Plimsoll Line on the Good Ship BloggerSeveral miles inland, on the estuary of the English River Avon, is Bristol City, one of the oldest seaports in the world. It has been in use for over a thousand years. A consequence of Bristol’s geographical location is that it experiences extremely variable tidal flows. Water levels vary as much as 10 metres between tides.Ships anchored at Bristol were stranded on the mud at low tide. Since they were beached twice a day, they needed to be built robustly to avoid damage. As well, cargo had to be securely stowed to prevent it being ruined by the severe movement incurred when a ship was repeatedly beached and then set afloat with the cycle of the tides.It is believed that the term 'ship-shape and Bristol fashion' originated because of the critical specifications that ships had to meet before entering Bristol Harbour. Everything on board had to be secure, neat and orderly. In 1805, a floating harbour was built that prevented ships from being beached at low tide.Ship-shape and Bristol fashion:I was reminded of this phrase when I read Sue Waters’ advice to bloggers on not using MS Word when writing blog posts. The introduction of messy coding that’s often not seen by the writer, through the practice of copying from Word into the writer’s blog post, can cause problems.It happens because of the presence of what’s known as html. It is carried across with the text when copying from Word. Sue rightly recommends ‘stripping’ the html by pasting the copied text into a Notepad file, and then copying the ‘cleaned’ text from there into the post. In this way, the html, that may well have been invisible to the unsuspecting writer, is left behind.So what is html?HyperText Markup Language sounds a bit of a mouthful. Its initialism, html, is far easier to remember. Html is a code that was developed in the early 1980s to permit the formatting of text for use in web pages. The so-called tags, marked by the <> signs, and code-words written in text form, permit size, colour, and font to be defined for a line of text.While the actual text is easily recognised in html, the tags and other code-words tend to make it look like gobbledygook. When that’s carried across and pasted with the text into a blog post, it is sometimes displayed as gobbledygook. Not what a blogger wants to see in a newly published post! Notepad - the html scrubber:So why does Notepad not permit the html to be carried across? Notepad is really a very simple digital tool. A component of Microsoft Windows, it is the so-called ‘plain text editor’. Because it is so simple, it acts as a filter, so that only the text in a portion of copied data is recognised and accepted into the Notepad file. Presto! Anything that is then copied from the Notepad file will be just text.The other splendid thing about Notepad is that it is a true WYSIWYG (What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get). So if there’s something in the text in Notepad that shouldn’t be there, you will see it. Not so with the hidden code in a Word file or text that you copy from a web page.So why does web page text have code?A web page invariably uses html for formatting its text. That’s what html is for after all. You can inspect this in a web page by right clicking on the text and selecting View Page Source. Try it on this page. Gobbledygook, right? Copying text from a web page carries all that gobbledygook across with the text and it can be pasted, with the entire messy html that you don’t want.Text that’s copied from a web page can be cleaned of html by pasting into a Notepad file first. So, lesson well learnt. No more messy html.From now on, we will have the content of our blog posts all ship-shape and Bristol fashion.

On this day, fifty years ago, the life of a young singer-songwriter ended tragically. The end for this brief and brilliant artistic career was a supernova in the pop music galaxy that continues to reverberate with the shock.Early in the morning (3 February 1959) a light plane crashed shortly after take-off, near Mason City Municipal Airport, Iowa. All passengers died: pilot Roger Peterson, Ritchie Valens, J P "The Big Bopper" Richardson, and Charles Hardin Holley, otherwise know as Buddy Holly.Holly’s life was short - too short for him to commit mistakes enough to influence, in the slightest, his inevitable place in the history of music.Don McLean’s famous line on the event, "the day the music died", is a conundrum. What Holly gave, in the few years before then, had a colossal influential effect on the music of many singers and musicians. Millions of people throughout the world have been touched by Holly’s artistry, and through their appreciation of the momentum of the music that's still evolving from it. I was too young to fully appreciate Buddy Holly’s music before he died. But in the years since, I have come to understand how his light is such an amazing guiding beacon to so many in the music world:Linda Ronstadt: The Beatles:The Rolling Stones:Cliff Richard:John Denver and David Essex:Don McLean:video American Pie

I read blog posts and articles that tell where education and learning are supposed to be heading with the economic downturn. I wonder how much this evident crisis is being used by many would-be educators to assist them to push their own barrows.It might be my age, but I feel that the rush-rush-rush of postmodernity is no excuse for continuing campaigns for further change just for the sake of it. Especially in training and education.We have watched a foray of theorising - on digital natives/digital immigrants - on the spurious benefits of multi-tasking and how this is supposedly the way to work and learn - on how hype-new communication technologies have just got to be the way to go - on how we should chuck the book and the text-book with no real thought given as to how these will be effectively replaced.New ageThe present digitalogical age is nearly new. Some of us are still playing with the packaging from much of its technology. And we learn that we must get rid of everything else we’ve been using up till now to make way for what’s yet to be unpacked. It’s strange how, in times of financial crisis, we seem to perpetuate this practice, with no time given to total what assets we have and what may be of use.While some are still extolling the virtues of pedagogy, others want to get rid of it, often with no real evidential basis for the extinction. And so, training is getting the heave - yet again. If we’re looking for something new to heave, forget training. It’s been heaved so many times before. Nothing new in that. Most often when it happens though, it’s heaved without regard to what’s thrown.Training CookeryIn times of financial crisis, getting rid of training is familiar recipe to me. In 1992 I was made redundant from a corporation through the use of this same formula, only to be offered my job back. I was a computer trainer. Needless to say, I refused the offer. I felt indignation at the trauma I’d been put through.Fortunately, another company offered me a job. Since then I’ve continued to witness the ebb and flow of training with the financial tide. There were phases when training was in abundant supply - price no object. But when finances were tight, training became a touchy topic.I wondered about this seesaw change in attitude. I began to take note of how training was viewed by and within organisations in these varying economic climes.Two metaphorical, attitudinal states for training came clear. In one, I was at home as a teacher/trainer in the workplace. In the other, I felt quite insecure and vulnerable.Pie toppingI clearly felt insecure when training was treated as topping on the pie. These were times when training was offered as a confection - an incentive, rather than a nutritious necessity.Often the training and accompanying resources were expensive. On these occasions, contractors might be brought in, at great expense, to provide training that, ultimately, was seldom put to good use. It was like flocculent cream topping, full of air, no real substance, and no nutritive value. But ooh! soo expensive! And we had to be grateful for what we received. When funds were tight, topping was off the menu.The environment that this sort of training cultivated was one quick to change. It fostered resentment in its recipients, indigestion in the organisation, making further courses of similar fare almost unpalatable and certainly of little provisional use.Pie baseThe most secure state was not necessarily when money for training was at its most plentiful. In that state, it was the attitude of the organisation, within the hierarchy of management, right to the CEO, that provided a vigorous climate for both teaching and learning.If funds were tight, innovative and smart approaches were sought and used if found. If funding was plentiful, it was for needed resources and strategies to best implement their use.In terms of the ‘training pie’, this is the pastry-base state. It provides a firm foundation on which to build a healthy recipe for learning. The funding of this base was flexible, within limits, permitting a variety of quality ingredients to be at the disposal of the training. If times were tight, the ingredients for the base could easily be plain-pack without substantial loss of quality overall.These two states are all about attitude to training - whatever form the training may take - held by the management hierarchy within an organisation.In lean times, what recipe would you rather have - a pie with no topping, or a pie with no base?

