Assessing reading ability is a very difficult task. This is because reading is very complex. What exactly are readers doing when they read? How do they understand what they read? At this day in age, I think we are more aware that reading is one of the most important skills that we need. It is […]

"it pisses me off that business schools virtually ignore sales, while fawning over marketing" - Tom Peters Marketing is relatively easy to teach. Doing sales takes time, practice, and feedback. It’s fairly obvious why universities prefer to teach marketing. I don’t know of any programs where students do real sales calls. I guess that’s for after graduation. Using the perspective of the 70:20:10 model (Experience, Exposure, Education) we should focus our efforts on maximizing our workplace experiences for learning. If we learn ~70% from experience, we should at least develop some practices to learn as we work. For the most part, our learning and development departments don’t help us learn as we work. They provide interventions that take us away from work (courses) or negate the need to learn (performance support). Educational institutions let graduates walk out the door and then get to work, with co-op programs being the exception. How we make sense of our work and continue to learn at the edge of our expertise is mostly left to individuals. To learn as we work, first of all we have to do things. We learn from doing the new. If we are not doing anything new, we are not learning. In an age of increasing automation, doing new work is how we stay ahead of the machines and algorithms. Personal knowledge mastery is one framework for individuals to take control of their professional development. Combine this with groups of co-workers working out loud and it creates the foundation for experiential learning at work: the 70%. The 70:20:10 model is not based on formal education. It is a way to ensure that we do not overly focus on training and education. We learn from experience, but only if we have new experiences and pay attention to them. Experience is the execution of education and exposure. Image: The Works, by Tom Peters  

  This is my first experiment creating a vlog-style video for a blog post. If you have never watched a vlog or other informal-style videos, you may not like this format.  I can already see things that I would do differently next time, but I hope you enjoy this little experiment and learn something in the process. The first part of the video is just my day traveling from Phx to Litmos HQ in Dublin CA. Was it necessary? Maybe not. But hey, that's what experiments are for, right? In the second half of the video I respond to a couple comments about my recent post about mobile learning: The Future of Mobile Devices, Mobiles Software, and Mobile Learning. The comments were made on LinkedIn and can be found here. Are you experimenting with video for eLearning? Are you considering video as part of your mobile learning strategy? Don't be afraid to experiment. Let me know if you give it a go. @Litmos The post The eLearning Blog Vlog - Answering Comments on Mobile Learning appeared first on Litmos.

Craig Weiss tops the 2015 Movers & Shakers list for the corporate elearning industry. He’s an LMS analyst and his influential blog, Elearning 24/7 is read by people in more than 150 countries.Weiss is a regular speaker at key elearning events around the world and we caught up with him at the OEB conference. In this frank interview, he shares his peeves about the elearning industry as well as his view on LMS trends and 70:20:10.What do you love most about elearning?I’m very passionate about it and what I love most about elearning is that it can change your life. Any topic that you think of can be done with online learning, anything. You don’t need technical skills, you can learn in your own time, you’re not waiting for an instructor and you can utilise your own learning style. I believe online learning gives people the power to increase comprehension, boost retention and enables them to synthesise knowledge and build from that skill set.But at the end of the day, if we strip everything away, it comes down to how the course was built. An engaging interactive course is going to be significantly more successful than what we call static elearning, which is where the course just has pictures and lots of text.What do you think is the most exciting emerging trend in the LMS space? "There are enormous metric and big data possibilities and it could lead to something really visionary - a personalised learning experience for each learner."There are so many trends but I would say the most exciting is what I call deep learning. This is where the LMS utilises a series of variables and uses an early stage of artificial intelligence to recommend courses based on what the learner is currently taking or recently completed. So it’s an automated experience and it’s eventually going to not only tell you the courses it recommends, but also the videos, the documents and all the curation. Then there is a third stage - which no-one’s at yet - where the LMS has the ability to identify a curriculum plan or a learning path and it’s all specifically tailored for you. To me this is the most exciting piece, it could be revolutionary. There are enormous metric and big data possibilities and it could lead to something really visionary - a personalised learning experience for each learner. This is almost like an LMS within an LMS, where everything is specifically tailored to that person and each person becomes their own learning community.What frustrates you most with the LMS and elearning industry?I have three big pet peeves. One is that from the vendor standpoint the people showing you how to use the products are typically salespeople or technical people, they don’t have a training or L&D background.The second peeve I have with the industry is we use too much jargon. We use too many words that we think everybody will know what we means, and also too many words that don’t necessarily mean what they should. For example, mobile learning, which only means that you can view something in a mobile web browser - that’s it. But consumers tend to think it means they can do everything in that device.The other big peeve I have, a huge one, is that generally consumers are no longer doing due diligence ahead of time before buying an LMS. You know, when I was looking for an LMS on the corporate training side, I would do the research, get estimates and book a demo. But what often happens today is people go to the vendor’s website and just blast out a request for proposal (RFP) that’s been created and that’s how they make their decision - they think that’s going to solve all their problems. But what I tend to find after speaking to people, is that they end up hating the LMS. Why? They didn’t do due diligence, even though it’s taken them a year to find an LMS. It makes no sense when you’ve got more information than ever before, you could hire an expert to help and focus instead on all the other things you need to be doing.You’ve written on your blog recently about why you think the 70-20-10 framework isn’t applicable for elearning. Can you explain your thinking? "Things change and technology has changed the way people learn."It was devised for classroom-based learning first and foremost. The terms formal and informal were defined for classroom-based learning. You don’t have to apply those today for online learning. I think they’re outdated terms so you’ve got part of that as a factor. And the other factor is that with 70-20-10 you have to break it down into separate pieces but online learning crosses between them. 70-20-10 is ‘siloing’ and elearning is doing it as a collective the whole, but if you only see elearning as a delivery mechanism than I can see why you would think 70:20:10 is the complete answer. But if you see elearning as the evolution of learning, which is what it is, then and the 70-20-10 is no longer applicable because it relies too much on the one variable being the model rather than the person. Things change and technology has changed the way people learn.For more about Craig Weiss visit www. elearninfo247.comThe post Craig Weiss on elearning peeves, trends and 70:20:10 appeared first on Sponge UK.

Top 7 Internet Tools to Brainstorm Ideas for Your MOOC https://t.co/VD59fXTg46 #elearning

Earlier this year, I was  invited to speak to a group of mumpreneurs, hosted by the fabulous company, Mums in Technology, to share my thoughts on ‘how to run a successful business’. In the workshop, we explored some questions like: What is success? What is a successful business? Can you ‘achieve’ success? How can you create success? It was a small room, with a creche in one corner for the mums’ babies (so apologies for the video angle), but I hope that by watching this video of the first 16 minutes of the 90-minute workshop I ran, you’ll be able to reflect on what ‘success’ means to you, and what you can do differently to help you achieve it.   Like this? You’ll love this free webinar on the 14th Dec 2015 at 16:30 GMT on: ‘How to create a winning start-up strategy’. Click here to find out more… Did you find the video interesting? Would you like to see the rest of the workshop? Let me know what you thought in the comments below…

This challenge is to make in interactive graphic about what people love & hate about e-learning, but I only saw love. Read more...

