Introit

Making the Case for Investing in a Learning Culture

Poignant piece in Chief Learning Officer magazine (online version) today. The topic is talent development + learning, and the excerpt is below (it's "business-y" in terms of feel, but the principles apply to schools). Of particular interest to me is the second paragraph. In order to be impactful vis-à-vis strategy, though, schools would benefit from a greater number of folks with broad experience rather than siloed experience. Otherwise, how does a school anticipate needs in the various areas? Professional development shouldn't be just about faculty, it should be about all adult learners in the community...and that would look fairly different from most models today.

One of the most important factors in building the workforce of the future is how organizations develop and train the skills needed in the workplace. This goes beyond formal training and learning; it extends to how to build a learning culture, learning on the job and using technology to deliver embedded learning experiences. In this context, the critical role of learning and development professionals in driving impactful learning strategies becomes clearer.

To increase impact, learning leaders need to understand future business strategy and skills needs. Learning leaders need to up their game in understanding and measuring the impact of learning on performance outcomes, so that they can make the strategic business case for investment in learning programs, tools and capabilities.

 

Work v. Job

I'm attending a wonderful seminar right now in Santa Fe, New Mexico, run by the good folks at Santa Fe Leadership Center.

Dr. Gary Gruber had a wonderful remark that I wanted to share. Though not quite verbatim, it goes like this: "Don't let your job get in the way of your work." Your job is what your job description says you must accomplish on a daily basis, but "work" is your larger journey. As such, it doesn't correspond to neat little packages of time that we prefer to ascribe to our days.

I like to use the Latin word for work, opus, because it feels less bound to time and more open-ended, more journey-like. For example, someone's magnum opus is a remarkable thing because you know they haven't simply created it on a Saturday afternoon whilst nibbling a biscuit.

The concept is similar to something my mentor during graduate school told me, as I was about to finish my doctorate. He said, "Once you finish the Ph.D., you can finally start your real work."

What is your opus?

Live Blog (7): Open Source Software Overview

Open Educational Resources: providing open source software/educational solutions. (one example of many)

David Wiley: "Expertise is non-rivalrous."

Open source software:

• access to source code
• freedom to redistribute
• freedom to modify
• non-discriminatory licensing
• integrity of authorship
• redistribution in accordance with the Open Source License Agreement

Creative Commons License -- potentially simple, or, potentially complex. Be sure of what you're dealing with!

Why use Open Source Software?

• cost savings (no licensing fee)
• stability
• independence/no forced upgrades
• access and broad rights to source code
• access to skilled community of developers
• ability to define and expedite new development as the facilitator of creation
• global collaboration and social prudence

Why use it in schools?

• provides functionality you would not otherwise have (high acceptance)
• provides similar functionality that you already have, but saves you money, has better features, or gives you freedom from lock-in (medium acceptance)
• allows you to customize solutions (medium to low acceptance)
• allows you to reuse older computer hardware
• allows you to share programs with students
• you believe in it (or the value set, ie. you're concerned about corporate influence in education)
• provides real skills/tools for students (internet, networking, web)
• programming (Python)
• creativity (Audacity)
• collaborative software building (participate in an existing project; local application of tech)

Why NOT use Open Source Software in schools?

• it's confusing, due to great variety and potential legal issues
• it's "free," like a puppy...beware of what responsibilities might come with it!
• migration costs (i.e. from MS Office to Open Office)
• uncertainty about open development model (splinter groups, programs)
• uncertainty aout licensing
• uncertainty about support (blame?)

Possible Lessons in Adoption

• involve techs and staff in decision-making
• look for non-displacing opportunities
• recognize the importance of leadership buy-in
• don't oversell cost savings/benefits
• start with something that can succeeed and open the door
• be patient!

Thought:

"If, as schools, we don't allow students to bring in their own devices, we'll have to move to Linux/Open Source Software in order to be able to afford the computing costs that will be required to keep everyone "wired"."

