Group items tagged

Blog post at P2PU, 2.13.13, that references MIT Media Lab's indicators for measuring success--might they apply to WLStudio? See excerpt below. "Finding the Right Metrics It can be easier to think about success in terms of indicators. High-level indicators are essentially aggregates of measurements that give you a quick indication of whether or not the organization is on target with its goals and will allow us to map all projects and initiatives to the objectives - bearing in mind that most projects don't fit nicely into a single goal or objective, but it's helpful to know how each project is contributing to the overall goals of the organisation. MIT Media Lab uses three indicators when they measure success: Uniqueness - have we done something new that helps the field? Impact - Have we reached people? Magic - Did we create epiphanies and enable serendipity? "

Excellent slidedoc on why slidedocs are important by Nancy Duarte. Really like the distinctions made on slide 15 between presentations and conversations in two columns. Use presentations when you need to communicate an already-formed idea; already have information about the audience's wants and needs; need to inform, persuade, or entertain an audience; does not require real-time feedback from the audience; or need a single event to move an audience toward your objective. Use conversation when you need to build upon, get consensus on, or more fully develop an idea; need more information about the group's wants and ideas; need to build a personal relationship with the audience; need the group's input in order to move forward; need continuous engagement to accomplish your objective. I believe that we are much more about conversation at the Studio.

Reflection blog post by Nancy White on 1.9.13 on her Project Community course that she co-taught at the Hague. Offers many insights including this jewel below on what the learning design must bring together: "The other aspect of the design was to bring three elements together: sense making discussions about the subject matter (synchronously in class and asynchronously on the class website), insights from weekly "guests" shared via 5-10 minute videos (to bring a variety of voices), and action learning through small group experiences and team projects. I know there are strong feelings about team projects, but building collaboration skills was part of the course learning objectives, so this was a "must do." And we spent time talking about the how - -and reflecting on what was and wasn't working as a vector for learning these skills."

Blog post by Jeff Cobb, February 2011, Tagoras site, on adults' self-concept of being responsible for their own decisions and how this is as odds with their frequent relapse into their K-12 expectations/habits/behaviors in adult learning situations. Explanation of Malcolm Knowles's concepts of the Adult Learner: 1. Adults need to know why they need to learn. 2. Adults have a self-concept of being responsible for their own decisions - they have a psychological need to be seen by others as capable of self-direction. 3. Experience is often the best foundation for adult learning activities - often the "richest resources for learning reside in the adult learners themselves." [66] 4. Adults tend to be most interested in learning that has immediate relevance to their jobs or personal lives. 5. Adult learners tend to be life-centered (or task-centered, or problem-centered) rather than subject or content-centered. 6. Adults are typically more responsive to internal motivators (job satisfaction, self esteem, quality of life, etc.) than external motivators (promotions, higher salaries, etc.). Excerpt on how online learning environments are not always recognized as such and how facilitation of learning networks is critical: "Finally - something I have been arguing in one way or another for years - the problematic side of "self-concept" pretty much flies out the window if you remove the obvious, traditional labels like "seminar" or "Webinar." This is a key reason why social networks are so powerful as learning environments - people tend not to consciously acknowledge them as such even though learning is typically the key social object in any professional community that survives and thrives over time. Educators must recognize this and learn to facilitate learning within networks if they want to truly lead learning in their fields and industries."

Nellie Deutsch is a wonderful educator using the WizIQ platform for helping people learn all kinds of things. This one is focused on the virtual classroom and has a list of learning objectives that might be adapted for our beta test work group as what they will learn while they are helping us with the website/program development issues.