So at School we use a lot of cloud based systems, Frog, Sleuth, Google, Go4Schools, SISRA, ClickView, RMBooks, The Suite, VMWare to name a few, so despite owning a dictionary I was slowly running out of passwords. It was the same for all staff and students, so we rolled out RM Unify to help.. There are basically three types of tiles (basically the links) in RM Unify: Fully Integrated (ClickView, RMBooks, Google Apps for Edu, Frog) - here Unify communicates user credentials with the the service, so once into Unify you don’t need a separate password or username at all. Saved Password (Sleuth, Prezi, Room Booking System, Kerboodle, TES)- Where you enter your username and password on your first use, then it remembers it and logs you in from then on. Unsupported - basically just Go4Schools who sadly don’t integrate with anything, so its a link to the log in page. In the latest update, on a  Chromebook, RMUnify can pick up the user credentials - so users get straight in without the need for a password (provided they are logged into the Chroembook on their school account). In turn RM Unify is providing easy access to all our systems, the use of the systems is going up (presumably because people don’t get locked out) and the requests for password reseting is down.

Google Chrome is awesome. Surely, the vast majority of the world knows this fact. It’s user-friendly and super fast. It travels well…meaning of course that your extensions, favorites, etc travel with you, even if you’re not working at your computer!! Many websites that teachers frequently use run best using Google Chrome. It’s just wonderful. I recently conducted a professional […] The post A "Techy" Teacher’s Toolbox: Chrome Extensions appeared first on Teaching with Technology.

Hearing T is for Training host Maurice Coleman unexpectedly and creatively expand the definition of augmented reality during a discussion on the show earlier today made me realize, once again, how inadequately our language and nomenclature represents our quickly- and ever-evolving training-teaching-learning world. As Maurice, Jill Hurst-Wahl, and I were talking about the intersection of lifelong learning and individual learning events, I was describing the wonderful experiences I had as a trainer-teacher-learner attending the LearniT! Technology Adoption Summit here in San Francisco earlier this week. What I was describing to Maurice and Jill was how LearniT! Vice President of Professional Development Jennifer Albrecht had, in her sessions, very creatively used every inch of the learning space and had, in providing a steady stream of additional resources, inspired me to pull out my tablet a couple of times, log into our local library’s online catalog, and place reserves on those books so I could continue my learning after leaving the classroom. And that’s when Maurice made the connection: by expanding the classroom, in the moment, by connecting it virtually to the library, I was augmenting the experience in a significant way that further extended the learning as well as the learning space. Augmented_Reality_at_NMC_2015_Conference[1]-2015-06-08Most of us familiar and intrigued with current definitions of augmented reality would, up to that moment, have envisioned the term as referring to overlays on a computer, or mobile-device, or wearable technology screen that provide additional information about an environment we’re visiting or studying. But I think Maurice was spot on with his observation: using my tablet to augment Jennifer’s list of resources by accessing them through a library catalog is no less significant than what we have, up to this moment, pictured when discussing and exploring the concept. And I could just as easily have augmented that particular learning reality by using the same tablet to find ebook versions of those works and downloading them immediately. Engaging in this augmentation of a definition of augmented reality made me realize how inadequately the term itself reflects the levels of augmentation we already are taking for granted. It also made me return to other situations where commonly-used terms no longer adequately suggest the nuances of what those terms suggest. Augmented reality via Google Cardboard The term mobile learning, for example, suggests the (often-wretched) formal-learning modules that allow us to continue our learning asynchronously on mobile devices rather than having to be in a physical classroom or other learning space. But many of us have come to acknowledge that those formal-learning modules are only a small part of a much larger mobile-learning landscape that includes a wide range of possibilities. Mobile learning can include just-in-time learning that is no more challenging than using a mobile device to find an online article, video (e.g., a TED talk), or other resource that quickly fills the learning gap. It can include participation in a Google Hangout via mobile devices. It can include exchanges between onsite and online colleagues reacting to learning opportunities in conference settings. It can include an informal exchange of information between us as learners and a colleague, mentor, or other learning facilitator who teaches us something via a mobile phone or tablet at the moment when we need that level of "mobile learning"; and given that informal learning provides a huge part of workplace learning, we clearly are underestimating the reach and significance of mobile learning if all the term conjures up for us is the image of formal learning modules viewed on a mobile device. In the same way, the words "libraries" and "classrooms" are beginning to overlap and expand in interesting ways as libraries feature stimulating state-of-the-art learning spaces that are at times indistinguishable from other state-of-the-art learning spaces. The words "librarian" and "teacher" and "learning facilitator" are also beginning to represent interesting and nuanced variations on professions with increasingly overlapping functions and goals. This is not meant to suggest that our training-teaching-learning nomenclature is completely obsolete. Quite to the contrary, it connects us to very deep roots from which incredibly dynamic branches are developing. And one of our many challenges is to not only observe and acknowledge the growth of those branches, but to help shape them in small and large ways—just as Maurice did, in the moment, during our latest T is for Training conversation. N.B.: An archived recording of today’s episode of T is for Training remains available online through the T is for Training site. 

The American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN) provides news, information, and continuing education about the latest evidence-based research and best practices in acute and critical care nursing. When updating its Essentials of Critical Care Orientation (ECCO) online program, AACN decided to create more experiential learning through patient case studies. Long used in medical education, patient case studies provide examples to learn by. In the new 77 hours of online ECCO training, case studies drive a scenario-based experience in which nurses care for virtual patients, make real-time care decisions, and receive performance feedback through natural consequences. In developing the curriculum and instruction with AACN, Enspire has gained knowledge and experience on how to design scenario-based training for nurses. Think Like a Nurse Critical care nursing is a highly specialized field. Dealing with severely ill and injured patients, critical care nurses employ an enormous amount of healthcare knowledge, skills, and critical thinking in their work. From interpreting and acting upon subtle changes in a patient’s hemodynamic or blood lab values, to recognizing disease pathophysiology and worsening progression, nurses continuously monitor, assess, diagnose, plan, implement, and evaluate treatment responses. With input from AACN and its subject matter experts, Enspire adopted a clinical judgment model (Tanner, 2006) of a continuous cycle of notice-interpret-respond-reflect. Couple Didactic Content with Patient Care Using the clinical judgment model as a foundation, the curriculum and instruction followed a learn-by-doing approach with learners receiving a new patient into their care in each assignment. Figure 1: A Scenario-based Learning Approach Initial learning activities require handling the immediate care priorities of the patient. Through patient assessments and nursing decisions, learners apply critical care nursing knowledge and skills. Didactic content is dispersed throughout the patient scenarios. For example, as the learners consider diagnoses, they may explore the etiology and pathophysiology of related diseases and disorders. After working through several learning activities, the learner returns to the patient care scenario to apply the new knowledge and skills. Provide Just-in-time Resources Because critical care nursing embodies a massive store of knowledge and skills, the program had to provide easy access to common job aids. Drug lists, diagnostic normal values, treatment algorithms, and more are stored in a handy resources section. A basic anatomy and physiology section and an extensive medical dictionary are also available for the nurse unfamiliar with a new term or needing a refresher on a body system process. As learners work through the patient case studies, necessary information is only a click away. Figure 2: Anatomy & Physiology Resource   Offer Reflection on Practice and Debriefs In hospitals, nurses new to critical care are coached and/or mentored by more experienced nurses who are called "preceptors." ECCO also features a virtual preceptor. Often introducing patient scenarios or providing advice from an experienced clinical perspective, the virtual preceptor also leads learners through case debriefs. Figure 3: Preceptor Conversation The debriefs occur through branching conversation simulations. The virtual preceptor asks "what-if" and "do-over" questions: What if the patient’s blood pressure did not improve? What would you do? What were the first indications of a heart problem? The next time you encounter a similar situation, how would you handle it differently? Retrospectively, what may have prevented the complication? Reflection on practice and meaningful feedback are powerful instructional methods. In a Part 2 blog post about the AACN ECCO program, Enspire will share some of the specific tools and templates designed for a 77-hour curriculum and instruction for nurses.     The post Designing Scenario-based Training for Nurses, Part 1 appeared first on Enspire.

