It's Hot Hot Hot

Well holidays are underway are they are none to exciting with this little heat wave that is going on here in Central Ontario. Hot, Hazy, Humid and 33C for the next several days (humidity is at 36C that's 100F for my ferenheit friends.)

So far holidays have consisted of a day of renting movies. "Keeping Mum" a british comedy, very funny, lots of surprises. "Astronaught Farmer" I enjoyed it a lot, but my family was so so on this one. "Little Miss Sunshine" hilarious well worth its nominations. "Letters from Iwo Jima" I really enjoyed this as well after seeing "Flags of Our Fathers" interesting to see the "same" movie from the other side.

An impromtu bowling tournament. Not one of us didn't complain of some body part hurting before the night was over.

I also went to a surprise party, however, we didn't want to scare the guy and all stood in the drive way so as not to "surprise" him too much. He's not that old, but doesn't need any sudden jumps.

A day at the beach was on the bill yesterday and was quite lovely. Not a lot of people there, the water was really warm, lots of sun. Dinner with a friend on a restaurant patio, followed my a visit to see an old high school mate, topped off with Harry Potter at 11:00.

Today consisted of some erronds, some driving aimlessly through the country side and a mountain bike ride through a local forest. Mental note: ....shiny new metal pedals with sharp bits might be good to keep your feet where they are suppose to be, but love to bite flesh off of shins. Good news though, I found wild blackberry and raspberry patches. Yum.

Well there's my excitement so far. Hope you are all doing well too.

Facebook Mistaken Identity is a Big Problem

True to form I found something to write about already.

The Toronto Star today is reporting about a young graduate student from Ryerson who has been come the centre of a mistaken identity problem through Facebook. It seems that an Ontario cabinet staff member was reported to make an unfavourable comment this week in an email. That person has since left her position (reasons not completely known). However, poor Aileen Siu, the graduate student, has had to bare all the backlash from that comment. She is receiving hate emails and slanderous comments through Facebook. Someone(s) have taken it upon themselves to track down a woman who happens to have the same name, is appx. the same age, and lives in the same town as the staff member.

I'm so surprised that anyone would go to this length to intimidate someone first of all, secondly that they don't make sure they are addressing the right person is completely irresponsible. The people that are writing to to Aileen (the graduate) should be ashamed of themselves as they are now no better then the original person that allegedly made the improper comment.

Holiday Time

Well I'm just getting ready to begin some summer holidays. I'm not going too far from home as this particular time I'm spending much of my holidays alone. I may get up a post or 2 in the next week before I set out on daily adventures. I'm kind of looking forward to being able to go to some local spots that's I've always wanted to see but never seem to get the chance to get there.

When I return to work however the new LMS will be waiting. We have our first meeting with the vendor when I get back. We're starting with an overall meeting and then each of the three component groups will meet. The system we are getting will give us a document management system for our 5000+ pieces of paper covering policies and procedures. There will be a content management system to bring us into the 90's with our intranet. Currently we have a separate server that houses a bunch of docs, pdfs, and some Publisher makeshift htm files. Finally there will be an LMS for me!!!! I know you're probably saying don't get too excited, do you know what is in store for you. Well no. But it's got to be better then marking 2500 tests by hand.

Have a great week everyone, but I will try to keep this up here and there too. I'm addicted I admit it.

How to Hide Files inside JPGs

This is a simple little trick to hide files by compressing them with compression software and then using a small simple code you enter into the dos window. The video by JimmyR.com is a little hard to watch because it jumps around, but that is only because the filming size of the window is small. JimmyR does a great job of explaining the steps in a very simple and straight forward manner that I think most would be able to understand.

10 Ways to Creatively use Wikipedia

I came across Top 20 Creative Ways to Use Wikipedia (Part 1) today from Friedbeef's Tech blog. He's posted 10 of the 20 so far.

Take a look at the first one closely. It is really interesting how Greg Williams' WikiWorld takes wiki articles and turns them into small cartoons. Visually they become more stimulating.

