Kerry Escobado's Instructional Design Resources for eLearning

Digital Story Telling

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 04:18:00 +0000

What is MemoryMiner?
MemoryMiner is a application that can be used to create Digital Stories. It's not free, but inexpensive, $45 to own. MemoryMiner won Macworld's Best of Show in 2006. "The core idea behind MemoryMiner is to treat your most interesting and rare photos as frames in a storyboard that are linked by People, Place and Time. As such, it's designed to be a complement to photo management tools such as iPhoto, Aperture, iView, Lightroom, etc. however, you can perfectly well use MemoryMiner as a standalone application."

Why are you interested in Digital Stories?
Digital Stories allow us to experience events, research events, express momentous events and learn. It is also an application that can be ran on a Mac, so for my fellow Mac user's, MemoryMiner might also pique your interests.

What is MemoryMiner used for?
"MemoryMiner is the award-winning Digital Storytelling application for Mac and Windows used to discover the threads connecting peoples’ lives across time and place. It lets you zero in on the stories depicted in your photos by linking them to each other based on people, places and time. Using simple drag and drop actions, you specify who is in the picture, where the picture was taken and when."

Explain how to use Memory Miner.
There are already some great videos for MemoryMiners. Here's nifty link to one such video.

Has MemoryMiner been used in educational applications? How?
Absolutely. Here's a link in MemoryMiner's website describing how to implement MemoryMiner into schools.

Is is MemoryMiner effective?
I believe so, they have solid Help Center containing how to videos, printed instruction, FAQs and email for tech support. One can also download the program for free for 15 day trail.

How does MemoryMiner help learning?
I view MemoryMiner allowing us to take ideas and put those ideas into action. Photos are concrete items and they can be manipulated out of our ideas to create more concrete items, such as slideshows. I can see how MemoryMiner projects can start as an idea about how US Presidents are similar and different. Using the MemoryMiner, one can add dates, locations, websites to see how each US President is unique and similar to other US Presidents. I think this paradigm follows James Zull's notion of the learning cycle, concert>reflection>idea>action.

TEN WEB 2.0 THINGS YOU CAN DO IN TEN MINUTES TO BE A MORE SUCCESSFUL E-LEARNING PROFESSIONAL By Stephen Downes, National Research Council Canada

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Kerry's Podcast: Isabela's First Bike Ride

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 22:54:00 +0000

So here's my first podcast/screencast, click on the title above Kerry's Podcast: Isabela's First Bike Ride. You should be able to use the RSS feed, located to the right, to subscribe.

I am still working out some kinks!

Kerry

Audacity

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 04:33:00 +0000

Richard E. Mayer, the author of Multimedia Learning, suggests we use narration in multimedia productions because it increases learning when animation is also used.

Audacity is an open source tool to use for recording narration. It offers:

Record live audio.
Convert tapes and records into digital recordings or CDs.
Edit Ogg Vorbis, MP3, WAV or AIFF sound files.
Cut, copy, splice or mix sounds together.
Change the speed or pitch of a recording.
And more! See the complete list of features.

In the past, I have used Captivate but the quality is not quite there with Captivate. Audacity provides a easy approach to recording, editing and exporting audio into multimedia presentations.

Skpe

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 04:10:00 +0000

Isn't life about conversations? We converse, we learn... We converse, we grow... We converse, we connect.

I can image the delight people enjoyed when they first used the telephone. Hearing the voice of a loved one far away likely made them feel immediately connected. I feel like I was able to part take in that same feeling of delight just last night when my mother, who lives in California, and I used Skype for free last night. We chatted about our day, plans for Christmas, work....everything we normally talk about except I could see her. My daughter was amazed to see her "Grammy." We even got the chance to see my mom's dog, Chaco, taking a snooze!

Web video conferencing uses technology as a way to converse and connect to the community. I learned that my mom really benefited from seeing me and my daughter as she lives alone in California.

There's really potential for using products like Skype in education, the workplace and personal lives! At work, it would be cool if a learner could use Skype to call me instead of a phone. We could discuss the problem and find a solution f2f in a convenient and efficient way. If this happens, maybe people would begin to see technology as problem solver!

