Starting on March 17th anybody who requires assistance with subscriptions, website registration and so forth will need to wait until the 29th. I (Paul) will be travelling and likely without any internet access during that time. I will survey emails when I get back, but older forum posts will not get scanned, so if you have an issue related to the those things, please send me mail (paul@linuxaudiosystems.com) rather than assume that a forum post will lead to action - it will not. Friendly users and some developers will likely still answer other questions posted to the forums, so don't feel limited in that respect. read more

We discuss the trends and issues we observed during the weeks of March 14-24 as we flipped resources into our Flipboard magazine (http://bit.ly/trendsandissues). We have five trends that we discuss. Virtual Reality remains a trend. The Oculus Rift has finally shipped. Microsoft’s Holo Lens was in the news as well with different applications being developed. Online […] Tags:   Del.icio.us Facebook TweetThis Digg StumbleUpon Comments:  0 (Zero), Be the first to leave a reply!Copyright © Trends & Issues [Episode 60 Trends for March 14-27 VR, Online Learning, Neuroscience & Cognitive Theory], All Right Reserved. 2016.

We’ve been revamping our mining safety training e-learning library, in case you didn’t know. What does that mean? Well, we’ve added a BUNCH of new courses, for one thing. We’ve spruced up older titles, adding new information when relevant and improving our graphics (our 3D animation capabilities become more and more impressive every year). And we’ve broken some of the courses up into shorter, more "bite-sized" learning activities to make them easier to watch and more effective learning experiences. One of the courses we’ve updated is our General Physical Characteristics of Surface Mines (great for Part 46 New Miner and Annual Refresher, by the way). To show that off a bit and give you a free training resource, we’ve taken some of the terms, definitions, and images from that course and made the free interactive glossary below. Feel free to flip through the glossary and see if you know what’s what. You can come back and watch this as many times as you want. Plus, you can send this links to others, too, so they can check it out and use it. Even better, we’re going to make this glossary available as a free download in the short-term future, so check back for that. Convergence Training is a training solutions provider. We offer mining safety e-learning courses, general EHS e-learning courses, custom training solutions, a learning management system (LMS) specially designed for mining safety and MSHA compliance, and more. Contact us to set up a demo, view full-length demos of the courses, or to just ask a question. Plus, while you’re here, why not download our free guide to online mining safety training? Here it is. Hope you enjoy it. Here’s a short sample of the General Physical Characteristics of Surface Mines course that we took these images from. Once we’ve made this glossary available as a free download (that’s coming soon, we’ve just got some behind-the-scenes work to do first), you can download it, import it into any SCORM-compliant learning management system (LMS), and deliver/play/view the glossary from there. If you’re looking for an LMS, we’ve got several, including our Mining Safety LMS with special features specifically intended for MSHA Part 46 compliance.  Check out the overview below for more information about our Mining Safety LMS. And hey, while you’re here, why now download this free guide to online mining safety training?   The post Free Surface Mine Physical Environment Interactive Glossary appeared first on Convergence Training Blog.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last year and a half, you know that this is an election year. Not only is this a Congressional election year, but this year, we are also charged with the enormous task of electing a new President of the United States - and leader of the […] The post Using Countable During an Election Year appeared first on Teaching with Technology.

All over the world, eLearning professionals are tossing and turning in their beds. They’re waking up in cold sweats, muttering things about ‘compatibility’ and ‘M-Learning’. The constant winds of change are taking their toll on our psyches. We couldn’t let you suffer in silence any longer. So we set out to do some research and find out what’s playing on your minds.  We all know that training has shifted, shifted, and shifted again. It’s changing at such a pace that we can’t even keep up. As soon as we think we’ve nailed a way to engage employees, improve performance, and retain good talent, a new method, new technology, a new study, or a new concern pops up. We decided that to tackle these problems effectively; we have to prioritize. That’s why we took a survey asking hundreds of eLearning professionals at the front lines of the industry what challenges they’re preoccupied with, and what’s keeping them from getting their head down at night. Here’s what we found:

"Colors aren’t important." Oh yeah - then how do you explain traffic lights, warning signs, and rainbows? Color is important, and it’s time we pay attention to color in eLearning too. Learning is a difficult field to understand, and there’s so much research out there discussing these issues that it’s hard to know where to begin. What’s pretty obvious though is that color plays an key role in creating an environment that fosters learning. So let’s talk about color - What colors help learning? What colors might be annoying or distracting to online learners? And how can we mitigate that risk? That’s what we’ll be delving into here.