Why should our principles, beliefs, creeds, raison d'être as trainers and educators, be dislocated because of a global financial crisis? It seems illogical that just because things have got tough financially, even on a global scale, our fundamental ideologies as educators should have to be reviewed and turned around.Is it logic?We do not rush to review our theories of Mathematics, or of Science, or of Computer Logic Theory, just because we can’t afford to buy the software. So why should pedagogy and training theory be any different? Yet this is the sort of so-called logic that I’m reading about and listening to, that’s being touted on the Net - right now.It seems that, because of our global financial situation, we should rethink all that we've done in the past about teaching, training and learning. It beggars logic.A possible genetic throwback:I begin to think that, perhaps, this is a genetic throwback. Maybe, way back in time, when crisis struck our primitive ancestors, some of them began to behave erratically, even stupidly. For some chance reason, the genetic strain that was shared by those demented individuals survived, and was passed on to some of us who are here today. Could this be what happened?I muse over so-called mass-hysteria - a strange and insanely illogical behaviour of people in large groups, who experience unusual, synchronous, emotional events. I wonder how much of what we are witnessing is as a result of the so-called bandwagon effect.If we can have collective intelligence,why can’t we have collective stupidity?

Courtesy Google AnalyticsSome weeks ago I was moved by a series of posts by Tony Karrer, pertinent to keeping track of posts, indexes and other ancient, twentieth century artifacts. I’d admired his Blogging Guide for First Time Visitors, which included an index. I had been thinking about starting a blog index of my own when I read about his decision to revise his current guide page.A blog with an index:I’d never seen a blog with an index before I saw Karrer’s, so I thought I’d perpetuate the idea. After all, nothing ventured, nothing annihilated, as Bill Bryson puts it. My blog had got to that critical size when, if I had not started an index, the initial task of setting it up would soon have been in the too hard pile. I’m glad I built it when I did.There was some minor initial discussion about the index post when it was first launched, and that was okay. I’d already decided to keep track of how things went. As expected there was some initial interest when I announced the index. The major bump shown on the graph above is almost entirely due to the announcement post.Here’s my stats so far according to Google Analytics - from Jan 12th 2009 when it was launched, to the present (Fri 6th Feb).I had backdated the index page to 1 May 2008, a date before I’d even started blogging. The reason I did this was because I wanted to be able to find the post easily in Dashboard, as I would be updating it regularly. The other was that I didn’t want it picked up by the RSS Feed, and it wasn’t. Instead, my announcement page was RSSed and this meant I could track the real stats on visits to the index page from Blogger in Middle-earth.Analysis:Activity on the Index Page was interesting to analyse in Google Analytics. It showed me that people actually used it, for a significant number of views of the page looped to the page itself. This would correspond to visitors using the links on the Index Page, to the two main index lists before making a selection. A Time on Page of nearly 3 minutes is a telling indication of the usefulness of the index post.Further to this, I was also able to see what people were looking for. There was some noticeable interest in listing posts according to label, and this has continued - Change, Complexity and Peace were popular list selections.Used Regularly:I was also heartened that people used the index on a regular basis. Apart from the initial expected flurry of activity, the page settled down to what amounted to a day-to-day visitor service, which was what was intended.I keep the index up to date - not a difficult task to do. Eventually, I will cull some of the less popular listings, using PostRank (PR) ratings to help me select those. They won't be lost, for they will be picked up in the label listings.Hopefully it will be easy for me to keep this index in trim, while at the same time providing some assistance to those visitors who want to peruse it.PostRank rating favourable:The PR rating of the Index page is currently coming in at an honourable high number, which is surprising. This shows that it's being linked to, rather than just visited, which is favourable. It’s actually showing a PR rating of 10 on my page widget (see screen-shot below).I’m aware that there is a difference between the displayed rating numbers on the right side-bar widget and what I can view at the base of my screen from the PostRank Firefox Extension as shown here. If anyone can throw some light on why there should be a difference in these numerical reports from PR, I’d be keen to learn. ( 4 ) ( 3 ) << - related posts - >> ( 1 )