Scenario Based Instruction

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 03:04:00 +0000

I am thinking about the importance of including scenario-based instruction in eLearning content.

I read on the CITT site, they suggest using "scenario-based practice every 3-6 screens."

Scenario-based instructions gives the student the change to apply the information in a meaningful way. For example, the content is about medical procedures to employ based on a patient's condition. A scenario can be presented to the learner about a patient with particular symptoms. The learner can choose the best option in which to employ, then based off their selection, feedback is provided.

Scenario-based instructions are excellent options to provide learner-centered, active and authentic content. A main challenge is of course, coming up with the scenario and utilizing the right kind of authoring tools to develop the scenario.

Instruction Package

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 01:25:00 +0000

What does it mean to deliver a powerful instructional message for online learning to our learners?

Should we have animation, if so what kind? Does audio make the presentation better? How do we include images that enhance learning? Do we need to include a print component?

Lots of questions....

Animation can enhance learning, and it can also be a distraction. We want to catch our audience's attention without distracting them from important instructional intent. Using animation to draw the learner to important aspects of the training is helpful as long as it doesn't confuse or take the learn off topic.

Choosing the right music can be a challenge since everyone seems to have a preference. Sound should compliment the instruction and come in the form of narration, sound clips that supplement the learning topic...one might want to stay away from background music!

Images can speak a thousand words, but words too can compliment an image: they can be used together. Use images that add to the instructional message, don't use images a fillers. Allowing the audience to breath and enjoy whitespace can create a stage for learning, not seem empty and void.

We would like it if we could remember everything we are suppose to learn, but our magnificent brains don't work that way, they have a tendency to forget. Providing a printable handout that reviews "key" points to help retention and provide just-in-time training.

Lots of stuff to think about...sometimes theses questions answer themselves as long as we can answer the most important question: who are our learners?

More cool tools

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 04:06:00 +0000

We saw skrbl and Picnik and Mogulus and Imagination Cubed.

There are many cool tools that we can use to design instructional messages or used to get our learners excited about an online class.

This week I was particularly interested in using Picnik as a way to edit my photos. It seems you can easily use the application to fancy up pictures.

In my free time not working or studying, I am going to play with Mogulus. It is so cool that one could create their own CNN.

I am going to show Isabela, my daughter, Imagination Cubed and see what an eight year old thinks. I think I will start with an email to her that I drew!

5650 Historical Timeline

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 03:54:00 +0000

I had some "lively" drill instructors teach classes in boot camp. They would always having an attention grabber of some sort, then they would drill down a long list of terminal and enabling learning objects. I am curious how the military put their rubber stamp on the I.D. field? Specifically, how did the military create processes and procedures for I.D.?

eLearning Management: Process, People & Product

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 19:52:00 +0000

To be responsible leaders in eLearning, we must know the roles and responsibilities for our projects.

Having a clear understanding on the process will allow for a smoother role-out and ensures content delivery and content maintenance meets the projects goals.

Having the right people fulfilling the plan's design ensures the best instruction, supportive and administrative services are delivered to the learner. For the learner to take advantage of the training, a marketing campaign should also be deployed.

The final product needs a strong foundation. Having a project plan, storyboard, learning materials and revising materials are vital to a successful eLearning project.

Know your three P's = Process, People and Product.

Cool Tools Con't..

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:54:00 +0000

Ning

Is a social networking site for just about everything. You can join a social networking group of like minded people to share ideas and have discussion on topics that of interested to you and your group. I joined the Ning Instuctional Design eLearning Group. It's my hope this group is lively and offers great discourse on eLearning. I joined last night, thus far not much new action.

Pownce

Pownce allows us to send stuff like pictures, files, music messages and links to our contacts. This could be of use to groups of people wanting to share content freely with friends, family and colleagues.

Twitter

Not the most intuitive application to use. The concept to follow someone means that you can read their "twitter" posts. That's pretty straight forward, but there's not much instructions to inform you of this. Twitter posts are a lot of fun to read. People post crazy, funny stuff, like how much weight they have gained over the last week, to their opinion that our weekly reading is making them fall asleep. This stuff is way better than email!

