person – they’re a constructed representation around which interaction takes place – a specific kind of social object. They are artefacts which connect and make visible networks.