Manage To Change

Got Game?

Learning is hard.  It takes time, effort, and engagement.  

It's the payoff that keeps us going.

Unfortunately, like exercise or dieting, in many cases learning has been institutionalized as drudgery. What's worse is that for those of us over 35 or 40 we learned how to learn in a way that took all the fun out of it.

Or... should I say we "re-learned" how to learn.  Innately we had it right.  We were born curious and experimental appreciating feedback and adjusting happily when we went down the wrong path.

Somehow, somewhere along the line, educational methodology was adopted that extinguished that joy for many students. Learning became like a failed diet or lapsed gym membership.

This morning, thanks to the Upside Learning Blog I read, Good Video Games and Good Learning, a paper written by James Paul Gee, that started me thinking about how to put the fun back in to learning.

We've all read blog posts or papers about the value of gaming as applied to learning and training environments, but that wasn't Gee's point. Instead, he simply and brilliantly articulated sixteen learning principles, how they are presented in games, and how our current educational methods fare in comparison.  

Here are a few of my favorites:

Interaction: “In a good game, words and deeds are all placed in the context of an interactive relationship between the player and the world. So, too, in school, texts and textbooks need to be put in contexts of interaction where the world and other people talk back.”

Production: "Players help “write” the worlds they live in—in school, they should help “write” the domain and the curriculum they study."

Risk-Taking: "Players are thereby encouraged to take risks, explore, and try new things. In fact, in a game, failure is a good thing."

Customization: "Games often have different difficulty levels and many good games allow players to solve problems in different ways...Customized curricula in school would not just be about self pacing, but about real intersections between the curriculum and the learner’s interests, desires, and styles."

Performance before Competence: "Good video games operate by a principle just the reverse of most schools: performance before competence. Players can perform before they are competent, supported by the design of the game..."

Whether you're a lifelong learner, an educator, or simply fascinated with how people learn, this paper is a must read!  

(Photo from CHC Emerging Tech)

Motivation: Do You Have Drive?

"There's a mismatch between what science knows and what business does." Daniel Pink at TED Talks 2009

According to Dan, what science knows is that when people are offered rewards for simple, structured tasks results improve.  But, when rewards are offered for tasks that are conceptual they have a negative impact on performance.

What business does, especially American business, is almost uniformly attempt to motivate staff through monetary incentives.

The alternative?  Intrinsic rewards: Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose.

This video was an introduction to Dan's new book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. I just ordered my copy.

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reBlog from Ann Michael under: The Scholarly Kitchen

Attending SSP IN!  Here's a post I wrote on the Scholarly Kitchen:

Fifteen years ago would anyone have imagined that Apple, a dying computer company, would come back to life by gaining control of the music business?Ann Michael under, The Scholarly Kitchen, Sep 2009

Read all the coverage of the Society for Scholarly Publishing IN Meeting on the Scholarly Kitchen.

SSP: Are you IN?

Why haven't I been blogging regularly?

One big reason is the Society for Scholarly Publishing (SSP) IN Meeting.

Richard Newman, from the American Medical Society, and I are the co-chairs of the SSP IN meeting.

SSP IN will take over the entire Hotel Providence from September 23rd - 25th. I could tell you all about IN here, but everything you need to know is on the SSP website:

IN is a different kind of conference. It is part symposium, part seminar, and part un-conference. Most of all, it's an opportunity to learn from your colleagues by participating in small groups lead by industry innovators like Kent Anderson (Massachusetts Medical Society, New England Journal of Medicine), Chris Beckett (Atypon Systems), Alex Frost, Thane Kerner (SilverChair), Howard Ratner (Nature Publishing Group), and John Sack (HighWire Press). During IN you'll be the student, the collaborator, and the instructor!

IN was created to address the unprecedented change taking place in today's scholarly publishing industry. Disruptive technologies and business models are changing the market at the same time the global economy presents the most challenging fiscal climate in nearly a century. IN is designed to help you formulate strategies and tactics to take advantage of the opportunities and successfully negotiate the challenges of today's publishing landscape.

If your interested in a highly interactive program and you care about the future of publishing and media, think about coming to IN!!!

Publishing, Nautilus, and Networks

Image by mindseyeimagery via Flickr

The other day I got a LinkedIn group alert from Andrew Spong linking to an article in The Journal of Electronic Publishing entitled Open Access 2.0: Access to Scholarly Publications Moves to a New Phase, by Joseph J. Esposito.

His "Nautilus Model of Scholarly Communications" was a brilliant way to provide a foundation for discussion.  The model is illustrated in the article cited above, but he introduced it in Open Access 2.0 published in The Scientist.

At the "innermost spiral of the shell of a nautilus, where a particular researcher wishes to communicate with a handful of intimates and researchers working in precisely the same area" is where he proposes Open Access is most viable.   He goes on to posit that at "each step away from the center, the role of the publisher grows and the merits of open access diminish."

At the core of the model is the degree to which the participants in the particular ring of the spiral are known to each other.  At the center, they know each other quite well.  As we move out, they do not and "...the publisher's brand is a form of insurance" to the consumer, insurance against wasting time (and, potentially, money).  

Thinking about the widening rings of the nautilus shell as decreasing degrees of familiarity, it seems as though this model is useful to consider more broadly.

• What kinds of products are valuable to [small] networks whose members are very familiar with one another?
• What kinds of products are valuable to networks whose members are NOT familiar with one another?
• What kinds of supporting services are needed in each type of network?

