2007 Canadian E-Learning Conference :: Blog

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2008/08/training-materials-developmentd

Bryan Chapman culled these from Brandon Hall surveys of real life experiences - in answer to how long does it take to develop training materials? development time: delivery "seat" time -

Ratio for each Type of learning

34:1 Instructor-Led Training (ILT), including design, lesson plans, handouts, PowerPoint slides, etc.

33:1 PowerPoint to E-Learning Conversion. Not sure why it takes less time then creating ILT, but that’s what we discovered when surveying 200 companies about this practice

220:1 Standard e-learning which includes presentation, audio, some video, test questions, and 20% interactivity

345:1 Time it takes for online learning publishers to design, create, test and package 3rd party courseware

750:1 Simulations from scratch. Creating highly interactive content

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Here are the bibliographies for each, in case you want to cite these in research:

34:1 Chapman, B. and the staff of Brandon Hall Research (2007). LCMS Knowledgebase 2007: A Comparison of 30+ Enterprise Learning Content Mangement Systems [online database, no page numbers]. Published by Brandon Hall Research, Sunnyvale, CA

33:1 Chapman, B. and the staff of Brandon Hall Research (2006). PowerPoint to E-Learning Development Tools: Comparative Analysis of 20 Leading Systems. Published by Brandon Hall Research, Sunnyvale, CA, p. 20.

220:1 Chapman, B. and the staff of Brandon Hall Research (2006). PowerPoint to E-Learning Development Tools: Comparative Analysis of 20 Leading Systems. Published by Brandon Hall Research, Sunnyvale, CA, p. 20.

345:1 Private study, done for a consulting client, information was not published. No bibliographical reference.

 750:1 Chapman, B. and the staff of Brandon Hall Research (2006). Online Simulations 2006: A Knowledgebase of 100+ Simulation Development Tools and Services [online database, no page numbers]. Published by Brandon Hall Research, Sunnyvale, CA

Of course I would add two more ratios with innumerable citations:

It Depends: 1
get it Done or Else: 1

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2008/02/elgg-10-build-your-own-sns.html

Elgg won't ship with any features. Why not? Elgg 1.0 won't ship with any end-user features; think of it as a social application engine that can power all kinds of different sites and applications.

Who are "we" to tell you what features you need? The original Elgg codebase came with profiles, a blog, a file repository, communities and an RSS aggregator. The classic Elgg will still be supported.

That's good -serving two audiences (shell for programmers; classic for out of the box non-programmers) and ultimately allowing free form development.

I think Elgg has a lot of potential - I have a number of Elgg sites running now - from a community of practice to research spaces to course and program delivery spaces. It is a many splendoured thing, with multiple applications and a capacity to evolve as your "users" evolve from students to researchers to professionals.

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2008/01/repress-u-homeland-security-cam

AlterNet: Seven Steps to a Homeland Security Campus

Personal tasers with an MP3 (in red, pink and even leopard print designs), mining student records, scholarships and curriculum for homeland security, watching foreign students/faculty (hidden camera surveillance and watchlists), target dissidents, armaments to campus security, privatize security - these are the steps being used to create Repress U - the new university for today's climate of fear. So much for open learning, open education and the pursuit of knowledge.

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2007/12/when-i-die-who-mourns-my-cyberl

NITROREV: Virtual Wake As I see Eduspaces - a social network I am part of - about to die and untimely death - I was wondering how to mourn the loss of those connections I made through this network. Then I encountered Stephen Taylor's blog entry where he muses about an actual incident of cyber friendship loss. It caused me a moment of thought. When I physically die, my cyber identityt continues on. The data remnants of my cyber activity exists - how will those I never met physically, yet socialized with electronically express condolences and grief? What happens to me cyber properties - do they revert to my heirs who have no interest in maintaining my blog entries and other data? Are they parsed out to my cyber friends? Further to this discussion I have a number of social software sites I maintain for educational institutions. Students post comments, reflections, artefacts and compile eportfolios. If a student does die, what is to be done with their entries? Do we just arbitrarily delete their account or maintain it in a condolences area? The expressions of grief, condolences and maintenance of cyber properties upon one's earthly death - these are issues we are yet to grapple with.