Print a Camera Lens Hood

I was reading through some feeds this morning and came across Top 5 Useful Items You Never Knew You Could Print Out. Well I've used all but one and thought this one was just kind of neat. Printing out a Camera Lens Hood. I always find it fascinating when someone has the ingenuity to "craft" something up rather then spend $$$ buying a product. Thrifty!

BlogOrlando

I've never been to an unconference before. I only just recently have seen the term mentioned. Apparently an unconference is one where the content of the conference is generated day-by-day by the participants and their overall interests instead of predetermined ahead of time by an organizing group.

I came across this unconference BlogOrlando coming up in September in Orlando. Seems interesting and is focused on bloggers and some of the tools they use when blogging.

It's a free event so if you are in the area, it might be worth stopping by. If nothing else to see an unconference first hand.

2007 Event:Hyku, in partnership with Rollins College will host the second edition of this FREE event that is open to bloggers and non-bloggers alike from Florida and anywhere else. We hope to bring together a good cross-section of folks to discuss blogging, podcasting, public relations, social media, citizen's journalism and other related topics. In addition to the Friday event we planned some outings at the local theme parks over the weekend. The event was as much a social/family gathering as it is a 'work' gathering.

PS...this is my 100th post....whooo hoooo. I'm having an unparty.

Tokyo Subway Map vs. Web Trends 2007 Diagram

I showed a friend tonight, who taught in Japan for 11 years, the Web Trends 2007 Diagram and she asked why I had a picture of the Tokyo subway. So I had to look up for myself the subway map.Ha. Now I'm even more amused at the Trends Diagram.

Web Trend Map 2007 Version 2.0 - Confusing Diagram

I saw this via George Siemens today. All I can say when I looked at is was WOW. My colleage that shares my office just wants to know....who creates these and where do they find the time.
Well this one is brought to you by Information Architects Japan (click diagram for link)

Interesting Links and Some Free CD Resources

Scanning my feeds today one from ALA struck me when I saw free elearning cd resources were available from The Australian Flexible Learning Framework.

I then started looking through their site and found lots of interesting links filled with all sorts of ideas.

These 3 links came from a presentation that was available for viewing from their Workshop Resources page.

e-paper - the world's largest flexible organic active matrix display.
http://www.epaper.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=55&Itemid=2

Grafedia (US based) - Here users create real graffiti in the real world but when they write it they underscore a word. Another person walking by that sees this can text the "word"@grafedia.net to see additional images, video, or audio from the "artist". Seems to be an interesting idea, but it does promote graffiti.
http://www.grafedia.net/

Yellow Arrow - This is similar to the Grafedia idea but this time users get a little yellow arrow sticker and place it somewhere in the world. When you see one of these arrows you text the number you see on it to a phone number on your cellphone and you will now see extra information about that spot as provided by the user. (They do mention on this site to ask permission to place an arrow somewhere and to not vandilize.)
http://yellowarrow.net/index2.php

The site explains that it can be used in an educational manner:

Yellow Arrow has proven to be a very valuable tool in an educational
environtment. It is a great tool for engaging students to think critically about
the places they live and frequent, and to have a concrete forum to express their
creativity. Yellow Arrow has been successfully showcased and used at such
institutions as M.I.T., Pratt Institute, Central Connecticut State University,
ITU-Technical University Copenhagen, among others. (I'm not sure I quite get
this one though).

Here is a Word document on tips for creating mobile learning with PowerPoint (basically for Pocket PC)
http://www.flexiblelearning.net.au/flx/webdav/site/flxsite/shared/New%20Practices/v3%20Simple%20mobile%20resource%20design%20with%20MS%20PowerPoint_t.doc

If you're from Austraila you can get the free CD resources on mobile learning by going to:

http://www.flexiblelearning.net.au/flx/go/home/projects/2006/newpractices2006/pid/200

1. Virtual Worlds- Real Learning -
2. Media on the Move - online casting such as podcasts, audio and video files, RSS and playback on mobile devices
3. ARED (Applications for Rapid E-learning Development)

A big hello to all my visitors

Flags from 25 Country Visitors

I use Blogcounter to see how many total visits I get to my blog and one of the features that I really like is that is shows the top 30 domains that have visited.