"A fireball five miles high and four miles across rose above Eniwetok within seconds, billowing into a mushroom cloud that hit the stratospheric ceiling thirty miles above the Earth and spread outwards for over a thousand miles in every direction, disgorging a darkening snowfall of dusty ash as it went, before slowly dissipating. It was the biggest thing of any type ever created by humans. Nine months later the Soviets surprised the western powers by exploding a thermonuclear device of their own. The race to obliterate life was on - and how. Now we truly were become Death, the shatterer of worlds." - Bill BrysonThe above quote, from The Life and Times of The Thunderbolt Kid, is one of the most lighthearted descriptions of the deeply depressing events that occurred in the early 50s, brought about by group action. Bill Bryson’s lines highlight global examples of how"A Group Is Its Own Worst Enemy".I'm grateful to Michael Hanley, who pointed me to Clay Shirky who used these words in the title of his talk in 2003. Though it was specifically on the behaviour of groups using social software, Shirky paralleled that to supposition from reports ("Experiences in Groups") on group dynamics studied by psychologist W R Bion some decades before.Shirky talks in detail about the ‘social stickiness’ of groups, as discussed by Bion. He also speaks of the 'the paradox of groups' - the unpredictable, but ever-present attribute of a group that clearly sets the function of it aside from that of a mechanical system.The broadest example of ‘social stickiness’ is the way groups react to change required of them. Groups resist change, even if the individuals that make up the group may believe firmly that change should occur, and that some may even want it to. We’ve all seen this in the work place, in some form or other. Groups can unwittingly foster this resistance, even if their purpose and given assignments are to assist change to happen.They may do this without malice or intent to forestall the change they are charged with bringing about. In so doing, they find innovative ways to perform their core duties without actually actioning change. They may even provide rational, complicitous reasoning to justify their strategies.Adaptive/emergent:Some groups tend to be inherently adaptive and emergent. They adapt to accommodate change, rather than to bring it about. Their emergent disposition permits them to come up with new ways of adjusting to this. It may also permit them to invent ways of maintaining the status quo.In this respect, such a group appears to behave like many other dynamic systems. The 19th century engineer, Henry Le Châtelier, observed that with these systems, "any change in status quo prompts an opposing reaction in the responding system."The role of the individual:It’s not as if the individual is incapable of actioning change. There are plenty of examples of how individuals embrace change, usually initiated from within, but not always. It’s that they behave differently when acting within and on behalf of the group they are a part of.Bion clearly defines the minimum number of members for group behaviour to be three. "Two members have personal relationships; with three or more there is a change of quality". With three or more, the dynamics of the group also appears to dictate the behaviour of the individuals making up the group.Jekyll and Hyde:The dual nature of people in groups, that of individuals and of social beings, no doubt contributes to the emergent quality of groups. Shirky emphasises this in metaphorical reference to the Necker Cube, also alluded to by Bion, in that it can be looked upon as being in two distinct juxtapose positions.For some individuals this quality may manifest itself in an almost Jekyll and Hyde fashion, which could have the potential to provide a powerful point of emergence within a group.But the factors that govern the behaviour of a group seem to be more than just what can be predicted by simply viewing it as a dynamic system. A more fitting description for some groups is that they resemble complexity systems. The elements of adaptive as well as emergent behaviour provide some explanation for the seemingly capricious way a group can modify its conduct and intent while continuing to exist.related posts - >> ( 2 ) ( 1 )

Okay, okay, okay, okay!We have a lot of things happening in our lives today. We are expected to multi-task to cope with all that comes at us from every direction at work: emails that we’ve to respond to dropping in at a pace per minute, phone calls interrupting our daily routine, txt messages arriving on our mobiles with an incessant beep, new-post announcements hitting the RSS Reader at a digital rap, never mind the twitter and tweets.And then there’s life itself.When ever do we have time to think?I was wondering about all his while listening to John Cleese on creativity. He spoke of boundaries of space and time.He said it like this:"Boundaries of space.""Boundaries of time."And I thought, "Yeah, right!"The biggest barrier is getting the space to build the boundaries and the time to plan the building. And it goes on and on and on. And we’re told that knowledge will be doubling every three days by 2020. How to keep pace with it all and still have time to think - that’s the question.Cleese mentioned that a lot happens when we’re asleep. Well thank goodness, I say. There’s not much time to catch up with it all while we’re awake.Or is there?Late last week I was asked to give a talk at work on cybersafety. I’d no time to sort out what I’d to do over the weekend. Monday was a shambles. I’d barely enough time to look out the PowerPoint on the topic that I’d put together, in a rush, at the end of last year.And there I was, Tuesday morning, sitting on the 7-o-clock bus heading into work wondering what the heck I was going to say at the 9-o-clock session, and what did I have to check before I started, and did I get the version right when I copied the .pp file to my memory stick the previous evening, and what would I do if there’s no sound system for the vids, and could I remember what the vids were about anyway?Thing is, there’s little to do on a 30 minute bus ride at that time of the morning. The bus was less than half empty. Traffic was light. There was the space. And there was enough time to reflect on my talk and mind-scan over notes I’d downloaded from the server the night before.It was a very satisfying morning session to facilitate. Well attended, with just the right number of active participants to keep the discussion firing on relevant issues. All in all, a session that I should not really have worried about - at all.So how did that all come together when it all seemed to be coming at me with so much of a rush?Boundaries of space.Boundaries of time.Those precious minutes on the bus. With no other thing to do but think.It is a facility that I often put to use - the bus. I travel to and from work with an average time to spend of about 50 minutes every day doing absolutely nothing - about a twentieth of my waking hours. I seldom read on the bus for I get travelsick. So I use it to think.Space and time to keep me in the pink. No phone ringing. No mobile beeping - I can switch it off when I need the space. No emails to read and reply to - I don’t carry a lap-top. So no RSS Reader to chase. Nothing.Boundaries of space.Boundaries of time.How do you find the space and time to do your thinking in a day?

It appears from recent conversations about blog indices and related discussions [ 1 ], [ 2 ], [ 3 ], [ 4 ], [ 5 ] that the most use an index on a blog can provide is to assist the bloggers to find stuff on their own blogs. How extraordinary!As a blogger who has a very new blog-index, I must admit that I’ve found it extremely useful for finding stuff I've posted on my own blog. Before I built it, I would waste time looking for a post I’d written but couldn’t find - and my blog is nowhere near a year old even yet. Other bloggers have admitted that trying to find stuff on their own blogs can be frustrating.Time spent searching:I’ve been giving thought to this lately (I tend to think now and again). How often have I spent time searching in vain through another’s blog or on my RSS Reader, looking for a post I knew they’d written and I couldn’t find? I’ve even tried a Google search or a specific blog search, on these occasions, hoping to hit on the post that I knew existed.Sometimes I’ve been lucky and I found the elusive post, but it takes a lot of time to do this when there is no index.People don't use posts that way:Sue Waters said that people don’t read blog posts that way - that an index wouldn’t be useful to them - that the blogger is only as good as the last post they wrote. While I can see some sense in the last bit, I surely can’t be the only blog visitor who’d find an index useful. I can’t be the only reader who goes off searching for things on other blogs that I’ve read before and know is there and didn’t bookmark specifically for reference later on.I commented on Tony Karrer’s post that I wouldn’t defend the index I’d built on my own blog as it was experimental and I really didn’t know what the best form was for a blog index anyway. I stick with this, for I have my own reservations about its usefulness.But I can’t believe that other readers have never experienced the frustration that I have when looking for a post I know a blogger wrote and that I can’t find easily on their blog. What is sometimes even more frustrating is when I’ve to search for the post on several blogs belonging to the same author. Come to think of it, it must make finding their own stuff on their multiple blogs just as difficult. How do they do it?