Cool Tools

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:13:00 +0000

We have been reviewing and getting "to know" about the latest and greatest tools being used on the Internet. As we know the days of communicating via email and instant messaging has given away to more interactive web tools that are redefining how we communicate.

Kindling

Using Kindling you can share your latest and greatest ideas with your inner circle. Everyone can add to the discussion and vote on the best ideas. Using this tool we certainly can record and voice our innovations. I think this is a valuable tool and I am going to share to see what other's at work think.

Skype

I have been hearing a lot of hype about Skype. This tool can put to use right away with those family members who live out of state. Skype users can talk to each other for free. I am wondering if online learners are using Skype in their online classes?

Audacity

I have recorded audio using Captivate for eLearning projects. From my experience, the quality is mainly poor due to the fact that the frequency changes between recordings and editings. I have also heard poor feedback from other eLearning developers who want to use other recording software besides Captivate. Other experienced developers recommend Audacity, I am looking forward to try it out!

ClassSpot

This idea might be the wave of the future. Students are able to interact and actively engage in real-time with content that is being displayed by the teacher. Teachers can present a slideshow and students can share their input with other students. This is coined as classroom 2.0. It sounds exciting! Will there come a day in our schools when children use laptops as much as they use a pencils and crayons? Surely presentations that are being developed for the presenter and not the learner will be quickly replaced by presentations being developed for learner interactions!

Reflections on Technology (RSS and Blogs)

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 19:53:00 +0000

Learning any new technology can be challenging for the learners, as an instructors we can forget the challenges we faced when learning new technology. When I was learning how to use Dreamweaver I was frustrated because my menu bars kept showing up in different places when I created a new webpage. I followed the same steps each time I set-up a new page, but the brain-busting misplacement of menu bars kept me bewildered. After building my pages and spending hours trying to rearrange my menu bars, I finally realized that I should have been using the "save as" command and not have been setting up new pages from scratch. Thankful I had some humor left in me that day as I rolled on the ground laughing in the simplicity of my solution.

This might not be the best example of someone learning new technology, but I think it does show that what may seem a "no-brainer" to us, might not seem so transparent to the learner of new technology.

We as instructors and introducers of those technologies should take a step back and remember what it was like to just learn about new technologies--might we start a journal now so we can better recall what it's like to be a novice--before we expect others to start using them.

There are barriers to overcome when learning how to apply new technologies to classrooms. Examples of those technologies are Blogs and RSS feeds. They can help learners grow through reflection. They provide ways to share information, which improves professionalism and increased quality. They increase creativity through self-expressive writing and conversations. But, they can't do these things by themselves. Blogs and RSS feeds are becoming more popular in eLearning, but they are not a "no-brainer" like email.

One possible solution is to create a dashboard or learner portal of some sort. Having one-stop-learning where the student can access webpages that teaches them how to use certain technology, best-practice examples of those new technologies. This dashboard should guide the learner in a step-by-step fashion and grow in content as the learner becomes more proficient.

Learning should be fun and challening, but not in the way that leaves you rolling on the floor laughing at your self. Most of all, learning technology should be be frusterating or confusing.

Ideation Blog: What's Up with all this technology

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 03:55:00 +0000

I am constantly surprised by all the new applications and web tools that are becoming available for use. As they come available, I am also constantly wondering "How can these tools be used in instructional design projects?"

Last week I was introduced to song playlist sites where one can create their personal song list to be shared openly or used personally. I also reviewed historical speeches, creative commercials, poetic movies, appealing graphs and other beautifully developed formats to look at what do they have to with instructional design and messaging.

I feel that we as designers of instruction just might need to look at the creative possibilities that can be explored when developing instructional materials. Using music or capitalizing on the creative play of typography should be fully employed. So, then, instructional materials should also be eye candy and ear candy. I think of a reason they ought not be.

Instructional Approaches to Online Teaching

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 22:34:00 +0000

Teaching online and learning online is a new to many individuals and new to the realm of education. For years learning has come from face-to-face interaction. The with the advent of a mailing system distant learning emerged when ponies carried letters to and from sender and receiver. Much of learning has come from books and only now are we thinking about how to write for the web rather than print.