I've had people from at least 25 different countries take a peek at my blog and I just wanted to give a hello and a thank you to everyone for stoping by and reading. Your visits and feedback are always welcome.

Empowerment of Women through Adult Education Conference

If I had money/time to get to a conference.....(http://www.chmwsc-inconf.org/index.htm)

International Conference on Empowerment of Women through Adult Education September 29-30,2007

The Objectives of the two-day Conference are as follows :

• To explore the phenomenon of dropouts/exclusion of large sections of the population from education systems in spite of the universal acceptance of the significance of education by developed and developing countries.
• To explore the impact of Gandhian thought and practice on Adult Education for women.
• To understand and evaluate various Adult Education/Adult Literacy Programmes and global experiments in the field.
• To study how adult education leads to the empowerment of women and how empowerment of women leads to the enhancement of adult education programmes.
• To initiate dialogue into various aspects of Adult Education Programmes for Women and to test their efficiency in actual situations.

Does m-learning have to involve course material?

I was just considering this question this weekend after pulling out my phone for the 6th or 7th time to look something up. Looking at the wikipedia it appears that maybe I was learning throughout the weekend.

The scope of mobile learning includes:

• Children and students using handheld computers, PDAs or handheld voting systems in a classroom or lecture room.
• Students using mobile devices in the classroom to enhance group collaboration among students and instructors using a Pocket PC.
• On the job training for someone who accesses training on a mobile device "just in time" to solve a problem or gain an update.
• Learning in museums or galleries with handheld or wearable technologies
• Learning outdoors, for example on field trips.
• The use of personal technology to support informal or lifelong learning, such as using handheld dictionaries and other devices for language learning.

So finding my way to that party, looking up a phone number, checking the movie listings, peeking in on facebook. Are those actions considered m-learning? Was looking at a blog or seeing when the next meteor shower was to occur? Maybe. Perhaps m-learning is a much smaller scope then I originally thought and can be facilitated with just small chunks of info. Something to keep a course intriguing, interesting, and a new venue for engagement.

(uh-oh is it mlearning or m-learning....lol....let's not get started)

Strategies & Techniques for Building ILS (eLearning Guild Online Forum)

Okay, well as another session wraps to a close....

This session was also extremely interesting and had some great point to think of when creating/thinking of ILS (immersive learning simulations), but in the end was a commercial. The software tool being toted here by Chris Crawford was Storytron. It does seem promising but is still being developed. It is centred around social interaction but is text based with no graphics.

Interesting points that were mentioned is that social interaction software should include:

• a personality model - this should be simplified personalities ie:nasty_nice
• an interaction engine - this is basically the what happens ie: person A bumps into person B
• "artificial personality" - estimates human behaviour
• language of interaction - this is the programs part of it all

Through several examples it was neat to see that a program can be described by the verbs it uses. First example was a word processor. It copies, saves, edits, deletes, etc. A web browser jumps to a hyperlink, go back to previous, jump to bookmark. The relation to the social interaction topic was that Microsoft Word has about 350 verbs and social interaction software has 100++++ verbs.

The last thing that I noted was the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis that was mentioned. It had to deal with the fact that language mirrors perceptual reality. An example for this is read these two statements:

• You don't know!
• You don't know?

The both have the same words but as you read them the first feels like a yell or surprise, the second can conjure up feelings of empathy or even pity. This hypothesis was pointed out to show how natural language in a computing world is virtually impossible. Reality is too big.

I don't think I have any use now or in the near future for this, but it was an interesting topic and Chris certainly was an extremely enthusiastic speaker.

Using Avatars to Enhance Learning Comprehension - (eLearning Guild Online Forum)

Just finishing up another online forum through the eLearning Guild. This one was presented by Jennifer Hoch & Dan Karwoski from Intuit. They were explaining and demonstrating how they use avatars for training with their employees. There was information on the impact on students including increased engagement and intrinsic motivation. Also that learners tend to respond better to interaction that are more similar to real life.