Courtesy Google AnalyticsLurkers, legitimate peripheral participants, silent participants, the silent majority and a host of other related descriptions can be used for about 99% of visitors to this blog.They refer to people who come to Middle-earth, have a look round, never comment and may never come back. Examination of data in Google Analytics shows that these visitors live all over the world, in their thousands.My intimate involvement, in many different ways, with teaching and elearning has developed within me a fascination for these visitors.In elearning communities, the return visitors represent a vast, possibly unknown, untapped resource. And they appear to remain inaccessible.Engaging visitors:Last year, in my more ignorant days as a beginner blogger, I spent a month in activities with the Comment Challenge trying to find out how to get these people to ‘engage’. It was the reason I took part in the Challenge, one that caused me disappointment that I didn't really learn much about lurkers; some learning in that area was to come later.I often think of the supreme wealth of skill, knowledge and community that these visitors could bring, if only they participated.Some researchers contend that these visitors do actually participate. Etienne Wenger considers them ‘legitimate peripheral participants’; Nonnecke and Preece refer to the ‘silent participants’. I have a different idea of the term participant, for it implies one who interacts, and interaction suggests contribution. But the visitors I refer to here, contribute only numbers to the data collected on my Google Analytics.Major treasures:I don’t like the term ‘lurker’, and my principles don’t permit me to coin a new term here, even if I had one, as I believe there are enough terms already being used to describe these anonymous observers. So I stick with ‘lurker’.The lurkers are major treasures when considering the potential contribution that they can make to elearning communities. But they can also be looked on as freeloaders who may benefit from the activities of the community, but who do not contribute to these.Blogger study:Many bloggers study ways and means to improve engagement of visitors to their blogs. Their tactics involve attracting visitors through comments and links on other blogs, using catchy post titles, headings and labels and other data that are picked up on searches.Once found by a visitor, the blog has attributes that have a quality that determines if its post content is read and if the visitor will come back later to read more. Bloggers work at improving this quality and many are accomplished in crafting this to a very high degree.There have been hundreds of articles and posts published about what features make a great blog, and how to write a great post. Some bloggers devote a large portion of their writing time to this analysis.Applicable in elearning:As a teacher, passionate about the art of eteaching and elearning, I look on the opinion and effort of bloggers in their analysis as a superb abundance of information. If ever there were time and place for studying how to engage visitors in communities, it is now - in the blogosphere.There is no finer environment for an eteacher to pick up ideas, tips, techniques and enthusiasm for encouraging learner engagement.Relevant, interesting and engaging:Whatever the message of the activity, it has to be interesting and relevant so that it permits the visitor to engage in discourse. With those elements there is greater likelihood that the visitor will return.And it’s not necessary that teachers who are studying this specially need to study blogs expressly written about elearning. The same or similar practices that are successful in engaging visitors to a blog can be applied to engaging learners in elearning.As Skellie says, ". . . immerse yourself in the work of world-class bloggers. Never stop watching and learning."

Finger Painting by Hannah Dear - age 5Mathew Needleman's Writing Tips #3: Pictures Aren't Just For Babies, brings forward a splendid way to 'unlock details from the brain' by drawing pictures. He made me think:Drawing pictures comes naturally to us. We’ve being doing it for thousands of years before Darwin. We have the historical evidence to prove it.What finer metaphor than a drawing for the thing that springs to mind? The word is a metaphor, but is at least twice removed from the image in the memory that it’s used to describe.Drawing is a primal action - an ability that comes naturally to most. Consequently we see that three-year-olds need no drawing or painting tuition. They don’t have to learn the alphabet of pictures to show us what’s in their minds.Drawing is a direct mapping, albeit interpretation, of the image that’s in the mind. Once drawn, the picture immediately calls to mind what was seen and done.The simplest symbolic language; it needs no translating.