In week six's discussion we investigated what kind of instructional approaches we should use for our EdWeb. People once again gravitated towards online discussions, how to motivate learners to get involved with learning, using images to transform information.

Sheri Trapp-Cordova posted a suggestion to use a map instead of text bullet points to emphasize "the importance of history in the forming the border culture of El Paso, maybe I could create a map of the area and visually show the border moving over time in relation to El Paso. This format might make it easier for learners to recall, or absorb the ideas of a changing border and what happens when one culture/nation is absorbed into another nation."

One topic I have really found fascinating is how Flash can enhance learning. Make things that happened long ago to be able to be relived, like the border between Mexico and the U.S. (even writing this blog allows be to revist discussions that took place a month ago, even now I am making new insights and connections, this is not possible with f2f instruction, even for the best note taker).

My best contribution was in my posting of an article. Here's the link. It is a study from Harvard University's School of Business regarding how to cultivate communities of practice to manage knowledge.

Although I didn't have the chance to comment on the article in my post, I hope that other's found it valuable. I hope to use some of the principles in my EdWeb and f2f training. One analogy I enjoy is creating a community of practice to function much like a park. In a park there's places to have open-space to large gatherings, closed-space to have a bench nested near flowers to intimate conversations, secluded space for reflection.

I think instructional learning technologies can allow us as the designer to create a website, much like a park space, so our learners can come into a space where their learning needs are met on many levels: places for vibrate discussion, places for reflection, places for self-paced learning, places where the images, much like scenery, can do the same as a thousand words

Online Teaching Techniques

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 21:40:00 +0000

In week five we discussed different online teaching strategies. The discussion surrounded how were going to engaged our audience using methods from Benders book. Some people were interested in how they were going to team teach the Web Conference together: have some people monitor certain activities? Or take a more collabrative approach and manage the discussions and activities together?

One topic that I gravated towards was chats. Specifically, how could chats be both reflective (to move learners up Bloom's cognitive objectives) at the same time not so overwhelming that people would have a difficult time keeping a focused conversation going all the while other people are trying to do the same thing but with another topic. Basically, too make people can spoil a learning opportunity just as too may cooks can spoil a receipt, if too much is added things can get confusing.

Bender devoted an entire section to synchronous learning, which was my Web Conference topic. I was inspired by the concept of using chats to display best practices in onlince teaching and so that learners could join conversation with others who were also interested in the same topic, thus to avoid side-bar conversations. My post was regarding that this might not be possible. Chad wondered if it could be? Dave Young said we could do it in Moodle but it might be challenging. I took this back to my team and we thought it was best to not use Moodle but keep everything within Breeze, since this is where we were going to present the synchronous event.

With this in mind, my team delivered a synchronous event in Breeze in which we had break-out discussions. This was easily accomplished with some planning. We introduced different types of synchronous tools and how they could be used using a PPT and VoIP. Then we build pods that displayed questions about the tools. We asked the participants to vote on the topic they'd like to join to make sure the number balanced out per discussion. Then we opened up the pods and have people chat for about 10 minutes. It was a great interactive experience and fun to faciliatate.

I enjoyed week's five topic discussion. I am not sure we would have had such a great interactive Web Conference if it wasn't for the threaded discussion of week five.

Formative Evaluation

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 21:17:00 +0000

What's a formative evaluation? Basically, when a instructional project is still in the design stage you seek out key individuals to provide you feedback on your design ideas. "Formative" refers to the beginning, like formative years of childhood. In designing a instructional product, the formative evaluator can can include people such as the subject matter experts or others knowledgeable about the topic, but most importantly, they should also include people who are going to be your target audience. That way, you are comparing carrots to carrots and not apples to oranges, like SMEs to a general learner.

In designing educational websites, formative evaluations take on a different form, no pun intended. To get week four's topic going, Dave Young asked us what was 'pining around in our heads' about our EdWeb. Many people reverted to their navigation. I guess I was a little behind the curve because I was more worried about how I was going to my project out to my intended audience, how was I going to sell my project to an organization so they thought it was going to benefit them.

