In an ongoing exploration of how to design and develop for mobile learning, I plan to examine many of the products and design paradigms in the mLearning space. In this interview, Michael Gregory, Director of Systems Engineering for Hot Lava Mobile, explains this mobile authoring tool. COACH: How long has Hot Lava Mobile been on the market?  MICHAEL: It’s been available through OutStart since we acquired Hot Lava Software in June 2009.  We saw the need and interest for mobile learning growing and wanted to leap forward by partnering with the early leader in the space.  It worked out well in terms of technology and learning from the experiences of early adopters. COACH: What types of learning solutions have been developed with Hot Lava? mLearning example of Insurance Policy Refresher MICHAEL: Hot Lava Mobile is used to develop and deliver content to mobile devices for a variety of purposes, most of which fall into one of four categories: Reinforcement Training. Leveraging mobile is an ideal way to remind learners of what they have been previously taught by providing follow-up materials as reinforcement.  These could take the form of learning "Snacks" (small refresher modules) or quizzes to stimulate recall for example. Performance Support. Learners can be given access to small chunks of content which provide reminders immediately at the point of need.  Whether it’s procedure lists or interactive checklists, using mobile in this way allows learners to get what they need at the exact moment it is needed. Priority Communications.  We often see Hot Lava Mobile used as a means for executives within an organization to communicate to the workforce.  This frequently takes the form of video delivered to users on their mobile devices. The tracking capabilities of Hot Lava Mobile enable organizations to know which employees have actually taken the content. Feedback Through Surveys and Testing.  There are lots of uses for surveys, whether capturing real-time feedback during a multi-day training event, eliciting employee opinions, or getting input from customers.  The testing capabilities of Hot Lava Mobile provide a means for verifying learner comprehension and retention. COACH: How is the mobile content deployed to the phone? MICHAEL: One of the unique things about Hot Lava Mobile is that you have a choice as to whether it will be delivered through a mobile browser or deployed through a native application installed directly on the device. Content is developed independent of the delivery method or device, and complete results tracking is available through both deployment methods as well. Mobile Browser.  The Hot Lava Mobile Delivery Engine has the intelligence to detect the user’s device type and dynamically scale the content to fit the dimensions of that device.  Hundreds of internet-enabled phone models can be supported using this method. Installed Application.  OutStart provides applications specifically for BlackBerry, iPhone, iTouch,  iPad and Android devices (with others on the way).  Content is downloaded to the application and consumed locally, which allows for learning to take place even when the user doesn’t have connectivity, such as when on board a plane.  Results are captured locally and automatically synchronized when connectivity is re-established. Example of mobile support: Diesel Engine Checklist COACH: On which mobile devices does Hot Lava Mobile work? MICHAEL: Hot Lava Mobile supports basic cell phones, smartphones, and tablets.  Device-specific applications are available for BlackBerry, iPhone, iTouch, iPad and Android devices, with others to be supported in the future. COACH: For those interested in tracking usage, how does Hot Lava work in this capacity? MICHAEL: User activity is tracked by the Hot Lava Mobile Delivery Engine (MDE). For browser-based delivery, tracking is real-time, as content is delivered directly from MDE to their browser. Results such as pages viewed, test scores, and survey responses are automatically tracked for reporting purposes. The device-specific applications provide the same level of tracking. Results are stored locally on the device and are automatically synchronized back to MDE at a configurable time interval, or when connectivity is available. Because OutStart views mobile learning as a component of an overall learning strategy rather than a standalone application, Hot Lava Mobile also supports standards-based integration with Learning Management Systems, which allows an LMS to serve as the central point for course administration and tracking for all types of learning, including mobile. COACH: Can you describe the development environment? In other words, how does a developer go about creating content? MICHAEL: Content authoring is accomplished through extensions to the familiar PowerPoint authoring environment with intuitive extensions for creating surveys, quizzes and assessments. COACH: What are some common mistakes instructional designers make when creating their first mobile learning/performance support applications? MICHAEL: The biggest things that people often forget when they first deploy mobile applications are usually the differences between both the form factor of the hardware and the usage patterns between computer-based learning and mobile learning. For example: A PowerPoint presentation that looks fine on a computer screen may look cramped or unreadable on the smaller display of a mobile device.  Use larger fonts, and don’t put too much on a page. While it’s not unusual for users to spend as much as an hour or more in a computer-based course, you won’t get nearly that much of their time in a mobile course.  Most successful implementations we see use 3 to 5 minutes as their maximum target length per mobile module. You can learn more about the authoring tool at Hot Lava Mobile. Join me on Twitter and Facebook for more instructional design, eLearning and graphic resources. Post from: The eLearning CoachMobile Authoring Tools: Hot Lava Mobile