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Twitter: Unintended Consequences

Image via CrunchBase

A couple of months ago, someone to whom I'm connected on Facebook mentioned that I over ran their home page with Twitter updates the last time I was at a conference.

I tend to take conference notes on Twitter.   When I had Twitter feed Facebook updates, my status was being updated every couple of minutes.  It had never occurred to me that I was monopolizing my friends' Facebook home pages!

When I started to look for a way to selectively update Facebook, but still use Twitter the way I wanted to use it, I consulted several of my Twitter connections.

Most of them weren't aware of a solution. 

What really surprised me was that they also said not to worry about it.

I learned two things from this:

1. Experimentation with new things often has unintended consequences.  They may be good or bad, but we should be looking for them.
2. If we're not careful our advocacy of a product, feature, platform (fill in the blank) will actually turn people off, rather than stimulate their interest.  Ignoring feedback is never a good idea.
   

If you're having the same issue I was with updates, there is an application that enables selective Twitter updates to Facebook.  I started using it during Web 2.0 Expo and it works perfectly for me.

PS Someone else (not the source of the original feedback) recently thanked me for updating Facebook more judiciously.

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Look out Rosetta, I’m Hooked on LiveMocha!

I’ve wanted to learn Spanish most of my life, but I’ve never gotten passed a couple of classes in high school and college.

I tried again a few years ago.  Even after spending a few hundred dollars on Rosetta Stone, I stopped using it after a couple of weeks.

That’s about to change thanks to LiveMocha, a social networking site focused on language learning. 

LiveMocha offers me something I was missing, community.  

 

Taking Lessons
Every lesson has four required sections (Learn, Review, Write, Speak) and optional exercises.

The software grades the Learn and Review sections and the optional exercises. The community evaluates the Write and Speak sections.

 

Feedback
One of the most satisfying features of Live Mocha is helping others in the community learn English.  Reviewing submissions is addictive!

In offering feedback, members of the community can type comments and record responses.  The recorded responses are terrific.  They allow the learner to hear the nuances of native pronunciation and sentence formation, much like what we’d hear in a public setting.

As you review exercises and others review your submissions, you start build your personal network. 

I’ve found myself committed to certain connections.  As soon as I see an email (delivered both to my LiveMocha and external email inboxes), I attempt to offer feedback as soon as possible. 

Why It Might Work

• A human connection.
• A large and growing community.  Even without connections, submissions are reviewed relatively quickly.
• Mutual benefit.  Many of my connections are native Spanish speakers learning English. 
• Notifications to external email. Having emails delivered to my inbox has helped me stay engaged.  This is especially true because the emails are from people that need their work reviewed, not marketing copy from a faceless company.
• Free and paid options. There are tutors, exportable content, and other options available to premium subscribers.

It's been almost four weeks now. 

I may not be as far as I’d like, but I’m still engaged.

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Communication is Key

We hear it all the time.

Without effective communication every interpersonal relationship, every goal, every strategy, every organization, is at risk.

Misunderstandings, poor morale, and ineffective relationships rooted in poor communication are commonplace.

Effective communication is hard.  It can be uncomfortable.  It can make people angry with you.

But, it's the only way to solve problems.

When times are difficult and emotions are running high, how can we be sure we're communicating effectively (and respectfully)?

It's time to get back to basics. 

Listen to what others are saying.  Adjust your style to try and connect with them effectively where they are. 

Don't think it's the other person's job to communicate with you no matter where you are on the organizational chart.

Remove yourself emotionally from difficult conversations, at first.  Listen. Ask questions. Stick to the cold, hard facts when assessing a situation. 

However, when it comes time to implement a decision it's time to let emotions back into the picture.  

If you find that a conversation or a topic is annoying you in some way, get another person's perspective.

Effective communication is like exercise.  We all know how to do it.  We all know that we should do it. Yet it's often neglected.

Innovation, Change, and Talent

Florence Foster Jenkins

Florence Foster Jenkins was a singer in the early 1900's who "became famous for her complete lack of rhythm, pitch, tone, and overall singing ability."

What's interesting about Florence, is that she seemed to have no clue that she had no talent.

Florence makes me wonder.

It's easy to listen to her and know she can't sing.  But why didn't she hear that herself?  Was she physically unable (tone deaf, perhaps)?  Was she psychologically unable?

Or, did she know she was "different" and consider herself innovative or ground breaking?

Another case in point, The Shaggs.

"There's an innocence to these songs and their performances that's both charming and unsettling. Hacked-at drumbeats, whacked-around chords, songs that seem to have little or no meter to them ... being played on out-of-tune, pawn-shop-quality guitars all converge, creating dissonance and beauty, chaos and tranquility, causing any listener coming to this music to rearrange any pre-existing notions about the relationships between talent, originality, and ability. There is no album you might own that sounds remotely like this one." (Review of Philosophy of Life written by Cub Koda on allmusic.com)

Who ultimately decides what's innovative and what's just plain bad?

(Full disclosure, I kind of like The Shaggs.)

The Future of Education?

Except for the Super Bowl, I never show much interest in TV commercials.  But last week two new spots from Kaplan University got my attention.

I don't know enough about Kaplan to know if they can deliver on these messages. What I do know is that these messages are on the right track.

Education must change to provide our children with the skills they'll need to collaborate, compete, and flourish in the new world.

Jeff Jarvis did a post called "Hacking Education" where he also included a third video posted on YouTube by Mike Welsh, an Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University.

They're worth watching.