My best contribution was "After listening to Dr. Tessmer's interview, I thought how much our EdWeb's are like a living document that under goes intensive editing. I wrote an honor's thesis in college, but the web project has many more considerations: navigability, writing for web readers, releasing to hundreds of learners at one time. One needs to pay strict attention to detail, understand web-authoring tools, and now solicit people for formative evaluations!"

Dave liked the idea of a living document, "Lots of great insights in what you wrote, Kerry! I particularly like the phrase "living document." Questions are going to crop up constantly that will need to be answered and if your approach is to be nimble and use formative evaluation effectively to answer those questions, you'll do well."

I learned much from the formative evaluation process. Life knowing which people to solicit and getting people to actually get hands-on practice before building the website.

Looking back at that conversation, I think this blog posting is like a summative evaluation of my formative evaluation.

Facilitating Online Discussions

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 20:43:00 +0000

Timing, Motivation, Organization, Focus, Patience, Silence...what makes or breaks when it comes to facilitation online?

There was lots of interactive discussion in week's three threaded discussion on the topic of facilitating online discussions. In fact, there were a total of 43 posting! Any novice online participant might feel daunted to join the discussion as if they were being asking to scale a 14,000 foot mountain when out on their first trek. Basically, how can we arouse vibrant discussion that creates a collaborative student-to-student interaction? And, how do we react when there is no response to the discussion?

There were many great suggestions. Dave Beatie suggested to use Keller's ARCS model to stir motivation--ACRS.

Attention. Gain their attention!
Relevance. What's in it for me? Let them know the answer to that question
Confidence. Being able to put newly learned knowledge into action
Satisfaction. Feeling fulfilled and reward from the learning experience.

Dave Young even chimed into the dialog by responding to posting surrounding the need to time the when to post questions, how to organize the discussion and how have patience.
" I decided to watch this thread play out because the variety of ideas being generated were very interesting! Lack of response is definitely something that can drive you crazy as a facilitator. The "wait time" strategy is important and tough to master in an online environment because of the lack of clues about why there is silence."

My best contribution regarded having a topics agenda. Know what questions to ask and when you are going to ask them. Provide the participants with a time-line for responding to the question to keep them motivated to be involved and to also know when it's time to move on to the next topic. I didn't post this in the discussion, but I also think it is important to let the learners have the option to post in older discussion knowing that the other participants might not check the posting but you as a facilitator will respond.

I offered up some facilitation tips:
"'Asking Questions That Stimulate Discussion
Asking questions in an online discussion is a bit different than in a face-to-face environment. In a face-to-face seminar the facilitator can immediately adjust his or her questioning strategies if the audience doesn’t respond to the first question asked. In an asynchronous conference, the discussion can fizzle quickly if the right question isn’t asked at the beginning. Here are some tips on asking questions to stimulate online discussion early:

Clarify the outcome objectives for the discussion.The first question(s) should immediately start participants thinking about the important issues in the topic.

Limit the number of questions that are asked at the beginning of a discussion to one or at most two. Participants will lose interest if they are expected to respond to too many issues in one discussion. If there are more than two aspects of the topic that need to be explored to meet the outcome objective for the discussion, give participants permission to respond only to one, or at most two, of the questions you have posed. Even better, ask questions later in the discussion that introduce different aspects of the topic that need to be considered.

Ask open-ended questions to which there can be more than one “correct” response

Ask for participant opinions on a controversial aspect of the topic or invite participants to describe their experience relevant to the topic.

Avoid asking questions that can be answered directly from the readings or which can be answered completely by one keen respondent."

Link to the PDF: http://files.myweb.med.ucalgary.ca/files/132/files/unprotected/FacilitatorGuideSept03.pdf

Richard Stewart added that "asking the student to complete the question" is also a great way to stimulate responses.

Online facilitation is both a science and a mixture of natural human interaction. The magic is how to use what works in natural dialog in online collaboration.

Week 111 Discussion: Ideas for EdWeb Visual Communication

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 03:10:00 +0000

A general overview of the discussion:
We participated in threaded discussions about the importance of visual display, and techniques for communicating content and ideas visually and how we can use effective visual communication techniques to accomplish quite a lot, like to establish relevance and meaning, arouse interest and excitement, convey information about structure and expectations, and so.

