7.27.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/27/2005

Designing sticky knowledge networks Much of any organization's experience and expertise remains underused and underexploited simply because it resides not in databases, repositories, or manuals but in the minds of its employees. The Neglected Receiver of Knowledge Sharing Most knowledge sharing practices neglect the group or individual who will receive and hopes to leverage knowledge. When Cell Phones Become Oracles Cell phones know whom you called and which calls you dodged, but they can also record where you went, how much sleep you got and predict what you're going to do next. At least, these are the capabilities of 100 customized phones given to students and employees at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology -- and they may be coming soon to your cell phone.

7.25.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/25/2005

On Being Digital Being a digital native is more about what you do, rather than your age. CasePlace CasePlace.org is a free, online service for obtaining cases, references, and commentary published by business educators and business executives. In Praise of Open Thinking (podcast - 42 min) "As a working hypothesis to explain the riddle of our existence," says Freeman Dyson, "I propose that our universe is the most interesting of all possible universes, and our fate as human beings is to make it so." An equal and opposite reaction The connectedness of the Net has clearly changed the way our kids learn. Collaborating on assignments just seems natural.

7.23.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/23/2005

Human Brain's 'Mastermind' Located Humans attempt to do many things at the same time, such as driving and chatting on the phone, or working and listening to music, and now research suggests why such multitasking may be possible: the brain appears to have its own control center. Training Top 100 for 2005 Training magazine's annual ranking of organizations that excel at training and development. Driven to distraction by technology The typical office worker is interrupted every three minutes by a phone call, e-mail, instant message or other distraction. The problem is that it takes about eight uninterrupted minutes for our brains to get into a really creative state. The result is a situation where the digital communications that were supposed to make working lives run more smoothly are actually preventing people from getting critical tasks accomplished. Systems Thinking There are some myths surrounding systems thinking. The most common is the 'Input->process->output' archetype. Podcast with John Thackar Thackar is the author of "In the Bubble -- Designing in a Complex World." He says that "if we can design our way into difficulty, we can design our way out."

7.20.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/20/2005

Open Cellphone podcast with Tom Evslin (Podcast) VisiCalc creator Dan Bricklin talk with Tom Evslin about getting a big company to do new things. Knowledge Process Management Knowledge processes cannot be managed following the standard business process management paradigm. Taiko Mania Taiko began as a cultural expression of the Asian American civil rights movement representing the dual (American and Asian) identities of the practitioners. Audiences, performers and young students gravitated to this art form that encouraged them to be both Asian and American. From Dave Pollard's How to Save the World.

7.17.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/17/2005

Personal Toolkit: Apertures of articulation We work and learn in living networks. Together, we comprise great bodies of knowledge and expertise. Getting New Managers Up to Speed Managers' effectiveness derives directly from their web of relationships," says Rollag. With that in mind, "map out" your new manager's network before she starts the job. Sharing knowledge - do we know enough? If your CEO comes back from a KM conference and sets up Lotus, LiveLink or eRoom with complex access privilege's, you should question if they have really got the message. How Costco Became the Anti-Wal-Mart Why Big Dog & Little Dog love to shop at Costco.

7.16.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/16/2005

Learning Space Designing a learning space, creating a learning space, and future of the learning space. Learning Objects and Motivation Theories Learning objects, when incorporated into an online course in an outcome-focused and learner-centered manner, can enhance learner motivation. Time Wasting or Wanting? AOL/Salary.com report about the amount of time workers "waste" at work and the "cost" to the company. Partnership for 21st Century Skills I was re-reading Learning for the 21st Century the other day as background material on a forthcoming undergraduate teacher preparation project. I was struck by how well the report navigates the political waters of educational reform, so decided to use this Viewpoint to bring this report to the attention of those who have not yet read it. It deserves widespread attention, particularly among those of us engaged in improving undergraduate teacher preparation programs.

7.14.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/14/2005

Mirror Neurons (video) We humans are really good at reading faces and bodies. A recently discovered system in the brain may help explain why we humans can get so worked up watching other people. Using Case Studies to Teach Science (note: excellent article for all learning professionals) I will tell you something about stories; they aren't just entertainment. Don't be fooled. They are all we have, you see, all we have to fight off illness and death. You don't have anything if you don't have the stories. - Leslie Marmon Silko, Laguna Tribe Wikipedia's Word on Folksonomy There's a debate at the online encyclopedia Wikipedia about a new listing for the word folksonomy, which it defines as "a neologism for a practice of collaborative categorization using freely chosen keywords." Untested Assumptions May Have a Big Effect Pfeffer, the Thomas D. Dee II Professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, has observed that numerous, often hidden, assumptions underlie the mental models or mindsets of senior leaders. Money isn't everything Through most of the 1990s, you may remember, the common wisdom was that Apple was doomed because, with its shrinking market share, it wouldn't be able to keep up with the innovations on the Windows side.