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It’s more than just an innovative method of delivering learning. This past Tuesday, our CEO Carol Leaman delivered a webinar titled: Microlearning - Small Bites. Big Impact. It turned out to be one of our most highly attended webinars of the year, which clearly highlights the importance of microlearning as a topic in our space. During the course of the webinar, Carol explained what microlearning is, why it has become so hot, what to look for in a microlearning platform and how it is impacting organizations around the world. Here are just three - of many - takeaways from the webinar, which highlight some points you might not know about microlearning: It’s not just about turning 1-hour training sessions into 1-minute videos, it’s about driving continuous learning and lasting behaviour change. Microlearning is more than just a method of content delivery, it’s a learning strategy that will help impact your business. According to Bersin by Deloitte, the modern employee only has 1% of their workweek (~5 mins a day, based on a 40-hour workweek), to devote to training and development. Microlearning helps you make the most of that 1%. If you scaled this across your entire organization, week after week, just think of the impact it could have. Gamification and Microlearning are like two peas in a pod. The simple truth is, if you’re going to deliver content in bite-sized chunks, it needs to be consumed more often. This just won’t happen if employees aren’t engaged. Since we’re close to the start of a new year, I’ll use the analogy of going to the gym. Let’s say you decide you want to get fitter, does it make sense to go to the gym twice a year for eight hours each time OR three times a week for twenty minutes each time? That answer should be easy. The tough part: motivation. This is why personal health devices such as the Fitbit have been so successful. They help motivate you by providing you with data, so that you can see progress and stay engaged. To tie this all back to learning, think of microlearning as your 20-minute workout, gamification as the Fitbit and the overall goal? Knowledge growth. Microlearning allows you to identify knowledge gaps at the granular level, so you need a platform that helps you intelligently adapt. Let’s suppose you and I sit in a training session that has been personalized to our roles within the organization. That’s a good start right? The content is already somewhat relevant to us. The issue is that you might remember certain points better than me and my lack of knowledge in a specific area might cause performance issues. It really becomes a problem when our managers realize there are performance issues and have us sit through the training again. Now it’s no longer relevant to you because you had no issues in the first place. An intelligent microlearning platform must be able to identify specific areas of weakness down to the individual employee and deliver learning at just the right time. This not only helps close specific knowledge gaps, but more importantly, it ensures learning stays relevant and performance does not suffer. To learn more about the impact that microlearning can have on your organization, watch the webinar on-demand. Feel free to share your thoughts with us in the comments below or via Twitter. Written by Shum Attygalle The post 3 Things You Did Not KnowAbout Microlearning appeared first on Axonify.

I love being an educator. The years I spent working hands-on in a classroom were some of the best of my life, and they taught me so many invaluable lessons that I would never have […] The post Showing Teachers They Matter appeared first on Angela Maiers.

Over the last ten years, learning has moved further and further in to the online realm. Beginning with basic video packages and progressing to advanced technologies such as mLearning and gamification. Some training is supplied purely online while other providers and employers prefer to take a blended learning approach. So, does having access to an online learning environment bring benefits to course candidates?

Avoid critical errors before you even start! Online course success starts at the beginning - with choosing a topic for your online course that is designed up-front to actually sell. We’ve helped thousands of course creators create, market, and sell their courses, and we’ve learned the key activities that lead to the highest success along the way. Ready to dive in? The first step is to download your workbook, then follow along to plan (or revisit!) your course topic: This post is the first in our new getting started series, designed entirely around building a successful course from the ground up - complete with our experience helping thousands, and lots of wise input from industry experts and fellow course creators along the way. Let’s dive in! Course creation success begins with a topic designed to sellClick To Tweet You might be an author, a speaker, a coach, a business owner, or you have some sort of expertise that is worth sharing in your niche. You’re here because you’ve got expertise that you’re ready to turn into courses. Picking the topic of your first course is less about figuring out what you can teach, and more about what you should teach first. If you know a topic well, it’s likely that you have dozens of courses that you could start putting together today. The challenge is figuring out where you can have the biggest impact, and what the first course you start working on should be. This isn’t what would be the most fun or the easiest to put together, it’s how you can best solve the problems your audience has (and that excite you along the way)! We want to build the right course, at the right time, for the right people. That includes identifying a topic that your audience is motivated enough to pay money to change. This is a common answer I hear when asking about target market: "My course really appeals to most small business owners. Small business owners have similar challenges - they work in their businesses more than they can afford to work on them, and they have limited resources especially with their time. I can really help them out." But here’s the key - going back to our secret to success: someone won’t purchase your course because they like what you are selling, they will purchase your course because they have a specific problem that you are going to solve. And, in order to make it clear that you can solve their problem, you need to be VERY specific. Otherwise, you create a course that is written for anyone, but appeals to no one. Let’s pick a topic like copywriting. Now, let’s say you’re a musician, and you’re working on the online presence for your own small business, your fledgling band. You go looking for a course helping you do that, and you see this: Copywriting For Small Businesses You’re a small business owner, not a wordsmith! Learn how you can use these copywriting tips to make your page stand out, get more customers, and make more money by using only your keyboard. Sounds pretty good, right? Now, what if you then found this course: Copywriting for Musicians You’re a musician, not a wordsmith! Learn how you can use these copywriting tips written especially for musicians wanting to make their pages stand out. Get more fans, sell your music, and get back to being a rockstar by using only your keyboard. You can see what I’m getting at here. If you appeal to too many people, you will appeal to no one. Don’t make this mistake! When given the option, your prospective students will always be drawn to the course that is MOST specific to them (and - pro tip: there’s nothing stopping you from making different versions of your course for more specific audiences, once you get going!) Even better - if I run across the musician course and I have a FRIEND who is a musician and I knew he was struggling with the problem this course aims to solve, I would send him the link in a heartbeat. It would probably come with a note saying something like "I know you were struggling with your website the other day, and I found the PERFECT course for you! It’s written specifically for musicians like you. Check it out." That’s the kind of solution that we want our course to be, to our own audience. Select the right course topic, and your audience will share and market your course for you.Click To Tweet With that in mind, let’s dig into defining our own audience. I’m starting with a couple of assumptions: You have expertise in one or more areas, and you want to create a course related to your area of interest. (Stuck on this? Check out steps 1 and 2 in the workbook for some tools to help!) You’ve already got some idea about the specific groups or types of people who can benefit from your knowledge. The goal here is to simply brainstorm about WHO you can serve. Some of you need to think more broadly, some of you need to think more narrowly. Get out a pen and a piece of paper and start with the big groups, then break them down to more specific niches. If you are an accountant and thinking about your potential audience, the list might start to look something like this: As you do this, the goal is to simply start thinking about how what you’re offering would differ for each of these groups. Once you have a decent sized list of the types of groups you can serve, go ahead and pick 3 that stand out to you (you can always come back and do these steps over again, so don’t stress too much about which ones to choose!) There are a few factors that should warrant moving groups up the list: Markets you have a particular interest in, and that you’ve already started to think about the specific ways you can help (like the copywriting for musicians example above!). You’ve got to love what you’re teaching - avoid picking something because you think it’s better, but that you know you’re going to struggle to get excited about.  Markets for which you have an existing email list of potential customers (your list might include past customers, your own opt-in email list, industry contacts, LinkedIn connections focussed on an industry, etc. This can be a huge head start.) Markets you have an existing connection to. The easier you can relate to a particular group or have some inside knowledge, the faster the next steps will be. If I want to target paediatricians, that’s MUCH simpler if my sister is also a paediatrician and can explain how the industry works, than if I have no connection to the industry at all. The ultimate goal is to find the Goldilocks of niches - not too big, but not too small. We need a group that’s specific enough that you are targeting a unique group of people, but not SO specific that you will never find them. Armed with our most promising niches,  this next step is where you hit the virtual pavement to answer the question, "Now that I know WHO I might want to get in front of, WHAT are the problems that they have, that I can help them solve?" Discover the (urgent!) pains your audience has today One of the biggest pitfalls course creators make is to decide the course that they want to teach FIRST, then go hunting for people with the problem. You will have more success if, instead, you go looking for the PAINS your audience has relating to your area of expertise, and then put together the course that solves their specific problems (and not the other way around). Find your audience's pains, then plan the course. Not the other way around.Click To Tweet You’ve got multiple courses you could create - the goal here is to pick the one that is MOST needed by your audience (and that has an audience size that is just right). There are three primary ways that you can find what pains your prospective students are experiencing today: You are a member of your market already. "Wanted to help accountants just like me…" You can immerse yourself. Join & observe. Find communities and join them. Read up. Learn. Search forums for people asking for help. Look for blog posts about the issues. Dive in and become a member of this community. You can ask & interview. This can take the form of surveys or interviews of folks who really know and understand this group. Get in front of members and experts of the market, and start by talking to them. This step can take hours, days, or even longer - but the key is to ACT rather than get stuck here. A small, mini course to get the ball rolling is the best bet for your first project (rather than diving in now to your monster-everything-you-can-teach one!), so don’t let yourself get stuck here! The end result of this process will be a long list of specific groups you can assist, and what you can help them with. If you’re a photographer, this list might start out looking something like this, based on your research: Once you have some ideas about what you can (and want to) teach, who you can teach it to, and what their specific pains are, it’s time to test your assumptions with evidence. The key? You’re looking for proof of a market, but not an over-saturated or overly broad one. Remember the goal: the right course, at the right time, for the right people. The course that solves a problem that your audience is motivated enough to pay money to fix. This is my favourite step, and it’s where we start making sense of the pages full of brainstorming you’ve now got in front of you! We need a way to evaluate ideas against each other. This is not an exact science, but this list can help tip the tables so you can make an evidence based decision on which topic to choose (rather than simply an emotional one!) Here are some things to consider when evaluating your options and are looking at market need: Use the worksheet to evaluate your potential topics against this list, and your ideal first topic will become apparent. Just as you’re looking for evidence that folks really do have this problem and are searching for and paying for solutions, this will also reveal markets that are REALLY over saturated - so the winner isn’t necessarily the one with the most points! Remember Goldilocks: not too big and not too small. Pick the one that is just right. Once you’ve put in the work, pat yourself on the back! You’ve taken the steps to choose a first course topic based in reality (and not just your gut!). Now, you’re ready to design your offer. Watch our blog for the next post in this series: how to name your course and craft your offer. Before you leave - if you do just one thing today, grab your free workbook that will take you through this rapid process to choosing your course topic! That will also ensure we can let you know when the next post in the series is ready. Happy course creating! The post Choosing Your Fail-Proof Course Topic appeared first on Thinkific.