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2007/12/cormiers-top-ten-ed-stories-200

Dave’s Educational Blog Dave Cormier lists his top ten tech ed stories of 2007 - number 10 is connectivism, number 1 is the action of one hacker to remove filtering software - what permeates all selections is openness and freedom and the need for effective education on the safe and efficient use of that openneness and freedom - kudos to Dave - always insightful

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2007/11/social-netowrk-play-and-chat.ht

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2008/08/illusionary-learning.html

THE DOCTOR FOX LECTURE: A PARADIGM OF EDUCATIONAL SEDUCTIONDonald H. Naftulin, M.D., John E. Ware, Jr., and Frank A. Donnelly
Journal of Medical Education, vol. 48, July 1973, p. 630-635


Abstract - On the basis of publications supporting the hypothesis that student ratings of educators depend largely on personality variables and not educational content, the authors programmed an actor to teach charismatically and non substantively on a topic about which he knew nothing. The authors hypothesized that given a sufficiently impressive lecture paradigm, even experienced educators participating in a new learning experience can be seduced into feeling satisfied that they have learned despite irrelevant, conflicting, and meaningless content conveyed by the lecturer. The hypothesis was supported when 55 subjects responded favorably at the significant level to an eight-item questionnaire concerning their attitudes toward the lecture. The study serves as an example to educators that their effectiveness must be evaluated beyond the satisfaction with which students view them and raises the possibility of training actors to give "legitimate" lectures as an innovative approach toward effective education. The authors conclude by emphasizing that student satisfaction with learning may represent little more than the illusion of having learned.

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2008/08/yes-university-model-needs-caha

Yes the University model needs changing – but to what? We can all cite the problems – as articulated in Carl Wieman's recent article on New University Education Model Needed but the solution continues to evade us. Might it be that we are the wrong one’s to come up with the solution to the problem that “we” are part of and contribute to? Imrevensoo, posted a comment to Wieman’s post citing a number of insightful quotes - "We can't solve problems using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them”Albert Einstein. Perhaps the "we" who created the problems are not the "we" who can solve them. Physicist Mano Singham: "No great scientific advancement has ever been made by anyone whose thinking has remained kosher. The problem is, the intelligentsia is dominated by danger zone IQ holders (125-140), a species capable of enough reason to be useful in maintaining an accepted model, but utterly useless in formulating new ones. Good stewards make crappy iconoclasts. It takes a solid paradigm inventor to shake things up. Given some years after any old model is replaced with a better new model, the stewards defend the new model as rapidly as they defended the old one." It may well be the students who are the "solid paradigm invetors" - as it should be they will teach us what should be. We would do well to listen and help them structure the solutions.

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2008/02/tip-in-appreciation-of-posting.

Tipjoy CrunchBase Company Profile

Now this is interesting - Tipjoy is a widget you can put on your blog where folks can "tip" you if they find your posting of particular value. Tipjoy will keep a record of those tips and when and IF the tipper decides to put real value behing their tipping gestures - each click of the “tip this” button sends bloggers a small fixed amount set by the tipper (10 cents is the default). 96% of tip amount goes to the blogger (2% goes toward PayPal fees and Tipjoy takes a 2% service fee).

Bloggers currently have two options for “withdrawing” their tips. They can either donate tips to charity or “buy” an Amazon gift card.

An interesting slice of human psychology - if I click a tip, will I feel obligated to follow through with my gesture? I'm a litle leary of putting this widget on my blog - mainly because I'm not here seeking remuneration for my postings - others linking to and or commenting on is my compensation.

http://choicelearning.blogspot.com/2008/02/anti-social-networking.html

Just because you are part of a social network doesn't mean you want to be social. And maybe you do want to socialize but do so without sharing personal information. There are times you might want to engage in a conversation but keep your identity confidential. No, not just when you want to be represented someone you are not (like a dating service) but when anonymity keeps the interaction flowing.

One such request came through a listserve that I am part of where the individual is seeking a 'white brand" social networking software that can ensure anonymity yet promote social interaction.

He wants to develop an invitation only community that allowa participants to enage in discussion under "Chatham House Rules" environment. Under these rules, "When a meeting, or part thereof, is held ... participants are free to use the informationreceived, but neither the identity nor the affiliation of the speaker(s),nor that of any other participant, may be revealed." The idea is to allowfor frank, in-depth discussions without concerns of having such remarks attributed to individuals and/or making their way into the press.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatham_House_Rules)

Now elgg can accomodate this - to a degree - through the user access controls and the ability to create anonymous profiles. I'm interested in how this can happen and have offered to assist this poster. I'll let you know if more comes of this.