Of interest/OSS:

ubuntu -- a community-developed, linux-based operating system. Has special version for education community (edubuntu.org). Special version for old computers (xubuntu.org)

moodle

libre office

scribus - desktop publishing

gimp - image manipulation program

Celestia - free space simulation (science: space)

Tux Paint - for youngsters in particular

Blender - 3D computer graphics, etc. Animation, rendering, post-production, etc.

The OpenDisc - CD that contains open source softwares, can copy and give to kids

Teaching - Thoughts

1. We must start teaching collaborative and creation-based tools, including Open Source Software

2. If we provide ubiquitous computing to our school communities, we will need Linux. However, we'll probably end up allowing students to bring own devices.

3. We must start providing real-world, authentic-audience environments for students

Live Blog (6): ADVIS Technology Workshop

A social networking site can become a form of personal portfolio. "Friending" can become a PLN (personal learning network). If we connect with others who have like-minded interests (educationally), we therefore promote a greater network which we can access: collegial relationships. Leveraging the power gained from colleague-friending.

Social networks need good forums in order to be educationally productive: ning allows for this piece, for example. Power of video is also important: ability to upload visuals that could work in a portfolio fashion. In other words, whereas use of video/visuals in social networking kind of scared us (think: inappropriate visuals), the same concept can be used positively in an educational networking space.

Groups hold much promise: think professional development, learning teams, and self-created communities. See PBL - Better with Practice by Jane Krauss.

Social networking + LMS (learning management systems) + live collaboration

Steve thinks the aforementioned will merge and become the "larger framework".

Benefits to educational/social networking:

1. allows authentic, peer-driven learning and professional development
2. provides emotional support and reduces isolation
3. allows visibility of practice within a community
4. facilitates networked and community learning
5. fosters creativity and perspective
6. provides for engagement, participation, and action
7. re-energizes personal learning (t-shirt idea: "personal cognitive revolution")
8. increases global connectivity (see globaleducationconference.com)
9. draws us into humanity's "great conversations"

Another benefit: education reform can be seen now as an internal, rather than external, reform

Lessons that Steve has learned with these networks:

• it's all about the users (valued activities: listening, testing, experimenting, looking for input, etc)
• facilitate and support the process, not the outcome (build a park, not a cafeteria). Don't mandate! Listen! Engagement trumps content!
• be authentic (act like a friend, and people respond)
• start with educators and administrators first (don't implement it in the classroom if you haven't used it with faculty)
• support and promote the early adopters (more important than you are!)
• allow for failure (including your own, as you look for real needs)
• build your culture and recognize the importance of interpersonal ("soft") skills

Live Blog (5): ADVIS Technology Workshop

There's a need to link pedagogy (and its history) to recent technologies. Our current school modeling scenario is based on a more corporate view point, meaning that it comes down to measurement, tracking, etc. Analogy: android with wires on head:

Here's a question: what do our physical structures (schools) look like, in terms of allowing for these technologies?

And another: do we still have computer labs? What would be their purpose?

Steve: I think we're going to move toward "passing the buck" to students, meaning that we will allow their devices in our schools, rather than the school providing everything." The school, in that sense, would act as 'hub,' but would allow for individuality of device(s). The counter comes from parents, who wish to be in control of their student's device (filters, etc).

Steve's claim: social networking will become (is becoming) the framework for education.

Here's a site to visit in order to learn about the role of social networking in education: Educational Networking

We will benefit from the continuation of social networking, i.e. looking at it over time and seeing what works, doesn't work, etc., as it represents the aggregation of a set of participative Web 2.0 tools.

We need to reframe our sense of what a social network is.

Live Blog (3): ADVIS Technology Workshop

MIT Open Courseware -- why make it free? Something really dramatic is happening!

The argument: the best learning is still face-to-face: the "memorization piece" is important, but the "conversation piece" is valuable.

Flexbook -- open textbook initiative -- you can mix/match content to your heart's delight.

What Skype does for education, from hiring to the classroom, is amazing. It connects people on a global scale.

Internet is now facilitating how we get things done...there is an explosion of collaboration. Connectedness is leading to innovation.