I am very excited that my first book is about to be published from Pembroke Publishers! The link below leads you to a preview of the book. More details coming soon! Coming soon, "The Feedback-Friendly Classroom" from @Bigideasinedu — get a sneak peek with… https://t.co/AD1FT3lIeY pic.twitter.com/3fmYgbiTIE — Pembroke Publishers (@PembrokePublish) December 10, 2015

Over the past five years, SCORM has become all but the default content format of choice throughout the eLearning industry. While Tin Can API has recently appeared to challenge its dominance, SCORM remains the preferred option for many of the organizations we work with at LearnUpon. Because we believe in the continuing usefulness of both formats, we’re taking two posts to suggest how the use of SCORM and Tin Can API might suit your organization. Beginning with SCORM, this post examines some common frustrations associated with the format and the approach we’ve taken to solve them.   The design of our SCORM implementation was inspired by a number of common problems we wanted to solve. Importing and publishing SCORM content was extremely time-consuming, so improving that experience was our first priority. We also saw that once users had imported SCORM content into an LMS, they often found that the course only partially operated or wouldn’t work at all. Why? For two simple reasons.   Firstly, while many learning management systems say they’re SCORM compliant, they’re generally only compliant with the mandatory elements of the SCORM specification. If your course implements non-mandatory elements of SCORM because your business requires those pieces of data, the course will not work in many learning management systems.   That a SCORM package is essentially a zip file containing all of the media contents a course consists of also creates problems when it’s imported to an LMS. The SCORM package includes a manifest file that dictates the structure and contents of a course, among other things. If the manifest is not located in the root of the zip file, then the course is not a valid SCORM content package at all. But in most cases, an LMS won’t indicate that this is the problem. The import simply fails without offering any explanation why! Or you might find that you can import your course, but the files are in a different location to that specified in the manifest. Or you might find that files are missing from the zip. Ultimately, your course just won’t work. To complicate matters further, in many cases you will have purchased the content from a third-party vendor. In that case, you’ll need to get your content vendor and LMS provider to communicate to fix the issue. That creates a lot of nasty headaches for what should be a simple task.   Yet it’s also a pretty common scenario for an LMS implementation that involves SCORM content. A lot of energy, time and money will have been spent creating the implementation, only to find that the imported SCORM course can’t communicate with the LMS. It might be because the LMS doesn’t support some of the fields the course implements but it never makes that clear. You’ve spent months, literally (don’t laugh, we know this to be true from conversations with customers) debugging to try to uncover the source of the problem. Until finally, the search throws up an invalid manifest file or missing associated or detrimental media files, or any number of other issues.   Inspired by these frustrations, we set out to develop a SCORM import tool and API that would solve these problems, creating a better experience for all.    Here’s what we came up with. To import your SCORM course into LearnUpon, simply select the SCORM file from your computer’s hard-drive and we do the rest. Your course will be imported and validated straight away. If your SCORM zip was deemed invalid for whatever reason, we tell you so. You don’t need to spend hours, or months, trying to discover why the course won’t work. You simply fix the errors and upload a new zip file. In LearnUpon, all of your SCORM content is stored within a super fast Content Delivery Network (CDN). That means the files are delivered to clients extremely quickly, thanks to CDN geographic features that leverage the best services for media and content web-delivery available in the industry. Any SCORM content uploaded to LearnUpon is also completely reusable. If you need to add a module to one or more courses, you only need to upload the SCORM zip package once. Using our course content authoring library, you can drag and drop your SCORM modules into each course, as required. It’s as simple as that. There’s no need for multiple uploads or file management, so you save on duplicated media storage costs. Finally, all of the mandatory and non-mandatory API elements are implemented by LearnUpon’s SCORM API. You don’t need to wonder if our SCORM API will support your courses, it will.   Our product roadmap includes plans to develop the SCORM API further. Meanwhile, the implementation has left many experts in the eLearning industry surprised at how quickly it can transform SCORM content "from a zip file on a hard-drive to an accessible set of course contents that function and track exactly as you would expect".  With the growth in demand for mLearning and mobile learning options, Tin Can API has recently challenged SCORM’s reputation as the most flexible eLearning format available. Read this post to decide if Tin Can is the best choice for your organization. The post Our Approach to SCORM in LearnUpon appeared first on LearnUpon.