Maui taming the sun - The Marae, Te Papa Museum of N.Z.I am a dyed-in-the-wool in-favour-of-elearning teacher. If I had the option, I would choose elearning as the way to teach distance students most of the time. I know that many of my past students found elearning and blended combinations of it useful and effective. I cherish their successful results that prove this. I also believe that an elearning component of blended learning is a way for the future.But the recent and global opinion that elearning is the way to solve all our economic problems, in training and education, scares me. When I read some of the positive articles and blogs that extol the virtues of elearning, I am also aware that myths abound that are associated with this relatively new mode of learning. I fear for the future of elearning, that it might get put to judgement unfairly, following its misuse in a time of real need.Here’s my list of champion elearning myths:1 - Print based resources are easily and cheaply converted into elearning resourcesIt’s a popular fallacy that successful learning resources, well designed for another mode of delivery (using print media for instance) can be easily converted into elearning resources. The late-20th-century trick of pdfing a print resource in Word and then banging it up on a server as a web-page is as erroneous as expecting a teenager to know everything about safe contraception.Robert Frost explained, "poetry is what’s lost in translation". In an analogous way, pedagogy is what’s lost when a well-designed print-based resource is translated directly into an elearning layout.A good print-based resource is successful partly by virtue of how the design and formatting of the resource lends itself to the media that’s used to hold it. Developing an elearning resource that’s just as good, means matching the design and formatting of the resource to the medium that’s chosen, whether it is text, image, video, animation, interactive or involving all of these.2 - Elearning removes the need for a teacher/trainer /facilitatorCommon misconceptions are that elearning students do not need support when stuck, confused or don’t know what to do next, and that the students will not need follow-ups to check if they're on track. All of these seemingly minor details amount to what is termed ‘support’.Teacher support is one of the essentials for student engagement.Do learners need to be engaged? Do they ever! There is nothing more likely to dampen the enthusiasm of a learner than getting stuck on a topic or concept and not being able to get timely help. Timeliness is paramount when learners arrive at this too common stage.A learner who is struggling with an idea could well be right on track and may not even know it. What finer input is there than a responsive teacher, to give support and encouragement when the learner doesn’t really know what to do next. The lifeline to the teacher should be apparent and available to the elearner at all times.Though this may not necessarily always be convenient for the teacher, the next best response to a student plea for help is the teacher to get back with the support the student needs immediately it is convenient.3 - Attractive colourful images capture the learner’s attention and generate interestUnless the elearning developer is careful to select engaging images, animations and videos that deliver the message of the learning objective, all that the images will succeeded in doing will be to distract from the learning that could otherwise have taken place. Pictures, diagrams and animations should be used specifically and only to assist with a learning objective.Keep it simple and relevant are the watchwords for effective use of imaging in elearning design. Exactly the same can be said for any audio-based resourcing.4 - Elearning and associated technology stimulates interest, and motivates learningMy experience with teaching students of all ages is that not all students want to embrace the most up-to-date technology when they are studying. The most likely turn-off for a learner is being forced to learn from devices they may have aversion to - ‘learner choice’ tells us all about that. There will be students in the target group who really don’t like elearning.They will find any opportunity they can to switch off and to ignore the wonderful elearning experience that you’ve developed for them. Providing print based alternatives for those students can give them welcome relief and provide some of the necessary variety that has brought blended learning to the fore in recent years.5 - As long as the learning aim is bulleted and made clear at the beginning of the module, the learner will identify the learning objective and knows what's to be learntThis myth is exceedingly close to being a genuine fairy tale. Contrary to what many 20th century pedagogues will maintain, most learners find the learning aim - the summary of the learning objective - to be as relevant as a runcible lemon.How can a learner possibly see any relevance in the summary of what’s to be learnt when they know nothing about it?Only geniuses and second-time-rounders get anything from being told the objective of the next lesson. FACT. For many students, this can be a real start-of-lesson turnoff.6 - Learners will navigate their way through modules in an elearning course with little need for guidanceBy definition, a learner needs to learn. Assuming that the learner knows the route and is motivated to follow it, is like leading three-year-olds to the middle of a labyrinth and expecting them to walk straight out again. The navigation for any elearning course has to be everywhere apparent.7 - Learners will easily find needed learning resources and their components as long as links to them are visible and well labelledIf any part of a learning resource is important to the learning, that part should be introduced to the learner wherever and whenever it is appropriate. Timeliness is all-important, and the time and place to introduce the learner to an important part of a resource is at the immediate point in time when they might need the knowledge or skill.It should not be left up to the learner to decide if it is important. Learners, by virtue of their ignorance, cannot be expected to know the relevance of anything new that has to be learnt. In particular, it is part of good scaffolding that students are prepared for the next step in the learning, and this should not be an optional learner pathway.8 - Learners read all posted announcements and this is the best way to pass important information on to them quicklyVery few learners are vigilant enough to read all notices, especially if they believe that they’ve read them all before. Isn’t this always the case with a noticeboard? If it’s all that important, it has to be communicated to the learner by at least two means of communication.I have been guilty of emailing and sending printed letters to my cohort of students about something extremely important that I’ve also splashed across the web-noticeboard.9 - Once an elearning resource for a topic is developed and made available to learners, development in that area of learning doesn’t need to be revisitedIsn’t it wonderful that we are all different? Learners are just as diverse in this respect. The adage, "different strokes for different folks" is never truer than with learners. If you think you have nailed it with an elearning resource that you've developed then think again. There will always be a learner somewhere in your learning cohort who will not be able to make head nor tail of your pedagogical thinking.This applies as much to a classroom as it does to an elearning environment. Provide as many pathways to learning a skill, knowledge or concept as are practically possible.10 - Learning is linear, and so elearning courses should be constructed so that the learner progresses from A to Z with the least opportunity to digressLearners who are familiar with parts of a module will be turned off by a pedantic one-way approach to forced examples and compulsory activities. Opportunity must always be available for learners to skip a part if need be, and to retrace a skipped part of a module if they find that they really didn’t have a grasp of a teaching point after all.Further to this, learners do not all progress through knowledge, concepts and relevant topics the same way. Providing a variety of learning pathways that embraces learner choice at appropriate points in a course empowers the learner.11 - Elearning is a cheap way to make learning happenThis is the acme of all elearning myths.In much the same way as the idea abounds that teaching is an easy job, the belief that elearning is cheaper than other methods of teaching and learning is so far from reality it is tragic. Unfortunately, this elearning myth tends to be propagated by some teachers too.Well-designed resources for elearning are not cheap. Neither is their proper implementation. But what is even more costly is elearning that is supposed to give access to essential learning but that is shoddily developed and doesn’t actually assist with learning at all.That’s expensive!related posts - >> ( 10 ) ( 9 ) ( 8 ) ( 7 ) ( 6 ) ( 5 ) ( 4 ) ( 3 ) ( 2 ) ( 1 )

Art by Hannah DearWell it’s finally happened! Blogger in Middle-earth has had to go back to basics.My home PC died over the weekend and I’m finding out how it is to blog without a PC! Any comments I post on other blogs will have to be real quick jobs at tea-break and lunch on my work laptop. So I’ll be up-skilling on the art of brevity. Perhaps I need to. As for my RSS Reader, I’m going to rely on doing a lot of skim dive skim, so Tony Karrer’s technique is going to come in very useful. You could say that this is the ‘back again’ bit, from my 100th post title, "There And Back Again".I still have my blog - thank goodness for cloud computing! My first blog post drafted with pen (I used a quill) on refill, was typed, formatted and posted at lunch. It is a look at some features of blogs that interest me from the point of view of their appearance and function, rather than just their content and literary significance.Here goes!I’m no expert at blogging, but I think I’m getting an eye for recognising those who are. Of course, it’s only by getting to know the writers in my RSS Reader, and by visiting their blogs regularly, that I can sense some of the characteristics that show me their writing is likely to be authentic.It’s not all to be found in the diction, ‘tone of voice’, sub-headings, paragraphing, and text layout either, so I have to go further than what’s displayed in my RSS Reader. What I’ve been looking at recently is really complimentary to all that makes for good reading in a blog post.There are several telltale features that I’m learning to recognise. Though not all of these are present in every valued blog, noteworthy combinations of these can often point to the quality and genuineness of the writings.Paint jobs and other renovations:A significant number of my favourite bloggers have brought a fresh new look to their blogs recently - perhaps a new blog header or colour scheme, or in some cases a complete new template. Invariably they have announced the changes, and asked followers for their opinion. This shows me that the blogger is thinking of how the blog is coming across to the viewer - reflective practice, if you like.Threads and follow-ups:It’s always refreshing to read a post about something new and innovative, but it is also invigorating to follow how an idea develops in the mind of the writer.Carrying a train of thought from an earlier post to the next over a series of posts is not uncommon among bloggers. The progression of thoughts expressed and how the blogger’s beliefs, feelings and point of view develop through discussion, however, is a clear sign of an active mind, willing to learn and be enlightened.Visitors following such series of posts stand a better chance of being introduced to new ideas, and forming their own opinions by reading the debate of others, than if they are following a progressive series that simply introduces a particular theory or principle.Updated blog roll in the side bar:It’s always good to be introduced to the writing of bloggers new to me. One of the ways I expand the scope of my reading in this area is by examining the blog rolls of other bloggers. In doing this I have become aware that good bloggers ring the changes by introducing new sites to their blog rolls. I see the alternative to this as analogous to the notice board that’s seldom updated. People get so tired looking at the same old postings that they miss the new notice when it appears.Relevant, appropriate and novel illustrations:The blogger who selects images, animations and videos that deliver the message of the post, uses a first class elearning design technique. Using pictures and diagrams specifically and only to assist with the content of the post avoids the flippancy of distraction. The word ‘engagement’ springs to mind and this is exactly why the technique is so successful in elearning.Awakening the dream:Bloggers who try something different show creativity and a desire to experiment.Jonathan Mead of Zen Habits explains that trying something, anything, not just doing what works, is the way to go. He explains that doing what works every time ‘is the number one dream killer’.Don’t kill your dreams. Try something different.