The Long Tail -- why the future of business is selling less of more. The "long tail" is a plotted curve that shows publication of books that don't "make it" on major stores and such. About one year ago, Amazon began to sell more product in the "long tail," ie. more product that wasn't in book store versus what was in book stores.

What's interesting is that the technologies are now allowing us to "return to participation, pre-broadcast, pre-factory model." In other words, communication is super-important -- kids are getting feedback, sharing writing and ideas with others...and not in the Henry Ford-like model of education.

Redistribution of our cognitive surplus, says Clay Shirky. The internet has unleashed this cognitive surplus. It is unleashed energy.

Where do schools live? In structure or in freedom? Where does cognitive surplus thrive?

Live Blog (2): ADVIS Workshop

"The answer to content overload is to...create more content."

Hargadon has problem with Kahn Academy and TED. It's nice to have that info available, but the point of technology is to create content. "Finding the best lesson" doesn't make sense, if the web is about conversation and content creation. That info can be used for backup, but it doesn't replace teaching content to students 1:1.

Learning as memorization vs. Learning as creation > which do you want to espouse?

Learning as creation is hard work.

Live Blog (1): ADVIS Workshop on Technology in Education

I'm going to send out some information today "live" from a workshop I'm attending, sponsored by ADVIS (Association of Delaware Valley Independent Schools). The speaker is Steve Hargadon, and the focus of the session is on how technology is now poised to change education fundamentally.

Interesting link:

Future of Education -- here you can join the conversation on technology in education, including listening to podcasts of great speakers.

Steve: "There's a crisis in meaning" in today's educational environment. We need new narratives to help us illustrate why we need to do what we need to do.

"We're about to go through the biggest change in education in a long time...perhaps ever."

The learning and creativity that is taking place on the internet is largely taking place outside our institutions. How do we make schools the place for this kind of learning, creativity, innovation?

Book: Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology

Realistic View of this change: image of tsunami hitting shore...look out!

Three large cultural shifts that are taking place, that will impact how we think about education:

1. How we find, create and consume information

2. How we connect with others

3. How we get things done

Technology: PD Approach?

How does your school address technology, from the angle of professional development?

Based on all the anecdotes one hears, it would seem that most schools offer the "Free Access Approach". In this approach, schools offer unfettered access to a dizzying array of tech tools for knowledge work, whether classroom work, academic reporting, or whatnot. "There you go," say the schools. "Enjoy. There's so much out there to learn and apply here. Good luck!" There is rarely substantive conversation about where to find the information, how it works, and how we might apply it in meaningful ways.

The obvious issue with this approach is that we, as schools, are counting on all faculty to define and integrate their own information environments. Let's be honest: how often does that actually occur? Which "knowledge workers" have the time, focus, or energy to do such in a thing, when faced with a fairly inflexible daily schedule and a life outside the school?

The Free Access Approach has no mission, and therefore, it is difficult to expect faculty to buy into it, let alone ensconce themselves in it and thrive. It will work, of course, for some individuals who are intense and driven, but they're in the minority. Otherwise, the greatest outcome of this approach is a further decrease in technology use (relative to the inclined growth curve of technology itself), just the opposite of what was desired in the first place.

If the Free Access Approach isn't working, what approaches might work? Does anyone have a good example of what has worked at a particular school? How did you address technology as a piece of the professional development puzzle, thereby leading to a better balance of learning/acquisition and productivity/utilization?

Cauldron of Creativity

Where is your school's "cauldron of creativity"? Which folks at your school are spurring innovation? How much freedom do they have to research and develop innovations?

"We want to, but it's [insert month here]. It's crunch time."

Guess what? It's always crunch time in our schools.

Where is your school creating additional value for itself? Are you fostering interactions among multiple players in the school world--not just at your school? We have seen that networks create value (think Facebook, for example), so why would we choose to ignore it as a strategy?

"Yes, but, when do you find time to do these things?"

Sleep less. Get up earlier than normal. Schedule 20 minutes each day for R&D: your time, for no pay. If you want pay, where are your priorities? Do you really want to create? How much is it worth to you? Can you take delayed gratification?