The definition of e-learning has always been vague but in my view one of the tests of proper e-learning is the inclusion of learning interactions. But in the last year I have seen increasing use of video positioned as e-learning. Whole platforms like Videojug or Learnable rely on video as the sole vehicle for learning and a lot of m-learning is also adopting the ‘learn by watching a video’ approach. But can we really learn simply by watching a video? A couple of years ago I delivered a seminar at Learning Technologies with the Sponge team where we looked at whether or not we could learn from watching a documentary on TV. We didn’t have a definitive answer - it was done more to provoke some thinking on how we use video and in particular documentary techniques when building e-learning programmes. I guess that when we watch a documentary most of us will say that we have learned something new - but that learning is quite shallow. Watch a documentary tonight on ‘Global Warming’ and in the morning we will be able to reel off some interesting facts but one week later the forgetting curve has kicked in and we will struggle to be able to recall anything other than the fact that it was a ‘good documentary’. As for actually changing our behaviour - in other words applying the learning - well the chance of that is pretty minimal. Of course true learning is best seen as a path or a cycle: You are exposed to something new You then interpret the new information You then try out what you have learned Finally you reflect on how it all went In Kolb’s Experiential Learning Cycle this roughly equates to the four phases of watching, thinking, doing, and feeling. Learning is the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of experience. Knowledge results from the combination of grasping experience and transforming it. David Kolb Watching a video may fulfil the first two stages but won’t help much with Stages 3 and 4. In many ways a lot of so-called learning actually only makes it to Stage 2 - but good learning online or offline completes all four stages. Don’t get me wrong - I love the immediacy that video brings to e-learning programmes, but video alone will not deliver the full learning experience. It needs to be supported by a range of learning interactions preferably both online and offline. Try it for yourself. Here are some examples of video used for learning. Which works best for you? Vimeo - The Credit Crisis Khan Academy - Evolution and Natural Selection Videojug - How to calculate percentages  

Three days in, we’ve found our groove, everything’s running smoothly and only two days worth of classes are left! For this post, I’d like to highlight the activities on our Third Grade Symbaloo: Tynker: self-paced, 11-lesson set designed to walk students through the basics of coding. The login credentials are the same as the kids use for Google Apps: their full NCS email address and their Google Apps password. Upon logging in, click the blue robot in the circle to access the lessons I’ve selected. BONUS! The good folks at Tynker added a NEW section today specifically for Hour of Code (you see it once you log in.) Tynker is our main focus this week, provided the service works for us in class (it did not last year.) Kids will however be able to select ANY of these activities in class based on their interest and ability. I also want to encourage my students to try Tynker at home. Please do - and let me know how they like it! Hour of Code Course #1, Stage 3: solve puzzles to learn the basics of coding! These are our go-to activities in Kindergarten and 1st grade and might be a good refresher for second graders. Hour of Code, Course #1, Stage 4: building on Stage 3, the blocks and programming get slightly more complicated, but not too much so. Everyone loves Angry Birds! Hour of Code, Course #1, Stage 5: More Angry Birds, but this set of activities focuses on debugging or correcting the code. Google Blockly - Maze: can you code "Pegman" to complete the series of progressively more challenging mazes! Hour of Code Course 2: this is the ENTIRE 20-HOUR Hour of Code Course #2 for kids who can read but are new to programming. Some of the activities are included above; plenty of others, including the offline ones, are not. Light-Bot: one of the best single activities available, this activity (revamped for this year) requires students to program a robot to light up squares as he walks. The coding takes place by dragging and dropping blocks onto a grid. You remove them by dragging them off. Some of the higher level puzzles can be tricky. Bot-Logic: more of a logic game than a programming lesson, this activity challenges kids to move a robot through a series of increasingly more complicated mazes. Watch out! You’ll be required to add loops and other interactive components to complete them all! Getting Started with Scratch: a simple project designed to show how the programming language Scratch operates. Refer to the "Step Index" on the right and follow the instructions. Dancing Yeti: drag and drop code blocks to create a unique dance for the Yeti to perform! Many easy to manipulate variables. Learn to Code with Elsa - kids can write code to have Elsa create drawings - from simple to complex! There you have it! On to Day 4! -kj-