I wasn't completely sold on this particular session. It was by no means a commercial, but it just seemed to have that feel to me. Perhaps I got biased from the beginning expecting something different. Although, I can't really say exactly why. Maybe it's because so far my experience with avatars has felt something along the lines of automated phone calls. Not the ones where you press 1 for yes, 2 for no. More like say English if you want your call in English and say French if you want it in French. Then no matter how slow or clear you try to say English you end up with Spanish!?!

I can't give a great review on this session, but I can't completely discount the material. It just wasn't for me at this point in time.

LOMAK - Hands free light operated mouse and keyboard

Having a disabled person within my family, I think this is a wonderful idea and apparently so does the 2007 International Design Excellence Awards. Lomak created a hands free keyboard and mouse that tracks a small light device that is mounted on to the users' head. Importantly each entry (keystroke) is confirmed before being inputted.

Creating a List of Things to Do

I keep having a post that Wendy Wickham wrote this week pop into my head. It referred to several things she wanted to try to attempt over the coming year. At eLearnDevCon she came up with wanting to:

1. Build an educational game.
2. Seriously upgrade my Flash and ActionScript chops.
3. Figure out how to build Google Gadgets from scratch with feeds from my Moodle tutorials or some other source.
4. Figure out how to build learning for mobile phones.

What I found great about this post was that having not attended the conference I was able to read Wendy's ideas and think...hmmm....maybe that is something I can try too. I could maybe apply that here. I could try that there. I haven't been able yet to explore these ideas she suggested, but something about #3 has been haunting me all week. It's great to read what inspires others and through their excitement become also inspired.

Checkers has 500 trillion play positions, but ends perfectly with a draw.

I found this interesting today. The University of Alberta has used dozens of computers for 18 years to compute every possible position play for checkers. Yep...checkers. In the end they computationally proved that there are 500 trillion (that's 500,000,000,000,000,000,000) play positions and if each player makes no mistakes throughout a game it ends in a draw. Asked if they will try to determine chess, Jonathan Schaeffer computer scientist at the university, said he didn't think so without new technology. Chess is guessed to have billion-trillion-trillion-trillion positions (1 followed by 45 zeroes).

Seems kind of deflating.

Southpark & Simpsons Me

Just for the fun of it. Here's a representation of me if I was a character on Southpark (make you).

And.... Simpons me (make you - took forever to get a picture loaded in though).

ILS - Immersive Learning Simulations Genesis (eLearning Guild online forum)

Just sat through the opening session for this month's eLearning Guild Online Forum for Strategies and Techniques for Building Immersive Learning Simulations . Jeff Johannigman was the opening speaker and did a fabulous job defining ILS, testing participants if certain items were ILS, and explained many of the elements needed to create ILS. (The more I say ILS the more I will remember what it means - sorry.) Jeff also incorporated some interesting results from Guild's 360 Study Survey.

Some of the descriptive words that "Learning" conjured up from the participants:

• grueling
• curiosity
• focus
• fun
• drudgery
• boring
• formal
• valuable
• serious
• important
• empowering

Some of the words "Games" inspired from the participants:

• social
• engaging
• distractions
• childish
• frivolous
• addictive
• fun
• exciting

Results from the survey suggested that most that answered thought ILS were better then other forms of skill practice, but that determining if there was good ROI from them was too hard to tell so early on. It was also clear that there are two large barriers to instructors/designers using ILS in there courses and they were the fact that the word "game" was seen as a problem corporately and that management is the biggest hindrance to utilization. Overwhelming the survey pointed out that changing the terminology from "game" to "immersive learning" was very poignant. Jeff then pointed out that several companies are already starting to adopt the newer phrasing of ILS.

Some great points for the use of ILS over traditional elearning were that it is:

• cyclical
• good for problem-solving and decision making skills
• mostly interactive
• principles are discovered
• challenges user before hand
• failure is not necessarily bad with proper feedback

Points to consider when designing simulations are:

• role of the user
• tasks you are to do
• resources and tools at user's disposal
• values that may impact choices
• factors (internal/external) to consider before making choices
• measure the resources
• consider tradeoffs between various resources
• effect on resources and environmental variables by actions

Overall the forum was really well done and I believe well received if the chat in the room was an indication. If you are a member of the guild I would recommend taking a look at the archive of this session.