We thought about our visual display and communication ideas for our own EdWebs and if we had any a-ha thoughts about how navigation

An excerpt of my most valuable contribution to the discussion:
I kicked off the discussion with posting what my is about, "Many residents and nurses need to rapidly adapt and learn new Information Technology to deliver patient care. This learning curve creates a huge training demand as new clinical applications are implemented frequently and new blocks of residents rotate into and out of the Hospital every month. Having "savvy" nurses who are certified expert users of the applications can help train the residents, and not so computer "savvy" nurses, on how to use the applications to deliver better and safer patient care."

What struck me the most about the readings and was my most valuable contribution was the statistics out of Driscoll that stated 83% learning comes via sight and 11% audio.

An explanation of why I consider it my best contribution:
People in my discussion thread were also stuck by the just how much of our learning comes from sight! I think it gave my fellow discussion partners a concrete idea of just how important a good visual layout can benefit the learning process and how important a good visual layout can determine a learning design's success or its failure, and who wants to spend hundreds of hours building something people can't benefit from anyway!?

Week 9 Discussion: Attention Getter

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 02:43:00 +0000

A general overview of the discussion:
In week 9 we broke out in groups with each member of the group to post a quote they identified with a significant ideas from the reading. We posted our quote to start a threaded discussion for the rest of the group to discussion the quote in less than 250 words. After everyone in the group participated in the dicussion, the person who posted the quote had the last word in no more than 250 word response about what they are now thinking about the issue and their reaction to what the other people said about the post.

Linda Gillmore quoted a sentence out of our reading, "Gagne (1985) lists grabbing the attention of learners as the first of his nine events of instruction, which he proposed long before e-learning earned its current popularity." It seems that most instructors struggle with daunting task of getting the learners attention in a creative fashion that will motivate the learner to stay engaged in the learning.

Here's my most valuable contribution to the discussion:
Engaging the learner's attention is crucial. In the Marines, the first things we were taught when we delivered classes was to create an "attention getter." The interesting thing was that the "attention getter" didn't have to relate to the topic, it could have been an off topic joke. What was important was grabbing their attention as a means of shifting their focus from "what am I going to make for dinner," to "its time to put everything aside and focus on learning. "

What I discovered was beginning with a topic related story or question was the most effective, I always enjoyed the "attention getter" and was motivated to attend a class just to hear "the getter." It also helps the instructor to shift into the "teaching" mode as well as with bringing their energy level up a notch.

I also think we can think about how our "attention getters" can relate to our Common Instructional Values:

1. Active? engaging, exploratory
2. Supportive? fun
3. Contextual? relevant
4. Social? discourse, discussion

Explanation for why this was my best contribution:
I think tying our discussion in with our Common Instructional Values helps us to reconnect with what we are trying to accomplish with learning in our course. I believe if we can answer yes when connecting to our Common Learning Values the chances are good that we are approaching the learning design in a manner that will lead to successful learning.

Week 7 Discussion: Why is Informal Learning So Valuable?

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 02:01:00 +0000

Each learning experience I have, whether or not I am a student or a teacher, I am reminded how valuable informal learning really is to the learning process. Just today, I taught a class of nurses how to use a medication administration checking application, where they scan bar codes listed on medications and patient's wrist bands to ensure that the right medication is being given to the right patient at the right time. The trick to training nurses is that they are so hands-on and that they expect their learning experience to be authentic so they can rationalize just how this program will work in real life when dealing with real patients whose lives are in their hands. Time and time again while training in this environment I notice just how much they actually learn from one another, they often share learning experience in off the cuff discussions or side conversations. As a trainer in a hospital I am challenged with either hushing their conversations and request them to plainly follow along with my mouse clicks, but the teacher inside that is actually putting the kibosh on what they value and relate to as learners. So, just how can I include this informal learning into the formal classroom training?

Its important to remember that "we all bring unique experiences into our "formal" learning environments that we likely cultivated in "informal" learning experiences. And, 'that we are' be more motivated by our "informal' learning goals than by our formal learning goals."

In addition, how do we as designers of online learning think about about the relationship of a given course’s design with the learner's informal learning experiences and goals. The five questions and my challenges in the classroom led training got me thinking about how they tie in with our Common Values.