An article for BBC by Maggie Jackson, September 2009, about our inability to pay attention in an age driven by speed through technology "Still, I'm worried. These digital age wonders will be squandered if we can't think critically, research well, and evaluate the data-floods we now have at our fingertips - and these are precisely the skills alarmingly lacking among both digital natives and older generations. Half of college students can't judge the objectivity of a website. Workers now switch tasks every three minutes, half the time interrupting themselves. As David Nicholas points out, we spend our time online 'power-bouncing' from info-snippet to data-point. And this propensity to rely on point-and-click, first-up-on-Google answers, along with our growing unwillingness to wrestle uncomfortably with nuances or uncertainties, keeps us stuck on the surface of the 'information' age. We're too often sacrificing depth for breadth in the ways we make sense of the world. Yes, we've always had 'power bouncing' and distraction. And surfing or multitasking may have an important place in 21st-century society as strategies of learning. But going forward, we need to do much more than hopscotch across the web, split-focused and pulled this way and that by choice distractions. We cannot mistake fragmented, diffused attention as avenues of higher thought. Instead, we need to do better at cultivating - perhaps resuscitating? - deep focus, keen awareness and meta-cognitive 'executive' attention - the skills crucial to creativity and problem-solving. "

blog by Maggie Jackson, on Forbes 100 list of websites for women. Written June 6, 2012. "Encore careers drive to the heart of who we are, and who we want to be. We can't google the answers to such dilemmas. Earlier in the day, I'd attended a rehearsal at the Yale School of Drama for Waiting for Godot. Asked how she prepared for a role, one student said: 'I look for the character's super-objective. What is the essence of what this character seeks?' I shared her words with my classmates, because in an age of career fluidity, we are always shaping and reshaping our life roles. Today, 31 million workers ages 44 to 70 want an 'encore' career that combines income, impact and meaning, according to the think-tank Civic Ventures. On average, they will take 18 months - and a likely pay cut - to make the change. Twelve million in this age group are interested in starting a non-profit or social venture. In this time of invention and insecurity, we need to take the time to think about our next steps. We need to have patience with ourselves."

A PDF presenting the mission and strategic plan for Association for Women in Science 2011-2014. Well done in design and content. Look at these goals and objectives: Increase awareness of issues that impede and endanger American competitiveness by limiting progress in STEM careers Promulgate results of important national studies on gender inequity in learning environments and workplaces Work with federal and local agencies to show how gender equity aligns with their goals for workforce development Actively seek out opportunities for positive coverage in the media of AWIS activities and positions Highlight ways to restructure STEM environments to foster diversity and inclusion to advance national competitiveness Focus on career transitions and special needs of women of color and other underrepresented groups Actively propose and support federal legislation and initiatives which are consistent with AWIS policies and position statements such as, but not limited to: 1. Economic equity; 2. Flexible work options; 3. Parental leave; 4. Improvement of post-doc employment status; and 5. Title IX compliance. Develop mechanisms to engage individuals and chapters in advocacy Identify opportunities for innovation and systemic change across multiple work sectors Promote best practice models for employers and educators by gathering and highlighting examples from different disciplines, work sectors, and industries Highlight the central role of professional societies in advancing women's careers Expand our voice through strategic alliances and partnerships

POST (people, objectives, strategies, and tactics) method for using social media effectively, 3.27.13 by John Haydon at the Razoo Foundation. Has some merit.

Web site for Digital Competence: European-wide validation for all levels of learning "Objective:  Identify the key components of Digital Competence (DC) in terms of the knowledge, skills and attitudes needed to be digitally competent; Develop a DC framework/guidelines that can be validated at European level, taking into account relevant frameworks currently available; Propose a roadmap for the possible use and revision of a DC framework for all levels of learners. Outcomes: (1) a consolidated draft proposal for a DC framework, applicable at all levels of education, including non-formal settings (2) roadmap on how to realise and revise the DC framework. Rationale: With the 2006 European Recommendation on Key Competences (Official Journal L 394 of 30.12.2006), Digital Competence has been acknowledged as one of the 8 key competences for Lifelong Learning by the European Union. Digital Competence can be broadly defined as the confident, critical and creative use of ICT to achieve goals related to work, employability, learning, leisure, inclusion and/or participation in society. DC is a transversal key competence which, as such, enables acquiring other key competences (e.g. language, maths, learning to learn, creativity). It is amongst the so-called 21st Century skills which should be acquired by all citizens, to ensure their active socio-economic participation in society and the economy. Major questions: What are the key components of DC and what kind of knowledge, skills and attitudes people should have to be digitally competent, today and in the future? How can and/or should the development of this competence be validated at European level within a lifelong learning context, thus encompassing formal education, non-formal and informal learning and the world of work? "