If you live in today’s world, read the papers, listen to the radio, or (more to the point) get on the Internet, you’ve heard the phrase: BIG DATA. We know it’s about data, and we know if we consult our friends at Merriam-Webster, they’ll tell us that in general terms, data is "facts or information used usually to calculate, analyze, or plan something," and in terms that are more specifically relevant to this article, data is "information that is produced or stored by a computer" (bonus points if you happened to know that "data" is the plural version of "datum," grammar junkie). And of course, we know that the word "big" placed before "data" means there’s a LOT of data. It doesn’t really matter exactly how much data you’re talking about. It’s enough data that it’s hard to manage, analyze, and make sense of with common software applications (read: Excel spreadsheets). But how much do you know about big data? And in particular, how much do you know about how it’s being used and will be used at your workplace, and how it will be used in your training programs and your learning & development programs? If you’re an expert, we invite you to use the comments field below to give us all the inside scoop. But if you’re a little fuzzy on all of this yourself, take a few minutes to read this article. It may provide a few "a-ha" moments, give you an insight or two, and help you better prepare for the big data revolution we’re told is coming soon. Convergence Training is a training solutions provider. We make a series of learning management systems (LMSs), off-the-shelf e-learning courses and custom training materials, apps for mobile learning and performance support (m-Learning), and more. Contact us for more information. While you’re here, why not check out some of our FREE guides?  LMS Buyer’s Checklist Guide to Effective Manufacturing Training Guide to Effective EHS Training Data and Big Data Are All Around You The term big data can sound intimidating. Who knows what it means? Who knows what it is? But really, it’s all around you, you’re probably already familiar with it, and the ideas aren’t all that complicated, even if the methods require some significant know-how. Let’s take a quick look. Remember, we’re not super-interested in discussions of just how big the data set has to be in order to be considered BIG data. It’s big enough to be hard to analyze, and it’s often coming from multiple sources. If you know that, you know enough for our purposes. Big Data in Society Big Data is used in our society all the time. For example, retail stores accumulate data on their shoppers and their buying habits every day. They then pour over that data to find strategic advantages. For example, a a clothing store chain may use this kind of big data to compare the performance of different franchises in cities throughout the US. In a similar way, people in the medical and healthcare industries collect and analyze patient data for diagnostic purposes, to set health care premiums, and more. Big Data and the Internet Google, Facebook, Amazon, and other Internet giants all use big data. In many cases, they’re doing it for advertising and marketing purposes, but this data can be used in other ways, too (we’re looking at you, NSA). Big Data at Work Companies now use big data for many reasons. That starts with hiring decisions and goes from there. Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is an obvious example. Big Data in Manufacturing Companies have been collecting about their manufacturing processes for a long time. If you have a historian or a software application to help you visualize that manufacturing data to see trends, you already know that. dataPARC’s PARCview application lets you visualize and trend months, or even years of plant data In the future, this is going to be even more true. If you’ve been reading about the Internet of Things, the Industrial Internet of Things and/or Industry 4.0, you know that too. If you haven’t heard about these things, you will soon-trust us. Big Data in EHS/Safety Safety professionals have always used data. And now, they’re collecting increasing amounts of data and putting that data to ever-new uses. For example, OSHA’s now collecting injury and illness data online (well, soon), and some companies believe they can use your safety data to predict your next safety incident (so you can proactively prevent it). Big Data in Training/Learning & Development Likewise, training is awash in data. For example, a basic learning management system (LMS) captures a LOT of data about all of your employees’ training: training assigned, training completed, training not completed, training overdue, test scores, and more. And that use of data in training is only going to increase, which is what we’re here to talk about today. The Future of Big Learning Data: Sources and Uses Although big learning data is still quite new and we can’t accurately predict everything it will eventually entail, there are already some clear indications of a few major trends. We’ll introduce each below, starting with some sources of big learning data and the looking at some uses of that data. Sources of Big Learning Data You’re still going to be able to use the data you’re collecting on your training program now (which could arguably be considered big data already). This includes the stuff you’re probably familiar with already, and that your LMS is good at collecting-pass/fail data, completion/incompletion data, test scores, answers to multiple-choice questions, the time it takes to complete an activity, activities completed, and more. A learning management system is specifically designed to record large amounts of workforce training data. In addition, though, there will be new sources of training data, which we’ll introduce below. Interactive Online Learning Interactive online learning exists today, but it will be even more common in the future. This includes: Non-linear e-learning courses with "branching" options Scenario-based online learning that puts the learner in situations like those they’d face at work and asks them to problem solve or make appropriate decisions/perform appropriate actions Game-based learning in which workers learn or practice work skills within the context of a learning game Virtual-reality simulations that duplicate the work environment and require workers perform simulated versions of work tasks Here’s an example of one, below, although of course these will take many forms. An interactive simulation of a web tensioning system on a paper machine can provide data about how each individual interacts with the simulation These types of training are valued because they are highly effective. Why? For one, they’re highly engaging, so they capture the worker’s interest. Plus the provide practice on the real-life tasks the worker will have to perform on the job. Not only will these type of learning activities become more popular, but they also provide more data about the worker. At each point in the inaction/scenario/game/simulation, data about what the learner is doing can be captured-what they did; how long they took; and so on. That will mean we’re collecting more data than the standard pass/fail, complete/incomplete, test answer, time to completion data we often focus on now. Informal Learning Informal learning is the stuff people learn on the job outside of the formal learning that’s assigned to them by their training managers. This includes stuff they learn directly on the job, often from their bosses and/or a mentor, plus stuff they learn from their peers, perhaps during water cooler chit-chat. Nobody really knows how much people learn through informal v. formal learning. You’ll often see the 70/20/10 ratio thrown around (70% on the job, 20% from peers, and only 10% from formal training), but there seems to be a lack of data to support the exact numbers. Nonetheless, nobody argues that informal learning does contribute a lot to workforce learning. And as a result, learning & development experts are looking into ways to facilitate, track, and make sense of that informal learning. To that end, you’ll see more emphasis on things like: Social learning Tin Can, also called the Experience API and/or xAPI and Learning Record Stores (LRSs) Uses for Big Learning Data So if we’re going to be collecting more data through our workforce learning & development programs, how will we use that data? Again, there are many answers, but let’s focus on two big categories below. Data Analytics and Training Data analytics is the process of taking lots of data from multiple data sets, often from different sources, and analyzing them to find patterns, trends, correlations, and similar relationships that might not otherwise be apparent. Data analytics can help us provide meaningful data to learners/workers, evaluate and revise our training materials, and more. And as the field of big learning data grows, we’ll be able to analyze that data in increasingly sophisticated manners, using it to find relationships that provide business value but are not immediately apparent. For example, why did that forklift operator run into that wall? Can it be traced back to something from her training-and is it something you can fix for other operators? And why is your best sales person so good? Is there a specific connection with the training program here, too-maybe one that can be repeated with others? Those are simple examples, but they’re the kind of thing you might be able to determine by analyzing big learning data more closely. And that’s the kind of thing you’ll be able to learn by comparing one set of data with another set of data drawn from your training program, or by comparing data sets from training with other sources of data, such as systems that track individual worker performance, your ERP, plant manufacturing data, and so on. The ultimate goal will be to better use your training program to create desirable business outcomes. For an easy example, you can use data analytics to find what the training of your highest-performing sales people has in common, and then make sure that all sales people receive those same training benefits. Want an example from a different context? Are you familiar with Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, the book (and later movie) about Billy Beane’s use of advanced baseball statistics to put together a championship-caliber baseball team on a small budget by assembling a team full of players who performed well in statistics that were not (at that time) valued as highly as more "glamorous" statistics such as batting average, home runs, and runs-batted-in? If not, check it out. It’s a good read and will help you appreciate the idea of finding relationships in data that aren’t immediately apparent. Predictive Analytics and Training If data analytics will help you discover relationships with your training data, predictive analytics will help you use those relationship to make predictions that can be helpful in a business context. For example, maybe it’s something as simple as creating a prediction that people who score well on one particular activity during their onboarding program tend to be effective managers. And maybe you can use predictive information to begin grooming your next wave of managers. Or, maybe people who go through an interactive training course about forklift safety very quickly on their first time tend to have a higher safety incident rate with forklifts in the field. And maybe you’ll steer these people away from being forklift operators (pun intended!). How about an example of predictive analytics from a different context? Well, one of the gurus of data right now is Nate Silver. He used data quite impressively to accurately predict the results of the 2012 US Presidential election in all 50 states plus the District of Columbia (if you’re not