A few weeks back my classmates and I in CU Denver's eLearning Design and Implementation cohort engaged in a discussion on Informal Learning and its relevance in eLearning.

Here's some questions that were asked, I boldeded my responses.
1. What do you often talk about at home or with your friends that you seldom talk about at school (this course) or work?
• Authentic and Real-World! The design should be contextual to the learner.
2. What are topics that you find relevant or valuable that you would like to see addressed in this course?
• Practical and Hands-On? Of course, the design should actively engage the learner.
3. What are some questions that this course should be asking if it were to be realistically related to the life you live? (or want to live?)
• Applicable…yes, the design should definitely be learner-centered to meet the highly motivated learner’s objective.
• 4. If Dave and Joni were to spend time with you outside of class, they might find it interesting that you.......
• Valued and Respected!! Everyone wants to feel valued, the design should be culturally responsive to include social interaction and also be supportive of the learner.
5. Something you definitely think you know more about than Dave and Joni is.......
• Sharing! As a teacher/trainer, I always deepen my knowledge about what I am teaching when I share my knowledge, the design would be enhanced if it included peer teaching/mentoring/coaching and fun…more social instructional values and supportive instructional values.

Why are these questions and the respective answers so important? In relevance to both eLearning and classroom learning the quality of informality brings with it an authentic learning experience that the learners can connect with on a personal level: this is important with retaining what's been taught. Sometimes I feel that my learners are like chatty kids on a playground running amuck, but this time also provides them with invaluable incites that I as a trainer of Information Technology Systems cannot offer. So I let them run for a bit, then gently guide them back into the formal classroom environment and onto another learning objective comfortable knowing that their conversations have provided them with a relavent and memorable learning experience.

Week 6 Discussion: Strategies Discussion

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 03:41:00 +0000

What was the discussion about?

Discussion protocols provide a step-by-step approach to discussion, and a structure for making sure that everyone in a group has a chance to lead and guide the discussion. These protocols are especially useful when discussing challenging or controversial content, but are equally suited to helping us achieve variety in our approach to online discussions. Discussion protocols provide a step-by-step approach to discussion, and a structure for making sure that everyone in a group has a chance to lead and guide the discussion. These protocols are especially useful when discussing challenging or controversial content, but are equally suited to helping us achieve variety in our approach to online discussions.

General Overview
This discussion was interesting because it we all got to play the role of discussion leader. It was interesting to see different styles emerge and all the different interests everyone had. We picked a quote out of Horton's book that made a connection with us for using different strategies for eLearning. We posted in 100 words or less the quote and why we thought the quote was significant. Then each member of the discussion posted in 50 words or less a response to our quote to stimulate discussion or to shed new light on our quote.

Most valuable contribution to the discussion
My most “fab” contribution on to the discussion was due to the topic I picked for the quote: synchronous eLearning. Synchronous learning is a vital piece of the larger learning strategies that must be engaged if self-paced learning is to succeed. It is such a vital piece because it incorporates "social instructional values" as learners are required/encourage to communicate with one another to enhance each other’s learning experience. One ways this is beneficial is because synchronous learning is not black and white, that is it doesn't necessarily need to happen at the same time and place for it to be synchronous learning. People can meet economically in a chat room or post comments to a discussion blog, or with a bigger budget in Adobe connect webinar. Either way we can share valuable experience and knowledge with one another via synchronous learning.

My quote:“One of the most important design decisions is whether to make e-learning synchronous or asynchronous.” page 363This quote struck me because I noticed that in taking online instruction we all still have different learning needs. Synchronous and asynchronous learning really is not black and white, but a mixture of real time learning and everybody at different stages. Both can be blended together, but first consider your learners’ needs, consider the learners’ schedules, should they have discussions, do they need motivation…. I think synchronous learning might be useful for projects in different stages, learners using the product can provide synchronous feedback to learners just beginning to use the product."