article by John Michel, August 22, 2014. Like this excerpt: "The lesson Washington's profoundly positive example teaches is that leading people well isn't about driving them, directing them, or coercing them; it is about compelling them to join you in pushing into new territory. It is motivating them to share your enthusiasm for pursuing a shared ideal, objective, cause, or mission. In essence, it is to always conduct yourself in ways that communicates to others that you believe people are always more important than things."

Excellent blog on valuable July reads by Jane Hart led me to this blog post by Thomas Handcock and Warren Howlett, July 29, 2014, CEB Blogs, a very good discussion of building productive learning cultures. They recommend three steps: 1. Right size opportunities (which on the surface sounds fine but then they say that the "best organizations limit learning opportunities to those that are most relevant to employees and impactful for the organization but then rely on their (HR's) determination of learning needs (how do employees express their learning needs in this scenario? how does it support ownership and spontaneity beyond annual surveys? Of course they are talking about BIG corporations.) and "learning maturity" which sounds condescending to me) 2. Advance the organization's learning capability (most of this rings truer to me than #1 but it may be that my perception of what they say in #1 is slanted and hypersensitive). Here they talk about "teaching employees how to learn." "this lack of learning aptitude is primarily a capability issue, not a matter of employee motivation." 3. Foster shared ownership of the learning environment (which overcomes much of my objection to what they say in #1)

good article on planning off-sites that work by Logan Chandler and Bob Frisch, June 2006, The Magazine. Has a chart listing objectives, content, meeting design and structure, and participants 60 days out, 45 days out, 30 days out, 2 weeks out, and 1 week before the meeting.

blog by Mitch Shepard, September 30, 2014 on 4 trends troubling women's networks 1. Unclear goals and objectives 2. Lack of skilled leadership 3. Unstructured and directionless agendas 4. Lack of consistent, relevant, and meaningful content

Cognitive coaching model by Costa and Garmston, found 1.2013

This paper written by George Siemens in 2008 on Learning in Networks raises issues very similar to those we are raising in our discussion at CPSquare. This paper also has implications for how the Women's Learning Studio is launched into practice in its discussion of teacher as learning atelier, concierge, etc. Google Scholar, Scopus, and open access journals offer increased access to academic resources; an extension to more informal approaches such as regular internet search and Wikipedia. Social software (blogs, wikis, social bookmarking, instant messaging, Skype, Ning) provide opportunities for learners to create, dialogue about, and disseminate information. But what becomes of the teacher? How do the practices of the educator change in networked environments, where information is readily accessible? How do we design learning when learners may adopt multiple paths and approaches to content and curriculum? How can we achieve centralized learning aims in decentralized environments? This paper will explore the shifting role of educators in networked learning, with particular emphasis on curatorial, atelier, concierge, and networked roles of educators, in order to assist learners in forming diverse personal learning networks for deep understanding of complex fields.

good article on using social media to achieve goals

Example case study from Knowledge Communities, Naava Frank's nonprofit org

Another excellent resource from PLP for Connected Educators (available through Dropbox) to kick off Connected Educators Month. What if August were also Women's e-Quality month? or Women's Webquality Month? August 26 is Women's Equality Day . . . something to think about for next year? Wonder which women's organizations might bite and support such an event.

Look at this description of the Powerful Learning Practice ecourse offered by Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach and others at PLPNetwork