7.12.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/12/2005

The Wikification of Knowledge The most talked-about thing going on right now is the wiki. Essentially, wikis are a fast way to do online collaboration, and people seem to enjoy them. GTD: A New Cult for the Info Age To converts, popular time-management manual Getting Things Done is a way of life and its author, personal productivity coach David Allen, leader of their flock. Video Blogging (aka Vlogging) Videoblogging is a new form of expression centering around posting videos to a website and encouraging an audience response. Will Malthus Continue to Be Wrong? In 1798, a curate at a small parish church in Albury, England, published a sobering pamphlet entitled An Essay on the Principle of Population. As a grim rebuttal of the utopian philosophers of his day, Thomas Malthus argued that human populations will always tend to grow and, eventually, they will always be checked. Learning Development Cycle: Bridging Learning Design and Modern Knowledge Needs Effective learning design must recognize different domains of learning. Learning Development Cycle attends to four broad learning domains: transmission, emergence, acquisition, and accretion.

7.10.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/10/2005

Generating Creativity through Benchmarking Toyota practices Kaizen: Everything it does is never good enough. Everything is viewed as an experiment, and people are empowered to make the next best improvement. Harry Dent - The Next Great Bubble Boom (Podcast) Dr. Moira Gunn speaks with Harry Dent, the author of The Next Great Bubble Boom. He sees another boom coming, and he says that technology and the Baby Boomers are behind it. Teachers map out new learning style Software offers concepts to help students understand, not just memorize, information. The hierarchy of power Leaders look for ways to affect the course of events. How much they can affect events depends on the circumstance, but those who have leadership in their character and not just their job description know the difference between having authority, making use of it, and depending on it.

7.09.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/09/2005

Strategic e-learning implementation What strategic e-learning coordination might look like. Theory & Practice of Online Learning A free ebook that includes both html and PDF versions. Technologies of Cooperation The eight clusters of cooperative technologies to include social tools, self organizing mesh networks, and knowledge collectives. Do we remember a pretty face? This study may explain why supermodels typically aren't flawless - Cindy Crawford's mole and Angelina Jolie's huge lips make it easier for us to remember them, even if they don't necessarily make them more beautiful. I believe this has a lesson for the learning programs we design. Podcast - On Maslow and leadership Also, a related reading - Leadership & Human Behavior.

7.07.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/07/2005

Challenging The Primacy Of Lectures: The Dissonance Between Theory And Practice In University Teaching (via Stephen's Web) Current practice in universities foregrounds the traditional lecture, tutorial, examination approach to teaching. It's Who You Know Social Network Analysis is a set of survey methods and statistics that reveals the hidden connections between people. Are the Basics of Instructional Design Changing? Sometimes, just asking a question is indicative of a significant change in climate. A Framework for the "Entrepreneurial" Learner of the 21 st Century Successful distance learners and entrepreneurs may be similar in that they seek out and capitalize on opportunities and marshal resources to achieve their goals. Yahoo's Search Reinvention Yahoo is tapping into its community of users (80.5 million people visited Yahoo in May, according to NetRatings) by allowing users to designate sites as share-worthy and to search what others in their Yahoo-based communities.

7.05.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/05/2005

Immersive Learning Environments Stephen Downes continually challenges those of us involved in online teaching/learning to think carefully about what we do and to conscientiously strive to maximize our use of this medium in a manner that will benefit teachers and learners. What's a micromanager? A micromanager is someone who manages at a level far lower, far more detailed than is necessary or appropriate. New Cornell study suggests that mental processing is continuous, not like a computer The theory that the mind works like a computer, in a series of distinct stages, was an important steppingstone in cognitive science, but it has outlived its usefulness. Tomato TomA[h]to Tom Peters shares many conventional business wisdoms and tells you why they are all wrong.

7.04.2005

Knowledge and Learning In The News - 7/04/2005

Instructional Designers: Being Everything to Everyone You can't be everything to everyone, and yet instructional designers are forced to be just that. Clutching our knowledge assets Human knowledge is not the aggregation of discrete, objective information, but a result of emergent processes of knowing through human subjective interpretations, or sense-making, dependent on complex historical contexts. Are the Basics of Instructional Design Changing? An interesting turn of discussion on ITForum. What are the SME's needs related to e-learning? Most of the learning in an SME is informal, i.e. it often takes place on the job, through a "sharing of knowledge" rather than in a "training". When confronted with a need, the SME worker will usually contact his network of reference people whom he trusts. The PDA market is not dead! (podcast) Media is getting much more compact and portable in today's world. iPods and PSPs are taking over the world.