Stephen Downes rattled my dags with a short post earlier this month - more so because his post was shorter than the comment I left. It was really in answer to the (almost rhetorical) question:"Why Are People So Gullible About Miracle Cures in Education?"This was asked by Diane Ravitch who said:"the schools just can't seem to shake this belief that all children will learn to the highest standards when:all teachers are great teachers;every school has a brilliant leader as principal;every superintendent has an M.B.A.;every school is run by entrepreneurs;every school is organized around a theme;every school is small;all schools are charters . . ."She suggested that her list had only just begun.Relevant to the first item in Diane’s list, however, I have to admit that I’ve been doing my rounds on posts about teacher bashing recently. But the further I go with this, the more I feel my comment to Stephen summarises the kernel of the problem:I think people are gullible about miracle cures in education the same way as they were gullible about miracle cures for ill health. It's just that our research in education has lagged research in medicine tragically, and it is well known that education research is still in its infancy. Bill Gates recognises that.As long as we have quacks who stand on their soap boxes selling their education tonic in a bottle to whoever is gullible enough to buy it, we are going to be seeing much more of this sort of thing.There are regulations in western countries about how one can claim a cure for ill health in a bottle. There are not yet any useful regulations governing how one can claim a cure in education. video

Tony Karrer, in his recent post Adoption Ideas, brought our attention to the post, Why Doing Things Half Right Gives You the Best Results.In it, Peter Bregman posits the idea that organisations should aim for imperfection. "I'm not suggesting you settle for imperfect. I'm telling you to shoot for it", was how he put his advice. Bergman heads a change management firm.Lyotard's Postmodernism:In reading Bregman’s post, I was reminded of a conversation I had with colleagues about postmodernism. Few were really aware of what it was. I’d only been made aware fairly recently of the existence of the term when, in 2001, Derek Wenmoth advised me and my teaching colleagues to become more familiar with postmodernism, its existence in society, in homes, in schools and what it meant to our relationship with our students. At that time, I looked on it as a way of thinking that was quite foreign to me. In many ways I still do.Bregman’s position has strong elements of postmodernism as claimed by Jean-François Lyotard in that the sequential detail and reasons for such detail within the structure of an established process is eschewed. The so-called ‘Grand Narrative’ is cast aside. By its function as a story, it tends to cloud anomalies and unevenness that are naturally present in any community or practice, and so stands in the way of progress.In doing this, postmodernism instead favours the situational event, dealing with each temporarily as it occurs. There is no need or call for reasoning, or what could possibly be universally acceptable or believed and neither is stability a required criterion.Analogies:But the recent conversation brought to mind analogies that helped me when I had to get my head round ways of thinking, strategies and developments that transcended the logic I was more familiar with from the twentieth century. I’ve often used these analogies, almost by way of self protection, in order to avoid the anxt of constantly trying to understand why things were happening the way they were. The contexts for these analogies are many and varied, and it may well be inappropriate for me to tie them to one specific example; sufficient to refer to Peter Bergman’s contexts.The analogies are to do with achieving a working success, whether it is of a small project or a larger one, such as a restructuring within an organisation, or any part of these that develops sufficient for there to be a potentially measurable outcome. Having been involved in many different projects that fit this description since the beginning of this century, I feel that, if nothing else, I have some expertise in observing the initiation, development and eventual outcomes of these.Here is a description of the analogies, comparing the traditional approach (modernism) with postmodernism.The Project:To launch a projectile in order to reach a goal called the target.Traditional:The target is defined - its position and range established. The launching device is chosen and a suitable projectile with means for propelling is selected according to the target range and conditions.Past experience with the same or similar equipment is called upon. Some allowance for wind conditions is made. Adjustments to sites are made for the range if necessary and the projectile is launched at the target.Following successfully meeting the target, or otherwise, there may be some decision made as to how the trajectory may be improved in order to hit the target more accurately in future. What evolves from this is what may be termed a ‘sure fire’ process or strategy.Postmodern:The target is defined, though its position and range may not be too definite. The launching device is selected and a projectile launched without a great deal of time spent considering such parameters as direction of aim, range or conditions.All these minor matters are decided upon and adjusted during the trajectory of the projectile, in much the same way as the Apollo 11 Command Module was navigated in 1969.The target is then brought more into focus. Provided there is sufficient time for trajectory adjustment before the projectile travels out of range, the target is decided upon. With any luck, the target is met.There are no repercussions. If the target is met the project is successful. If the target is not met, a new project and strategy to hit a new target is discussed at some later date.