from the US, trust us, this is hard and it was impressive). More entertainingly, perhaps, you can check out a lot of his predictive analytics for sports and other fun stuff at the Five Thirty Eight website. And of course, you can read his best-selling book The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail-But Some Don’t. Lessons Learned from Reading "Big Learning Data," a Book Edited by Elliott Masie and Published by the Association for Talent Development (ATD) We recently read Big Learning Data, an ATD-published book edited by Elliott Massie that looks at big learning data and data analytics from many different perspectives. It’s short on answers and comprehensive how-to guides, because this is a new field. But it poses many helpful questions and provides lots of well-placed nudges in the right directions. You can buy it at the ATD bookstore; we recommend picking up a copy and reading it. Here’s a quick overview of what it covers. Introduction (Bob Baker) Sets the scene nicely, including some impressive stats on the amount of data we generate and the current (and projected future size) of the big data market. But maybe most interestingly, it offers a three-pointed definition of big data, saying the "terms generally describes three aspects of data:" volume (meaning, there’s a lot of it); velocity (meaning, you can get it real-time or close to real-time), and variety (meaning, it comes from multiple sources). See page 2. On Big Learning Data: Thoughts from Elliott Masie (Elliott Masie) Touches on many interesting topics in a superficial, conversation-starting manner, and wraps up with a nice list of three major challenges facing us in the future: How ready are we to manage, analyze, and use this increased amount of data effectively? How ready are our learning systems to work with big data (not just in training/learning, but in all aspects of workplace performance/measurement)? How can we distinguish between worthwhile, meaningful data and meaningless, "silly" data? Why Are Big Learning Data and Data Analytics Important? (Nigel Paine) Sketches out some reasons to use big learning data. This can be boiled down to two points: Companies that make effective investments in learning & development (L&D) outperform other companies You’ve got to use learning data to determine what’s an effective investment in L&D This essay includes a nice 8-point list of things to consider when moving forward (with the main thrusts being: you can do it, get started now, and use data to tell a story), and ends with a note about preparedness to use this new data in new ways: "The October 2012 Harvard Business Review ended one of its big data articles with the statement "Big data is an epic wave gathering now, starting to crest. If you want to catch it, you need people who can surf" (Davenport and Patil, 2012). This is true, but you also need people who can act on what the data is telling them, and you need people to be data-driven." See page 22. The Skills and Mindset Required for Big Learning Data (Donald H. Taylor) Presents some solid points: Special skills are necessary for big learning data analysis Most learning & development experts don’t have those skills (I imagine that’s true of many companies as well) One of those skills is knowing how to find and query data (this can be learned-"running a database query, searching across tables of data to find what you want, and running analysis using a tool such as Excel pivot tables to extract the information you need). See pp. 24-25. The second skill, data analysis, is trickier And, noting the difficulty of analyzing data, making accurate connections, and putting that information to use effectively, ends with a good cautionary note: "The risk of big data is that rather than putting it to good use because we know what we are doing with it, we become the servants of those who do." To that note, I’d add another risk is wrongly applying it when we only think we know what we’re doing. Big Learning Data and Training Programs: Start Small to Go Big and Go Big to Go Long (Tom King) Gives some examples of how you can use big learning data for new courses in development and older, established courses possibly in need or evaluation or revision. Some interesting points raised concern: The value of actionable metrics v. vanity metrics (an actionable metric is a metric that would result in an action and a vanity metric is meaningless information that may seem important even though it’s not-referred to as "silly data" elsewhere in this book) The value of split testing (also called A/B testing) during course design to experiment with appeal, retention, or application) The chance that our oldest courses, perhaps most in need of "big data help," have little data behind them due to LMS migrations over time, etc. The importance of drawing data from many sources, including non-training sources The importance of patience (it takes a long time to collect large data sets that reveal meaningful information), persistence (keeping all historical data, and not overwriting/losing it when changes occur), and consistency (recording data consistently in the same formats over time and throughout multiple systems-think of something as simple as the many different ways in which dates can be recorded) Three Roles of the Learning Leader (Coley O’Brien) Lists three "roles" the author thinks are important for big learning data and analysis to work in an organization: Connector-"someone who knows which data are available in organizations, has some basic understanding of what data tell us, and can provide recommendation as to how to best use data to solve real business problems. Catalyst-"someone who knows which groups or individuals control the data and knows how to break through bureaucracies to help others get access to the right data Content Expert-"Someone who has broad knowledge of business metrics and can provide guidance to analysts on key questions," including (desired targets/acceptable ranges/data capturing frequency/importance of data sets/who uses this data and how/how is this data most easily interpreted by others?) Stakeholder Perspectives and Needs for Big Learning Data (Rahul Varma, Dan Bielenberg, and Dana Alan Koch) Discusses the importance of identifying and including different big learning data stakeholders at work and determining what needs they have from big learning data. Also includes an emphasis on the importance of big learning data for improving training programs, skill development, and business results (pretty closely related to Kirkpatrick’s levels 1/2, 3, and 4, accordingly). Avoiding the Dangers of Big Learning Data (A. D. Detrick) Offers "a list of the four most common myths and misconceptions of what a big data environment can and should do": Deferring completely to digital data in decision making Using data to confirm assumptions Sharing too much data with employees Expecting to uncovered predictive analytics quickly or consistently Big Learning Data Risks: Privacy, Transparency, Culture, and Silly Data (Elliott Masie) Notes that there are and will continue to be concerns about privacy, transparency, cultural issues, and meaningless/"silly" data, and proposes some common-sense starting points for those issues: Transparency: "Learners have the right to know how learning data will be used, shared, stored, or leveraged." Privacy: "Organizations may want to define area where the privacy levels are different, or even whether the learner gets to indicate the desired degree of privacy." Value to the learner: "We must make big learning data valuable to the learner-or it will be a one-way and low-trust process." Silly data: [Data] "must have context, trust, and reliability to be effective…We should develop a set of queries that helps us evaluate the meaningfulness of the evidence and conclusions…How do we add context and validity to our big learning data efforts?" Skill-building and collaborative examples: "Let’s define the skills, competencies, and approaches that managers, learning producers, and learners need to leverage big learning data"…and "build multi-organization collaborative efforts to provide tools, technologies, and analysis models that will push our big learning data competencies forward." Case Study: It’s Bigger Than Big Data-Metrics and Measurements Without a Strategy is Just Data (Nickole Hansen, Peggy Parskey, and Jennifer O’Brien) Starting with the assumption that it’s important to have a strategy for using big learning data, this chapter is a case study of how one company developed theirs, and it offers a template for creating your own strategy as well. The chapter ends with three additional takeaway: Get leadership involved early Look holistically at all the dimensions that affect measurement Begin small and build from there Case Study: Big Data, Big Difference in Training and Development (Jeff Losey) This case study focuses on how a company used big data to create an online portal "to help our employees assess how they measure up against the 47 skills, 14 competencies, and five major themes we’ve identified as mission critical" to our company. In addition, the portal "enables every employee to design, track, discuss, and share their performance and personal growth with others in the organization." Case Study: Points for the Training Scoreboard (Ben Morrison) A case study of a company trying to come to terms with, and create a dashboard for, evaluating training effectiveness along the common four-five level evaluation model: Learner reaction Learner knowledge Job transfer Business effects ROI Case Study: Big Learning Data Sources and Analytics (Doug Armstrong) Another case study, this time looking at some sources of learning data and some ways it can be effectively analyzed and put to use in a company. A Perspective from K-12: A View from the U.S. Department of Education on Big Learning Data in K-12 Looks at six questions posted by the U.S. Department of Education in its recently published report on the future of big learning data in K-12 learning: How can education decision makers obtain the increased quality and quantity of evidence needed to fuel innovation and optimize the effectiveness of new technology-based learning resources? What can be done to ensure that technology-based resources and innovations are up to the task? How can the learning data these systems collect be used to improve the system’s ability to adapt to different learners as they learn? How can data better be used to help support the full range of student needs and interests-both inside and outside schools and classrooms-to improve learning outcomes? How can educators use the system to measure more of what matters in ways that are useful for instruction? What better support do educators need as they make decisions about which digital learning resources to adopt? Epilogue: Moving Forward (Bob Baker) Wraps up the book with another series of questions we should be asking ourselves about big learning data: What makes big learning data and data analysis important for our organizations? What does big learning data mean for learning personalization? How might big learning data play a key role in the life cycle of learning programs? How does your organization grow and borrow the skills and mindsets to leverage big learning data? How will the roles of learning leaders need to evolve to foster a big learning data approach in our organizations? Conclusion: The Future of Big Learning Data Begins Now We hope that helps you better understand what big learning data is and how it might be helpful. What about you? Are you currently using big learning data? Do you have plans to do so? It would be great to hear about your experiences, plans, expectations, hopes, and concerns below. The post Big Data and Big Learning Data in Manufacturing appeared first on Convergence Training Blog.