Discussion responses:
1. I agree Kerry this decision is most important to design. In terms of learners providing the feedback, I found that Jackie Dobrovolny article on self-paced learning in that she states that discussions and conversations are a definite part of self-paced learning has stuck with me. She says adults use conversations in three ways to learn the content: (1)ask or answer questions about the course content, (2)discuss problems the content helped solve and (3)teach a colleague or subordinate. As I indicated in a post in Week 5 it seems natural to me to use learners as part of the feedback process through threaded discussions, e-mails, etc. in the role of coach, mentor, instructor assistants or "Champions" to engage other learners.

2. Kerry - This is always difficult since both learners and content are in constant change. Sometimes it's also helpful to look at the ROI and budget allocation which does drive how to present content. For example, Breeze is a great interactive tool, but one that I cannot afford to use in my design. Email, threaded discussions and phone chats are my modes of interaction with learners.

3. Synchronous learning and $$$...I agree with everyone's assessment of blended learning and how important the decision is on when and how to use each. I think it is a shame that synchronous methods are so often difficult to incorporate because of time and money concerns. This is especially a problem in situations where management outside the training/instructional design department writes all the checks and has to answer to "efficiency" guidelines. While the value can be clear to us, it isn't always the case with corporate management.

4. I to think that e-learning can be synchronous or asynchronous or mixture of both, you just need to decide if it is cost effective to do it one way or the other and keep in mind the advantages of each.

My response: Yes, cost is very important component to consider. I am thinking about cost in a new way, especially since three posts focused on cost. I was intrigued by Linda's info on the ways adults learn content.

Week 5 Discussion: Where’s the Social in Self-Paced Instruction?

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 04:43:00 +0000

Week 5 Discussion: Where’s the Social in Self-Paced Instruction?

What was the discussion about?

In the world of eLearning (in corporate settings, in particular), a lot of our instructional design work is in the service of creating self-paced instruction. Think back to your original stories of great learning experiences that you shared...were any of them self-paced? No. But, that doesn't get us off the hook when determining how we can achieve the common values -- especially the Social value -- when there are no (or limited) learner-to-learner or learner-to-instructor interactions. How should we reconcile our need to create self-paced instruction with our need to reflect the common values in our designs? Or, do we need to reconcile? What strategies do you have for addressing the values in self-paced instruction (or in learning from computers instruction, in general)?

General Overview

This discussion was interesting because it made us probe into the Common Instructional Values. We focused on the Social Instructional Value by pondering how we should reconcile our need to create self-paced instruction with our need to reflect the common values in our designs.

Most students agreed that including self-paced learning is valuable since is adds spice to the blandness of self-pace learning. To “kick-it up a notch,” self-paced learning need to be learner-centered, authentic, engaging, but it also needs to include social instructional values—collaboration, debate, conversation, team work, cooperation, discourse, discussion…ect. One example of how social interaction contributed to self-paced learning was seen in an Audio car forum. The Audio forum didn’t meet the needs of all involved, so the dissatisfied members left the forum to create their own Audio forum. This forum grew into a national forum beckoning members to travel the county to meet face-to-face, in the kitchen no less! They had a different take of things, and quenched their needs by building a new forum using social interaction.

But not everyone agreed that social interaction is fabulous. Some saw value in learning on their own as a way to learn the most since figuring things out and learning by mistake makes a more memorable learning experience.

Most valuable contribution to the discussion

My most “fab” contribution on to the discussion was how self-paced learning is going to revolutionize learning. No more are we going to think of learning as being one-directional: it is not going to come from the hierarchy of expert to student, e.g. author to student, teacher to student. We are going to be using on our own creativity and ingenuity to aide us in our own learning process, and, in addition, we are equally going to us our peers as teachers/mentors/coaches.

Why was this a great contribution?

It reformed the way I view “feedback” from peers. Now, I really see the value social interaction and how I can grow from learning from my peers. I used to take suggestions from my peers as a knock against me/my ideas. But now, I see how their point of view as a way to broaden the way I understand ideas, thus making me a well rounded individual.

2nd Blog

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 21:05:00 +0000

Just making sure I am blogging correctly......this is a test of my personal blogging system....this is only a test....

1st Post--ever!

kerryescobado@gmail.com (Kerry Escobado) — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 20:57:00 +0000

So, this is my very first post to any blog, ever--at least in recent memory! I am feeling sorta proud since its my own blog that I am blogging on for the first time ever.