I loved this quote that Jeff used as well.

"Anyone who makes a distinction between games and elarning clearly does not
know the first thing about either one." - Marshal McLuhan

Would your training keep a child interested?

I saw something in the morning news that reminded me about some basic principles I should keep in mind when developing new courses for staff. Leapfrog was having a toy testing lab today at the Delta Chelsea in Toronto. Basically they bring 50 kids a day (for the week I believe), babies to 6 years old, and let them test out all the new toys they are thinking of developing and marketing.

The key thing that the spokes person said for me is that the toys that did the best were the ones that were brightly colours, lots of interaction, and had immediate feed back. They pressed something, something else lit up or made a noise.

Seems simple, but I think it's something to keep in mind for adults training and especially when developing courses for the up-and-coming workers. They are even more hardwired to expect immediate results to their actions. Think of the connections they demand to have with their friends (Facebook, Twitter, etc). Course material must have that same instant gratification to keep them intrigued and interested enough to continue through.

Using a Wiki for Conference Info

It's not the prettiest wiki I've ever seen, but it's a great idea of how to use a wiki. Jason Plunkett created this wiki for the Computers in Education Group of South Australia conference that is happening July 19-20.

It's a great idea in that it has a page for the keynotes, speakers, session topics, presentations, workshops and all sorts of links.

I'm going to have to borrow this idea for my next in-house retreat.

Be Careful How You Use Facebook

I recently had some friends concerned about photos they had posted of them from other friends. The issue was around the fact that although the photos may have been just showing a fun weekend, coworkers of the concerned friend may see them on Facebook and not interpret them in the light manner they were intended.

Facebook is just like any other internet tool . One, regardless of their age, should take careful consideration as to what you "put out there" for the cyberworld to see and who you allow access to see it.

CBC News was reporting yesterday that Oxford is using Facebook as a way to discipline students. It seems that after exams there is sometimes the unsanctioned custom of "trashings". This involves dousing classmates in foam, eggs, and flour. A campus misdemeanor that is drawing fines to the students. Officials are searching through Facebook for photos that capture any of the activities and emailing students with the fines.

As if often the case, the tool is not the problem, but how we sometimes utilize them becomes an issue. Some schools have completely banned Facebook on the basis that threats and derogatory remarks have been made against fellow students and teachers. This Oxford case seems like some harmless fun, but does go against the rules of the university. It helps to point out to the masses again the need to protect your privacy. Make sure you use the features established within the tools to allow only your friends to see your information. Sometimes a better rule to live by is not to post info/photos/comments that can put yourself or others into harm or offend.

All That Blogging Has to Offer

I was just asked to provide some information on what blogging has done for me in terms of how it has impacted my learning and social networking.

I started blogging the day after the eLearning Guild Conference in Boston. So April 14th and have since written 82 postings to my blog (not including today). That's a little less then an average of one a day, but in reality it's about 3 a day with weekends off. I'm not sure if that qualifies as perhaps a little addicted to blogging. I think so, because I am finding myself reading more about events that happen and if they are blog worthy.

I find blogging to be currently my main and most important source of learning. I recently took a course that was necessary as part of the core curriculum for a certificate and can honestly say I learned nothing new during the semester. It was titled Facilitating Online Learning and was anything but that. The course and my blogging started at roughly the same time. During time I was blogging I learned some of the better open source wikis to use, how to engage staff to participate with the wiki, ideas to help motivate staff to be excited to use web 2.o tools, and I was even able to use some of the knowledge I had now collected to do my own presentation on these tools to a network of colleagues. At the end of my presentation there was a scheduled discussion time to go over the ideas I presented and make a decision. It turned out that the group liked my own recommendations so much that the discussion was dropped entirely and they went to a unanimous vote to go with the tools I had picked. Had I not the knowledge behind me that I had gained over the past several months this would not have been possible.