If you’re in safety, you may be familiar with various reasons why it’s a good idea to use online training tools as part of your safety/EHS training program at work. There are lots of reasons. It can result in more effective training and therefore a safer workplace. It can help you deliver training to more people, especially those who work on different shifts or in different locations. And it can do all that while ALSO cutting your EHS training costs and still facilitating instructor-led training or other forms of face-to-face training. But here’s one you may not have heard before: adopting an online training system can cause your workers to take a more active, engaged role in safety matters at work. So the online training not only improves your EHS training program, it also has a positive effect on your safety culture and on safety as a whole at work. But you don’t have to take it from me. In fact, we’ve heard this very point from three customers who made the move to an online training system and began using them for safety training at their workplace. We’ll give you a quick overview below. Convergence Training is a training solutions provider with a strong EHS offering. We make a series of learning management systems (LMSs), many libraries of e-learning courses including an EHS e-learning library, custom training solutions, and more. Contact us to ask some questions or set up a demo. And while you’re here, feel free to download this FREE GUIDE TO EFFECTIVE EHS TRAINING, which is based on ANSI Z490.1. Three Stories about Online Safety Training Causing Employees to Take More Ownership on Safety Issues at Work During recent conversations with current customers, their safety and/or training managers have repeatedly told us that adding an online training element to their EHS training program caused an unanticipated benefit: increasing the employee’s sense of ownership on safety issues at work. Which is great. Here are quick overviews of three stories from three real customers, all of whom recently when "online" with some of our tools (a learning management system, e-learning courses, or both). Some of their uses of the online tools, and some of the benefits they report, may surprise you. The Distribution of Safety/EHS Courses Causes Workers to Improve Safety Culture In All Aspects of Work (Small Manufacturing Facility, Hawaii/United States) Here’s one training manager’s story about how adding an online EHS training component improved her company’s safety culture dramatically. Interviewer: What was the state of your safety training and safety culture before you began using the Convergence LMS and EHS e-learning courses from Convergence? Training Manager: Not that good, honestly. We were a new company that had spun out of a series of corporate takeovers and downsizings. We had a small core of experienced workers, but most of our workforce was somewhat newly hired and inexperienced in our production processes. They were new to our processes, procedures, machines, and equipment. And that means they were unaware of most of the hazards, too. Interviewer: And that’s when you decided to come to Convergence to get some tools to help? Training Manager: Well, basically, yeah. Actually, the decision to get the LMS and EHS courses from Convergence was made by others at the same time I was hired as HR manager. And so I was put in charge of building a training program, including an EHS training program, largely from the ground up. And I used the LMS and EHS courses from Convergence to do that. And they worked well-better than I could have expected, really. But those were the kind of benefits I expected, even if things worked out better than I had expected. But what really caught me off-guard was when I began seeing benefits I hadn’t planned on… Interviewer: Now what do you mean there? What kind of unanticipated benefits are you talking about? Training Manager: Well, like I said, when I started people had already been working there and there wasn’t much of a safety training program. It was pretty minimal and cut-and-dry. And because of that, I think the workers didn’t give safety much thought. For themselves, sure, although even that was limited by their lack of job-specific knowledge and the lack of understanding of hazards they faced. But there wasn’t a broader safety culture, a sense that "we’re all in it together and the safety of everyone is important." But that all changed when we got the LMS and began assigning EHS courses through it. Interviewer: Why was that? Training Manager: I think when we began using [the] LMS and assigning an organized EHS training, the workers took notice. They saw that the company had made an investment in safety and that they cared about the workers. And that just sort of snowballed. I began to notice workers letting others know about unsafe acts or hazards on the job, and I also noticed an increase in reports of hazards and near-misses. Over time, our employees became much more personally and emotionally invested in safety, and now they truly believe that creating a safer workplace for all workers is everyone’s job, and that they all deserve nothing less. So in this case, the training manager (and the company) got the benefits they expected from the online safety training-a greater knowledge of workplace hazards, etc., but also a totally unexpected benefit-having employees take ownership of safety, actively caring about the safety of others, and accepting nothing less than a safe workplace for all workers. Using the Online System as a Central Repository to Capture and then Distribute "Tribal" Job-Specific Safety Knowledge (Large Manufacturing Facility, Southeastern United States) This training manager explained to us how, after adopting our online tools (most important, our learning management system), he had workers create their own job-specific safety/EHS courses, which were then imported into the LMS and distributed to all workers who needed that information. Training Manager: We’ve got an aging workforce, lots of folks getting ready to retire soon. And like a lot of places, at our mill we’ve got a lot of pockets of "tribal knowledge." Interviewer: What do you mean by "tribal knowledge?" Training Manager: Important workplace knowledge that only certain people know. And for us, it was important to somehow capture that knowledge, have a place to store that knowledge, and make it available to the other workers who needed it. And so we started with safety. What we did was have all of our workers document key parts of their jobs-both job skills and safety aspects. Interviewer: How did they do that? Training Manager: Well, we had them create their own e-learning courses with an e-learning authoring tool called Articulate. (Note: click for more about e-learning authoring tools, using e-learning authoring tools with an LMS, and how to use an e-learning authoring tool to create your own safety training e-learning courses.) Interviewer: Cool, we’re familiar with that. But they could have used something like Word or PowerPoint too, right? Training Manager: Sure. But these self-created e-learning courses worked well for us. It was pretty easy for our workers to learn to use them to make their own e-learning courses, and then they’d had them in to me and I’d put some final touches on them. The great thing about using the e-learning courses, though, is that that they included not just the information from the worker who made them, but also their name, picture, recorded voice, and even a link to email them. And what that they did is, once I had taken the course, put it into the LMS, and assigned it to other workers….then those other workers would check the LMS the very first thing when they got to work at the beginning of their shift to see the new training materials created by Bob, or by Sue, or another of their coworkers. It created real excitement about safety, everyone wanted to make the best safety training courses possible, and everyone was excited to see the safety e-learning courses their coworkers made. This is a great story, because by putting the workers in charge of recording their knowledge, the training manager created an environment of excitement about EHS training-while also capturing knowledge that would have been lost to the company when these workers retired. Using the Online Training System to Track Quarterly Safety Tasks and Determine Safety Bonus Eligibility for Employees (Small Manufacturing Facility, Midwestern United States) Here’s how one training manager used our online training system to facilitate the safety bonus system at his workplace-while not providing an accidental incentive for workers to hide or not report safety incidents. Training Manager: I utilize…[the LMS]…as a better way to transfer ownership, which I think is a bigger part of managing than… [simply tracking KPIs]. So we used it more to build a culture, I guess, to sum it up. Instead of saying "we want to lower incidences in this area," we say, "well, we’re going to lower incidences by increasing our culture, the responsibility of the employee, those type of things. That’s what we have used Convergence [Training LMS] for. Interviewer: Great. And what were the results? Did it work? Training Manager: Oh, definitely, because we have a system-a safety bonus system. [Our use of the LMS for that safety bonus system] actually ties right into what OSHA wants. So OSHA doesn’t want you giving safety benefits just for not having injuries, because it promotes hiding injuries. So our corporation drafted a policy that said "Employees have to conduct X, Y, and Z" in order to conduct safety bonuses, and Convergence gave us the perfect way to track that information. So in this case, the training manager used the LMS not only to assign and track training, but to record specific tasks workers performed as part of their expected "safety contribution" for a month or quarter, to credit workers with completing those safety tasks, and for awarding safety bonuses when those tasks were completed. All without creating an incentive to workers to not report safety incidents while chasing a bonus payment. Conclusion: Improve Your Safety Culture and Safety Record with an Online Training Tools There are three great stories from our customers, each highlighting a slightly unanticipated safety benefit or a slightly different use of online training tools for safety at work. What about you? What are some of the big safety challenges you face at your workplace? Have you used online tools for EHS training before? An LMS? e-Learning courses? Both? If so, what experiences can you share below? The post 3 Ways Online Training Can Improve Your Safety Culture appeared first on Convergence Training Blog.