Since my PC died, I feel as if my blogging has been put in the stocks. Funny enough, the lack of PC and drop in frequency of posts seems to have had an inverse effect on blog hits, for Google Analytics showed a definite rise in the past few days.Nothing to celebrate but it’s nice to know my readership hasn’t died just because my PC has.But hey, with all this time on my hands, I find all sorts of other things to do at home.Who needs a PC?I was lent a copy of George Monbiot’s, ‘Bring On The Apocalypse’.If ever there is a writer who will write great blog posts, he is. His book is essentially a collection of short essays (what Monbiot calls arguments) on six key topics of interest all written this century, some very recent: Arguments With GodArguments With NatureArguments With WarArguments With PowerArguments With MoneyArguments With CultureMonbiot's new blog is on the Guardian’s web site - check it out.I also listen to the radio a lot - always did.Last Saturday, Kim Hill interviewed David Haywood, a New Zealand blogger who has earned such a reputation for his posts that he has been persuaded to write a book, essentially comprised of his blog posts, would you believe. If ever there was a writer to prove the rule about blogging clashing with authorship in print, Haywood wouldn’t be one. Check out Haywood's blog.

courtesy Google AnalyticsIt’s nearly time for my monthly chronicle on the Index Page for Blogger In Middle-earth. I started this project in January this year. Shown above are the stats graphs for the five most popular posts on this blog for the period 2 Feb to 4 March 2009. They include graphs for the Index Page and February’s report on it.Only recently the Index Page slipped from first position in Google Analytics’ popularity stats. It has held this position steadily for over a month. Such a slip is to be expected, as the initial flurry of interest that usually accompanies any new post is now no longer part of the statistical total.The Content Detail graph for Index Page is distinctly different from most other post graphs, with the exception of last month’s report which has a similar profile. The graphs for both these posts, the index and its February report, mirror one another over the past few days.On 24 February the February chronicle for the Index Page found its way onto Tony Karrer’s Hot List - 2/1/2009 - 2/14/2009 and I have no doubt that this mention may well have contributed to this mirroring.The three other typical graphs shown above indicate clearly the standard peak with tail. The Index Page does not show this tail, however, and appears to be stablising in its activity over the period recorded here.I am pleased with how the Index Page is shaping up. A total of 116 hits over 4 weeks represents a significant usage by visitors, and is certainly a portion worthy of consideration.( 4 ) << - related posts - >> ( 2 ) ( 1 )

This post is a dedication to the people who have shared a spot in the blogosphere - who have brought much enjoyment, companionship and wisdom - who have permitted us to exchange views and opinion, experience and learning - who have brought an enormous cornucopia of thoughts, ideas and achievements here at Middle-earth.How great the feeling is to receive support, encouragement and reassurance at times of need. That’s what I’ve experienced lately, initiated entirely by visitors who have been reading my recent posts.Blogging isn’t easy without a PC. I was feeling as if I’d lost touch with the ‘ether’ - the ‘fluence’, as it were. I saw my fledgling blog-spot flapping its wee wings and disappearing into oblivion.But no. I believe it is just my perception, for the circle is still there.I am, and always have been, thankful for the support of those in my commentsphere.Not so lonely traveller:This is an amazing journey. The ‘lonely traveller’ is not so lonely, for so many helpful friends are met and made on the way.At this time, I’m particularly grateful to my work colleagues who have dropped by and cheered me with their chummy banter. They are newcomers to my commentsphere but I sense that they are not newcomers to the blogspot.They, and many other welcome visitors like them, affirm that it’s not the blog posts that make the blog. A blog without visitors is like a child’s party without children.What use are all the nuts, apples, oranges, lemons and grapesif there’s no one to munch them and spit out the pips?

When elected British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan uttered these words in 1959, I was 12 years old. He summarised what he thought were future halcyon days for Britain. It didn’t work out so well for Macmillan.But 50 years later, these same words can be used to describe genuinely a halcyon time for those who wish to learn all about elearning.Never has there been a time when world leaders in the field of elearning have been so generous with their advice - on all aspects of elearning, from the best available software, both free and commercial, to the best technique in elearning design.Never has there been a time when so much free debate and ebullient discourse between those experienced in the field of elearning have been so accessible to anyone who has the wherewithal and takes the trouble to access it.Never has there been a time when virtual festivals of learning have raged so splendidly and so deeply on the intricacies of thought, idea, knowledge, pedagogy and scaffolding on behalf of that favoured being, the elearner.Never has there been a time when all of this has been so easily accessible in archives that date back ten years and more.Never has there been a time when a teacher/tutor/instructor/learner could build so easily his or her own online database of information on elearning using the most up-to-date free software to access the Internet.Bountiful elearning:From regular blogs on the subject, written by experts on practical tips and tricks, through expert tuition on blogging, on how to use blogs and all the attendant embeds, widgets and devices, and advice on current changes in those, to a 60 minute mini-course on elearning design practice. Chronicles that burst forth cornucopias of up-to-date news-streams on everything that’s happening online, feeds that weld collaboratively the joint thinking and writing of elearning experience from all over the world, you could read about it all 24/7.The above ‘fan of links’ (with apologies to Sue Waters) merely skims the surface of the skin of what wonderful fruit is available online for anyone to enjoy in elearning all that is currently known, available and being developed.When it comes to finding out and digesting anything to do with elearning, you’ve never had it so good!Tom Kuhlmann - The Rapid Elearning Blog 50 Practical Tips and TricksSkellie - Skelliewag.org Bloggers: Watch and LearnSue Waters - The Edublogger Have You Re-inserted Your GA Tracking Code?Clive Shepherd - 60 Minute MastersStephen Downes - Stephen's WebBrowse My Stuff - Tony Karrer's brainchild Elearning Learning

Tony Karrer asks the BIG question,If you peer inside an organization in 10 years time and you look at how workplace learning is being supported by that organization, what will you see?In answering this, I’m going to be brief and pragmatic.Ten years is a long time to project when making such a prediction. We have to forget about the current global economic crisis that’s putting everything, including workplace learning, into a tight spin. I’m assuming that we will have well recovered from this trauma by 2019.We also have to shut our minds to the time warps that technology and its uses seem to have experienced in the past 10 years. Technology will experience its own ‘crash’ that we will have to contend with. This is already starting to happen with technowhelm, and I estimate that such a trough is not far off. My prediction is that the crazy technological frenzy that appears to be peaking at the moment will tend to moderate tolerably.Drawing from the past:Ten years ago, we might have been forgiven for thinking that the future of workplace learning in 2009 lay in computer assisted learning. Advancing a further five years and we could have been excused for believing that training databases were going to be action packed with animated instruction kits and video assisted training tools.None of these predictions became general features of workplace learning and for a number of differing reasons. A few components of these found their way into specialist programs, limited in their extent by budgetary factors.Learning must be accessible:Accessibility of any information is the main limitation on its effective application. With the sheer volume of digital data that is likely to be associated with any organisation, access will become a major feature of any support system providing useful learning. It’s my best guess of the most efficient way for it to be brought about. The likelihood is that accessibility will become a major issue well before the year 2019 and will have to be dealt with or bust.Over the past few years resourcefulness and conservation have been features of many societal practices. This cultural trait will find its way into the processes to do with how knowledge is stored, and disseminated.Knowledge management will have swept a wide orbit and will return along a familiar but digitally oriented groove. Filtering and replenishing will be based on practice and resultant success, rather than theoretical principles governing what’s deemed to be useful.Data retrieval will have become a fine art, almost an algorithmic feature of the technology of an organisation, rather than a problematic process within it. Already we have successful examples of data being managed on the Internet in Wikipedia and examples like this will serve as practicing models for the design of accessible data systems.The networks:Digital networking may well have found a niche by 2019. The study of how online groups behave and operate, tackled from the standpoint of best optimised rather than random mixes, will develop some of its own fundamental principles.Sharing skills and knowledge, and working collaboratively in doing this, using refined technologies and their developments and appropriate techniques, will be lean and more efficient. Partnerships within and between organisations will be mutual organisational strengths, rather than organisational threats in a competitive environment.Taxonomies for learning:Training and learning in the workplace will become principled studies. Practical taxonomies will evolve. Technologies and associated learning techniques are selected for particular learning needs.For this learning need, use this learning practice, is a pithy summary of how it will work out for most workplace learning needs in 2019. related posts->> ( 1 )