My social network has begun to grow. This I find is a little slower a process because I feel a little as if one has to prove themselves a bit more in online environments. One does have to work at communicating with other people, asking questions, and responding to questions (directly asked of you or as comment responses). It takes some work and dedication to "put yourself out there", but is very much worth the effort. I think I may now have a few people that recognize my name/face popping up here and there on various postings and network sites. I have begun talking with a few people I think are "key" and feel that I can at least go to them for guidance and advice on various topics or ideas that come into play in my environment. The one thing I have really noticed and experienced about the elearning/technology blogging community is that everyone is extremely friendly, open and willing to share ideas and be mentors to one another.

Other than the fact that I feel I'm always looking for the next thing to write about, I have no negatives to think of in regards to blogging. In fact this drive to find the next thing to post had kept me up-to-date and current in the happenings of elearning, technology and the news. I feel more a part of the "current" world then perhaps ever. I also apparently like to write. I never ever considered that to be something I was capable of, but it appears to happen day after day. So, I've also been able to learned and develop a new skill.

I can't see myself stoping this learning any time soon.

ToonDoo

I tried out ToonDoo today after seeing it on the EduBloggerWorld site. Kind of a neat little tool you can use to create little cartoon scenes for your blog, training sessions, or just for fun. I created this little one about my new LMS that's coming in about 5 minutes. There is lots of customization, but easy enough too with many drag and drop backgrounds, characters, items, etc.

Quote of the Week

After reading a few posts and comments about It's Time to Drop E-Learning this week, I just found this quote in my inbox this morning that makes it all clear to me now.

"When a thing ceases to be a subject of controversy, it ceases to be a subject of interest." ~ William Hazlitt (1778 - 1830)

MindMeister - Mind Mapping Tool

Thanks to Brent Schlenker for posting about this wonderful, neat tool MindMeister. It's a mind mapping tool that you can use and then share with colleagues to collaborate on projects.

I gave it a try today and tried to map out some of the thinking of revamping our orientation to become more engaging and interactive.

Pay Attention - Transforming Teaching Through Technology

Scanning through the EduBloggerWorld site I came across and quoted recently Darren Draper who referred to a video Pay Attention. This video is presented on the T4-Jordan School District website Transforming Teaching Through Technology.

The video is definitely worth watching and has some great stats (US 2001-2004) about why students are so technologically savvy.

• Average college students have spent 10000 hours playing video games, 10000 hours using cell phones, 20000 watching TV
• Today's children and teens spend an average 2.7 hours at a computer a week
• 70% of 4-6 year olds have used a computer
• 65% of children under 2 will use a screen media for just over 2 hours

I don't work in an environment with children, but these ideas and statistics are things that we take very seriously. We are dealing with (as is much of North America) a nursing shortage. Our late career nurses are ending their careers, there are few mid-career nurses around, and our next great hope is a much younger generation. We realize within our department that our training methods must change greatly to appeal to this generation of people that know how to use all sorts of technology. More so they expect to have it readily available to them regardless of where they might be at any given time.

It's amazing to see that in our organization we have 6 computers (I know that's not very many) that staff can use on their free time (lunch, breaks). We try to encourage their use for educational advancement. We do have a lot of continuing students employed. But what we see day in and day out is Facebook on the computers. I sat down at one on Friday to work on our payroll. The girl beside me must have thought I was spying on what she was doing, and I guess I was since I can recall her actions. She opened another screen full of something medical and then minimized Facebook down to the corner so she could read a message that had been sent to her. I guess she doesn't know that, hey that's okay. We actually don't mind you using the program here, but on your free time.

Back to the video though, it did tweak my thoughts to a discussion we had in our department last week. We do orientation every month here for new hires. We get great compliments on how informative it is and how much they like the session. However, as a trainer standing at the front of the room watching the doodling and eyes rolling into the back of their heads, we have to wonder how engaging is it really.

We hope to revamp it before the end of the summer and instead of having a bunch of talking heads at the front of the room drone on about WHMIS, occupational health, infection control, fire safety (I'm getting bored just listing the topics) we want to change it into an entirely interactive day. We have considered inserting games, scavenger hunts where they must find the main points of topics we normally cover, their own presentations, etc. If we can find some budget money to make it more techno-interesting too I'll bet we'll get great reviews from our new staff.