Hello everyone!I apologize for not getting any new podcast out in a little while. I have been extremely busy wrapping up a few projects and finishing up the Fall semester. But don't fret, I have 3 or 4 new interviews on there way with better audio quality and hopefully full transcriptions as well.One of the projects I had the pleasure to be apart of was a podcast for SHAPE America on adapted physical education. It was a lot of fun and I wanted to share with you episode one of the three part episode.Click here to get the episode:)

The new National Education Technology Plan was launched today. Having worked on the 2000 version of the plan, I was anxious to read the document entitled "Future Ready Learning: Reimagining the Role of Technology in Education". The #NETP16 provides a current look at successful technology practices in schools across the country and includes five major categories -- learning, teaching, leadership, assessment, and infrastructure. There were no real surprises for me in the document, and I know of many schools who have already met many of the goals and recommendations outlined in the document.  However, for those schools and districts who are still working on embedding technology more meaningfully into teaching, learning, and leadership, the NETP includes short vignettes that can help continue the conversation around technology in their schools. And, with a robust bibliography of resources and people consulted for these overviews, the NETP will allow those who are in the planning stage to contact the subjects of the vignettes and ask questions (or read their blog) to find out more about the steps they took to move ahead in this area. The NETP document is arranged in a fashion that make it easy for all members of the education community to understand what the current best practices are in the use of technology to support teaching and learning. Higher education faculty can use the NETP to plan their instruction for pre-service teachers. Pre-service teachers can use ideas from one of the vignettes and conduct an action research project. School and district leaders can use the NETP to help board members, parents, and community members to better understand what works in today's classroom. Teachers can take each chapter of the NETP and turn it into a PLC to discuss what is best for their school, grade level, and classroom. There were a few items that jumped out at me, probably because they were ideas and thoughts that I am passionate about. The first was a new phrase to me-- "the digital use divide". The student use of technology for creation rather than consumption is something that is near and dear to my heart, and that is what this phrase is all about.  The second was found in the chapter on assessment. The overview of next generation digital assessments becoming more project-based and meaningful for the student is exciting! With more powerful back-end hardware and software and robust infrastructure in schools, I believe the time is finally here that this will become a reality.  School districts should consider combining the study of The National Education Technology Plan 2016 and the New Media Consortium's K-12 Horizon Report, which provides a five-year out look into innovations in technology that can impact teaching and learning. By combining best practices with exciting new ideas, I believe the use of technology in the classroom to support teaching and learning in a meaningful and innovative way will become the norm and and help our students get ready for whatever awaits them in the future!   Visit Kathy's Web pages: Kathy Schrock's Home Page Kathy Schrock's Guide to Everything

So as promised, let's talk about the benefits of how fitness and health relate to students’ academic performance and student persistence. We've captured data through wearable technologies!  Here's how:Research supports a direct correlation with fitness and improved grades (see results from Purdue University: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijWW8kgXDD0). Therefore, we hypothesized that if students could monitor their health with wearable technologies, they might just improve their health and increase student persistence in the classroom also. We began by having interested teachers explore various wearable technologies. The winner was the Flex Fitbit due to cost and functionality. We secured grant funding adding: "Innovative technology to support physical activity to promote increased retention and completion" to the budget.Teachers experimented with their usage and were immediately excited about the possibilities. We introduced the concept to students during their regular orientation.  Those who were interested and applied became part of our pilot group of students. An orientation and weekly checkpoints discussing the tips of the trade and the science involved in fitness kept the buzz going.  Students impressively shared unexpected results of how they were drinking more water and monitoring their rest along with walking and exercising more to achieve their health and wellness goals. Specific results reported students having to say this about their experience:"It helped me realize how inactive I was and that I need to do more exercise." "I learned that science is improving our daily lives,and that we as a society will live longer and healthier if we maintain common sense also run,walk, sleep, and eat healthy."But, the learning didn't stop when they left the classroom.  In fact, they shared it with their families, friends, and classmates. Nine out of the original 11 (91%) completed until the end of term.  To date, seven of the current students completed the survey attesting to the following.  One graduated and is working on enrolling into college level courses.  Two passed some parts of the GED® exam with a few others scheduled to take the exam now.Want to see more?  Take a look.  Make certain to scroll to the bottom to see our shining stars!  https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1uDnSNEixfH7lHFjHBGGDwn2KeKKd5MsWtIPKbtfPUuo/present#slide=id.p4

Greetings! Here are some of the recent additions to my Edtech Archive; a curated repository of over 7000 free educational web resources. 20150407 - 20150408 software,  3D_printing, autoCAD, modelling, software: Autodesk 123D Design - a collection of free, shallow learning curve apps for 2D and 3D modelling; physics, astronautics, training, space, NASA: Project PoSSUM - Polar Suborbital Science […] The post Additions to the Edtech Archive 42 appeared first on Many Pebbles, One Pond: The EdTech Archive.