Short of performing a science fiction mind-meld, how can you efficiently transfer content from the brain of a subject matter expert (SME) into a form you can use? In case you’re new at this, instructional designers often interview subject matter experts to access their stream of knowledge. SMEs will often provide you with content resources and will also review design documents, scripts, media assets and test questions for accuracy. Leveraging the knowledge of SMEs is one reason that instructional designers are content neutral. The Expert Brain Working with a SME is unique, because by definition, this individual is an expert and most likely, you are a novice. (See The Expert’s Brain for more on expert-novice differences.) Not only are you dependent on the SME for basic knowledge, the two of you may have conflicting ideas on how a course should be designed and what it should include. You can think of working with a SME in three phases: Preparation, Interview and Follow-up. Below are guidelines for each phase. Feel free to add your personal guidelines in the Comments section below. And at the end of this article is a SME Content Collection Form you can download. Phase 1: The Prep Work At all costs, don’t walk into a meeting with a SME knowing nothing about the subject. Your questions will be more intelligent and you’ll be better able to drill down if you are a little knowledgeable about the content. Guidelines for Preparation: Request documentation and resources prior to the interview. Then review these or do research on your own to get some background knowledge prior to the meeting. Prepare interview questions ahead of time. Request permission to record the interview. Although you’ll be taking notes like a fanatic, the recorded version will be greatly appreciated when you don’t understand your notes. Bring a supply of paper and pencils so your SME can diagram processes, procedures and structures. You can also sketch to visually explain your ideas or understanding to the SME. Establish what the meeting will accomplish, how it will be run and the types of questions you will ask. Explain this to your expert ahead of time, giving him or her time to prepare if needed. Phase 2: The Interview Be sure your SME knows that you are appreciative of his or her time and busy schedule. Remember to record the interview for later reference if you have permission. You may want to remind the SME that you know very little about his or her domain of expertise. Narrow the focus of the interview to the specific skills and tasks targeted for training. It’s difficult for experts to minimize information—they know so much. You may have to politely ask, "Does a person really need to know that in order to perform the task?" You may want to read and use the Five Moments of Need model to avoid getting a brain dump. Ask questions that allow you to drill down to the level of content you need. Take notes (on a laptop) and at appropriate points, repeat back what you heard in a summary form. You may wish to use a Content Collection Form. See the download link at the end of this article. Encourage your expert to draw diagrams and mind maps whenever it will help you better understand the content. Ask what types of visuals will be most effective for explaining abstract concepts. Use your best listening skills. Establish a procedure for contacting your SME with questions. Phase 3: Follow-up If your head is not exploding by the end of the interview, something probably went wrong. You will most likely feel a compulsion to get everything organized immediately, before the delicate puzzle pieces fall out of place. Follow that instinct. Review your notes and clean them up so the information is clear. Organize them into a form that will still make sense to you in a few weeks or months. Listen to the recording to catch important details you missed in your notes. Indicate where there are gaps in the information. You might be able to fill these in yourself if you have reference sources. Or place these in your question list for the SME (see below). Through the design and development process, collect all of your SME questions in one place. Then email or set up a call when you’ve accumulated a good number of them. This minimizes the number of times you disturb your SME. Download: SME Content Collection Form This SME Content Collection Form was created by Abigail Wheeler, a learning and development project manager at a firm that consults to government agencies and nonprofit organizations. Follow her on Twitter: @abigrace. Thanks, Abigail! Join me on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter for more on instructional design, eLearning and multimedia.   Post from: The eLearning CoachHow To Brain Sync With A Subject Matter Expert

Hour of Code this week has been a terrific success! Kids have had a fantastic time exploring and coding, despite the challenges we faced with slow and inaccessible websites. As we prepare to finish the week, I wanted to highlight our Kindergarten activities, which can be found on the Symbaloo, below: I don’t have pictures yet (hope to remember to take some today) of the highlight of our Kindergarten #hourofcode experience - an "offline," "non-technology" activity in which a student "programs" another student to walk a certain path along our colorful foam mats to pick up our Webkinz class mascot, Gumdrop. I will try to remember to get some pics today, but, this is what it looked like last year: One student was the "coder," the other was the "actor" and everyone else cheered them on. It’s been great all week! Here are the websites kids can use to explore coding: Hour of Code Course #1, Stage 3: solve puzzles to learn the basics of coding! Hour of Code, Course #1, Stage 4: building on Stage 3, the blocks and programming get slightly more complicated, but not too much so. Everyone loves Angry Birds! Hour of Code, Course #1, Stage 5: More Angry Birds, but this set of activities focuses on debugging or correcting the code. Tynker: self-paced, 11-lesson set designed to walk students through the basics of coding. The login credentials will be provided to parents under separate cover.  The login process, and the actual activities, are best handled with a parent or older sibling. Hour of Code, Stage 7: These puzzles involve getting a bee to collect some nectar. Very similar to the prior stages but with words incorporated on the programming symbols. Might help to have a parent or older sibling nearby. Hour of Code, Stage 8: No more puzzles here - students program a robot to draw pictures! Bot-Logic: more of a logic game than a programming lesson, this activity challenges kids to move a robot through a series of increasingly more complicated mazes. Watch out! You’ll be required to add loops and other interactive components to complete them all. <= THIS WAS OUR GO-TO APP FOR KINDERGARTEN! IT IS SIMPLE, ELEGANT AND EFFECTIVE! Light-Bot: one of the best single activities available, this activity (revamped for this year) requires students to program a robot to light up squares as he walks. The coding takes place by dragging and dropping blocks onto a grid. You remove them by dragging them off. Some of the higher level puzzles can be tricky! That’s all for now! Hope you enjoy these activities as much as we have! Best, Mr. Jarrett