Hannah and Catriona posing for the photoThe attitude of the know-it-all learner is well known to anyone who has been teaching in the classroom for even a short term. It’s also recognised by trainers, tutors and coaches and is often a difficult barrier to dismantle.In my varied experiences in education and training, I was often left wondering what it is that brings about an attitudinal obstacle in the first place. Its source is usually difficult to reveal, for its origin can lie in many different parts of the human psyche.Unless its cause can be identified, there is little the teacher can resort to, other than dismissing it with reference to taking a horse to water.Here are three of the causes I have identified over the years.The greatest barrier to learning something newis the belief that it has already been learnt.This barrier to learning is most commonly met in the classroom and needs a teaching strategy that I call unteaching. It is met in some form by every teacher when introducing a new topic to a class. A deal of dismantling of the misconception and erroneous belief in the mind of the learner is required.One useful path to achieving this is in revealing to the learner, in the nicest possible way and without them losing face, that their knowledge or belief may be wanting in some important detail. Once the major part of the learning obstacle is removed, its remnants are eradicated through the art of good teaching and the application of appropriate pedagogy."I’m expected to know all thisand I can’t show my ignorance."This is a too common situation in learners, at all levels.I once had a job as a computer coordinator for the student database of a prominent university. My boss was the Registrar who shouldered convincingly the responsibility of being knowledgeable about everything to do with the database and the student data contained there.That responsibility was the biggest impediment to assimilating anything new that needed to be learnt. While it was my duty to pass on required student information to the Registrar, and I did this successfully through verbal reports and other means, I often felt powerless to convey effectively any technical knowledge that the Registrar also needed.The transactional analysis of that situation is explained admirably in Thomas Harris’ celebrated book, I’m OK - You’re OK."What are you? Ignorant or something?"Peer pressure in a classroom environment can often engender an ability in ignorant learners to appear convincingly knowledgeable. This unlearn syndrome can also exist in the workplace.I have always claimed that one of the reasons I learnt more than I might have done is because I’m forever asking questions.At work meetings I am usually the first to ask a question. For as much as what I ask may be met with tones of derision and ridiculed by some, I am always amazed at the proportion of people who are grateful to hear the answer - if there is one. In some instances when I ask my evident question, it turns out that few, if anyone, know the answer, and it starts a debate."It’s possible that my whole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others" - Ashleigh Brilliant.

Since my old PC packed a sad, I’ve been bereft of Photoshop, a tool that I used a lot for preparing pictures on this blog. I’ve been forced to find other means to create and edit images.This weekend I did a bit of experimenting and research, with various Web2.0 image editors, all of which offer wonderful editing features. During my searches, I recalled a post on screen capture applications Sue Waters wrote some time last year.I was gobsmacked when I found she had asked me some questions in a later comment on that post that I’d never seen and of course never answered! It just goes to show how things can be missed in conversation. Today’s post on photo editors is by way of my humble apology toSue Waters and a reply to her 8 month old question on MWSnap.MWSnapThis cool tool allows any image viewed on the screen to be snapped and cropped at the same time. It has additional facilities to save in a range of different file formats, gif and jpeg to TNG and TIFF.For instance, by simply opening an already saved gif image in MWSnap it can be converted and saved as a jpeg image. I found this feature very useful.When I need to edit a gif image in Picasa 3, which only accepts jpeg files, I open it in MWSnap and use Save as with the jpeg option.MWSnap also has other simple features, including adding a border with a range of useful colours and styles that can be customised.All the pictures shown on this post were fitted with matching borders in MWSnap before uploading.MWSnap has no text facility. For this I can use Picasa 3 or Paint.Picasa 3Picasa 3 is a free Google photo editor and viewer. It is also the default picture editor in Flickr. Picasa 3 offers a rich range of most often needed image editing tools.Among its useful features are cropping, straightening (useful for sorting crooked pictures) a red-eye removal device, brightness/contrast adjustment as well as colour and colour density adjustment, and a simple easy to use text writer.The text writing features that impressed me most were the ability to rotate text and to adjust the text font and size, while also relocating the text before locking.Picasa 3 also has a facility to adjust text transparency, style and alignment. I find this handy.10 other Web2.0 apps In my inevitable panic to find easy-to-use image editors, I came across this wonderful post on Daily Gyan that listed another 10 great online photo editors. Check them out.For anyone who is looking for a tool that is more like the professional ones, I'd advise having a look at Splashup. It comes with a high recommendation from the team at Gyan.CreativityI’m a great believer in the suck-it-and-see approach to using computers. I recommend you should try this as a first approach before looking around and asking for advice or searching for a training clip on Google unless you are an absolute beginner.I'm not knocking asking for advice though. Use everything at your disposal, including, taking time to think through different ways to do things. That’s what I did to get the illustrations for this post.Though some of the images may not be edited in the most artistic way,I hope they serve their purpose and inspire others to do better.

Today I listened to a presentation by Andrew Churches. One of the highlights of his talk was a video by Don Tapscott launching his book, "Grown Up Digital - The Net Generation is Changing YOUR World".I just have to post his vid, but it's a tad ironic that Tapscott has to write about the use of all this technology and the Internet in a book!