I just joined EduBloggerWorld

I just found this via a post from Julie Lindsay. It's a fairly new social network set up through Ning by Darren Draper, Steve Hargadon and inspired by conversations with Vicki Davis.

Its intent is to be a place for connections and community geared towards education bloggers WORLDWIDE. It's also a step towards future virtual events. As Darren states "We think this is an important step in embracing the international culture of a flattening world and an excellent way to pay attention to the world around us."

Online games good for teens, says study - BCS (rebuttal to myself)

Well in response to myself....I found this via Ray Schroeder's Online Learning Update

Online games good for teens, says study - BCS
Teenagers who regularly play online multiplayer games could be benefiting from personal development that does not occur in the 'real' world, according to a new sudy. Researchers at Brunel University in London conducted a three-year experiment where they examined the impact of the popular online game Runescape on teenagers aged between 13 and 16. They found that the game allowed players to try out different identities and find out more about other cultures, races and classes than they would through everyday physical interaction with the people around them.

BarbieGirls.com @ 3 million users, but what about the kids?

Still in beta, Matels' BarbieGirls.com has 3 million users (since April 2007) with 50,000 signing up every day. As I have read it took SecondLife 3 years to reach that many users. On BarbieGirls you can create yourself a virtual-self in a "Fashion, Fun, Friendship" world. Yay! Of course as you want to wander around and buy your little virtual-self new clothes or adopt a pet for a fee.

What becomes interesting here is that according to Reuters SecondLife News Centre (Feb. 2007) "The average Second Life user is 33, according to self-reported data, with 27.5 percent of active users 18-25, 38.8 percent 25-34, 21 percent 35-44, and 11.5 percent older than 45." The average age of users on BarbieGirls....well I'm not sure, but I'm guessing their under 18. There is not only BarbieGirls.com, there is a whole collection of interactive sites that expand the brand usages and immerse kids into virtual toy worlds. There is LEGO.com, AmericanGirl.com, Crayola.com, HotWheels.com and Tamagotchi.com.

Our kids are becoming more and more technology savvy, understand and can use it better then most of their parents, but what happens to them. There is already a growing concern that young girls have poor self-esteem comparing themselves to images they see in various magazines. So now I begin to wonder that if I can go online and walk around and talk to others as a 6', 120lb Amazonian Goddess what does that actually do to my true self-image and esteem? Does it make me more confident? Maybe virtually, but if I have to speak to someone in person who can see that I haven't stepped off a rain forest cloud can I cope socially. What about a child/teen? I know nothing about psychology, but it did cross my mind today that is so many kids are only exploring virtual worlds, does it help or hinder them in interacting in their true worlds. Will any of this come to haunt them in the future if they can't cope, interact, speak to others in a social setting? Picture it....100 years from now and the only form of speech is virtual.

LMS finally here

Yeah good news yesterday. My organization finally got the last contract signed for our new LMS. It's about time. We knew years ago we needed to go this way (early 2003). But, a change of directors, budget cuts, etc. etc. etc. held it off until now. A friend here comes up with some great expressions that I want to keep capturing...his metaphor for this one was "It took as long to get the LMS as it does to get a new baby elephant" (Dannyism 1). I'm not even sure who it was we "tricked" into agreeing to this one, but you'll won't here me complain.

Or will you.....

I guess for the time being I'll be the one running the show on the LMS side. We also got a content management package and intranet package with the deal. So I begin to be excited that we will have one solid system to track all the various bits of education and certifications that fly around here. One place to track our reimbursements. One place to sign up for courses. One place to manage our people and their talents. But...all this brings more work and as many of you I have spoken too also realize, when more work is given to you it doesn't mean something else is being taken away so you can deal and cope. So my fear also begins, but I "won't start kicking the cat until I know for sure" (Dannyism 2 - I don't even know for sure if I understand that one.)

Query about Healthcare Learning Environment vs. Corporate Learning Environment

Most of the postings I read through tend to deal with either corporate environments or school. My environment is health care which I think of tending to be slightly different. (Mental note: need to find some elearning blogs from others in health care).