If you are a learning and development professional interested in innovative approaches to learning then it’s definitely worth trying to get to this year’s Learning Technologies Show at London’s Olympia on Wednesday 25th and Thursday 26th January. This year I will be assisting on the WillowDNA stand (Stand 124), but I will also be out and about catching up on the latest tools and technologies. This year I’m expecting a lot of the focus to be on m-learning and also social/informal learning platforms. Lisa Minogue-White from WillowDNA will be running a FREE seminar describing how we developed a range of online CPD programmes based on learning paths for the Institute for Practitioners in Advertising (IPA). It’s on Thursday at 13.15 in Seminar Theatre 5. In fact this year there are three learning events running over the same two days at Olympia: Learning Technologies Learning and Skills Learning without Frontiers It’s an un-missable opportunity to get up to speed on a whole range of new developments and approaches in L&D. See you there!

Some lessons learned while designing my first reference and performance support app.Post from: The eLearning CoachDesigning An iPhone App: Instructional Design Guru

Apple announced two very interesting new developments today for those involved in online learning. iBooks2 eBooks get multimedia and interactivity embedded in the pages. This is an interesting development considering I have just been blogging about ‘learning from reading’ and ‘learning from watching video‘. iBooks2 even allows notetaking which pleases me immensely since I just blogged about the value of notetaking last month for 24Tips. The new textbooks offer a host of functions which experts say will transform teaching - including images that turn into slideshows, links from the body text into glossaries, and multiple choice tests which are instantly assessed. Students will be able to create notes by highlighting text with their fingers, and then review all of their notes in one place - instantly creating a tailormade set of study cards. Guardian Online Learn More: Review on Engadget iTunes U The most significant development though for e-learning is iTunes U. Apparently iTunes U has been around for some time but this new app provides a really cool interface for online learning. One of my favourite sayings was ‘If only Apple built an LMS.’ Well now it appears that they have. For me LMS’ have often been about the ‘MS’ not the ‘L’. Primarily they have been designed to enable L&D to manage learners and content as efficiently as possible. Well Apple’s approach has firmly placed the ball in the learner’s court. If only Apple built an LMS. John Curran iTunes U works in a similar way to other stuff on iTunes (music, video, apps). You browse the catalog, click to install, enter your password and bingo it downloads to your iOS device. Currently all courses on iTunes U are free - most of it is provided by leading universities (see list of links at the end of this post). I guess this is Apple moving into the potentially lucrative education space by initially supporting Open Courseware, while the universities are experimenting with the freemium model. Or maybe I am too cynical and it’s all a genuine attempt to make the world a better place. I have only had a brief look at a couple of courses but they are quite comprehensive and clearly would have needed a reasonable amount of investment on the part of the universities. Other ‘courses’ however, such as some of those from Oxford University seem little more than a list of audio files - but it’s likely that this is legacy content from the initial version of iTunes U. One key downside is that courses are asynchrounous - they are designed primarily for self-study. iTunes U appears to lack the ‘social learning’ activities that are becoming so popular in new LMS’. More significantly the content authoring platform is available to educational institutions ONLY. As a learning designer working in the non-education space I don’t appear to have any way of building programmes in iTunes U. That feels a lot like discrimination. Why not make the service open to all - surely a suitable business model could be identified? One request please Apple - can we lose the iTunes when we’re not actually selling tunes? What about iOSU? Here’s a very quick tour of an Open University course in iTunes U: Learn More: Review of iBooks2 and iTunes U Open University on iTunes U Oxford University on iTunes U Stanford University on iTunes U Related: Hack Education Inside Higher Ed

Podcasts are the only way I know to learn without taking away from tasks that must get done.Post from: The eLearning CoacheLearning Podcasts (and a few others)

Hate being out of school but love talking about the learning in my classroom. Here are the presentations I’m sharing at NJASA’s TECHSPO conference in Atlantic City today.