A quick search of the almighty Internet reveals that there is no end to the amount of advice on how to do just about any job better. ELearning is no different. While plowing through dozens of blogs, articles, and how-to sites will likely garner you quite a bit of good information, it will also take up valuable time you could use actually to design and improve your craft. So, because a big part of our job is to make you better and more successful at your job, we’ve compiled a list of top elearning blogs for 2016 to ramp up your design skills and stay on top of the industry. Quick tip: use the handy Feedly app to organize the blog content you want to read. 

Like the King of Pop once sang "it doesn’t matter if its black or white…as long as you use good, complementary choices from the color wheel." Ok, maybe those weren’t the exact lyrics, but the point is that color, regarding its place in eLearning design, is quite significant and knowing how to use it can make or break your eLearning courses.  So, how do you decide what colors go where and how? The answer can be found in the spinning wonder we know as The Color Wheel. That spiffy, rainbow-hued circle you were likely introduced to all the way back in elementary school is actually an extremely useful tool for creating seamless, organized designs.

The blogosphere has been abuzz with talk of the Millennial generation for a while now - and we’ve talked about designing eLearning for them ourselves. But the times are a-changing, and now it’s time to start thinking about the next gen. Born after the mid 90s and raised in the 2000s, this new ‘Generation Z’  workforce is set to account for 20 percent of working adults by the year 2020. With this in mind, we would be looking at a unique situation of four distinct generations working alongside one another, including Baby Boomers, and the infamous generations X and Y.  As an industry, it’s time that we start thinking about tomorrow’s workforce today. Companies need to plan to educate, train, and recruit these young workers.

The benefits of Big Data mentioned in the previous post would on the surface give us cause to adapt the whole regimen as very worthwhile in the design of learning experiences. Having the ability to produce Big Data that is individualized to each learner should enable us not only to reach that elusive goal of instruction designed to the strengths and weaknesses of individual learners but also when a case is needed to present to education ministry administrators for the purpose of increased funding.  There is also the great benefit of the efficiency and expediency that Big Data affords. In terms of efficiency, the ability to stream strategies saves time in the design of learning experiences that is not only noticeable when employed in the education sector but also in the learning culture of business organizations.Credit: Surya P. MohapatraDespite these benefits, there also exists some serious ethical concerns to be wary of.Credit: www.news.mit.eduGate Keepers of Big Data: In the previous post, I posted the Latin phrase: " Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?", which loosely translated means: "Who is to watch over the guardians themselves?"  With the incredible amount of data being produced every day on individuals in society in the online world, a very informative personal open dossier of individuals is available. Although this dossier has a vast amount of information on an individual, it does not mean that all the collected information is absolutely accurate or even true at all. Consider the fact that companies such as Google have and promote extensive services that include: email, document storage and processing, news, Web browsing, scheduling, maps, location tracking, video and photo sharing, voice mail, shopping, social networking and other tools of interest to users. From these information producing tools, personal data is collected, stored and cross-referenced. There are a number of important questions that need to be asked in regards to privacy:Who will have access to this personal Big Data and for what motives?Will this Big Data be protected from unauthorized access by individuals with motives other than the improvement of education for the learners? Data breaches of customer data is not science fiction but a serious reality and in the business world digital espionage is something to be prepared for. Are we ready?  Credit: www.fortune.comWill governments use educational Big Data to improve the quality of real education for learners or will they use it for self promoted political agendas to slap down political opponents where learners and their schools, instructors and education districts are just pawns in a larger game?Will learners themselves have access to the Big Data collected on them as well as the interpretations of that personal data?If Big Data is the basis for decisions that will have an effect on the actions taken "in the best interest" of the learner, the whole path that the life of a learner will follow may be determined in ways that violate the learner's goals and future occupation. 2. Reducing Human Beings to Just Numbers: The concept of profiling learners can lead to the        dehumanization of learners. People can become just collections of objects and collections of facts rather than living, breathing thinking unique individuals. It is the extreme application of objective judgment.3. Lying With Statistics: Correlation of data does not prove causation! The motives of the handlers and interpreters of Big Data always needs to examined. It is very easy in the heat of debate, especially in the political realm, to jump to purposed conclusions using Big Data and forget how many people's lives are going to be changed based on the interpretation of the Big Data.Credit: www.instructionaldesignandtraining.blogspot.comQuestion: Do we have effective protocols in place to handle educational Big Data and address the ethics of using it?Next.... Positive suggestions to address the concerns with educational Big Data