I've been considering this for a while and started a discussion yesterday with our Nurse Educators. Some of my questions to them were:

• How do we currently train our nursing staff?
• What do we expect from them in terms of time commitment?
• What about the other 800+ staff?

I've had a couple of responses that seem to be the norm from the nursing stand point. There is currently a mix of classroom and hands on theory. Most of this training is just orientation to specific units and "how we do things here". Certifications are kept track of in binders/databases of all varieties. There are a few courses that staff can do online (but, are they really courses with interaction, quizzes, etc).

My department, or better yet myself, keeps getting wrapped up in let's get this LMS out there. Get it going. If you build it they will come. The more I think about it the more I wonder will they?

We implemented a pilot elearning system here a few years ago just to managers and most logged in at home, late at night. Is this what we should expect of all our staff when the new system comes in, especially knowing the majority of them are working 12 hours shifts? If it is work related material shouldn't they be allowed time at work to learn? If it was a course or seminar we would send them during company time to attend. This is all flying around in my head right now, not to mention the thought of who even has access to a computer on site.

I'm still waiting to hear the "YES we do have the LMS go and play." I'm excited but at the same time extremely concerned about how this is all going to play out and work. Especially since most of the time it will be little ol' me running the whole show. It seems that here in Ontario only a few of my counter parts have started down the elearning road, but no one has been at it for a very long time. I'd love to hear from anyone who's been through this in a health care setting or anyone else who has advice to share before I even get started.

I'm Ginormously Excited. (I can actually say that now)

Merriam-Webster just recently listed some of its new 100 words to be added to the Merriam-Webster's Collegiate® Dictionary, 11th edition. Editors keep track of many neologisms (yes, I had to look this up, and I love the second definition of this word is "a meaningless word coined by a psychotic ") and then decide upon the number of citations a word has whether to be added or not to the dictionary.

A small sample of the list can be found here. Until the whole list is published though I'm going to go listen to some "crunk" while I lay a "smackdown" on "ginormous" "suduko" game and watch my favourite "telenovela" and eat a little "agnolotti".

Graham Wegner's Olympics Effect Theory

I only just came across Graham Wegner's blog today through a series of links through other blogs, but I am glad he did.

Graham at the beginning of July explains his Olympics Effect Theory. It's something worth a read by the entire blogosphere and is important for us to understand as global social learning contributors. Basically he is comparing the coverage of the 2000 Olympics held in Syndey. From a US perspective due to TV coverage (because the US can afford grand coverage of their grand number of athletes) the games appeared to be all about the American athletes. From an Aussie TV perspective since they don't have a large number of their own athletes to showcase they had to show stories of athletes from all nations.

Gramham continues with...

"Unless you live in a smaller country, you can’t see that many of the issues pushed as being important around the edublogosphere are actually focused towards the biggest participating nation and its education system. This is not a criticism. Don’t get me wrong. But it is something to be aware of if you are a Stateside blogger - your view is not necessarily the world view. Just like the American public watching the Sydney Olympics. There are others involved, maybe in lesser numbers, but just as passionate at leveraging new technologies for learning."

I guess his theory hits home for myself as a Canadian. We're not small by any means, but we have more US coverage (news, entertainment, music) then we do Canadian and we seem to like enjoy it that way. More people tuned into American Idol's first show this season (37.7 million) then Canadian Idol's Finale (2.35 million). If my coffee group is any way to judge....yep they all watched the US version; every episode.

Graham Wegner is trying to point out that there are lots and lots of people in the world that are interested, passionate and striving to share their perspectives on elearning, technology, blogging, etc. and that we each should try to stay aware and informed to all of those perspectives. I find that I am continuously learning from people all around the world now since I started blogging and it's wonderful. It's amazing what you can learn from the "small" and "big" when you listen to all the voices and can you imagine how unified we as edubloggers will all feel as this does happen. It's just as amazing and liberating too when you open yourself to new perspectives and learn from them creating expanded or new ideas that you can then use within your own context.

Have you read a blog from the other side of the world today?

Bye Bye Schools, Hello Learning Centres

Wow this is an interesting idea. One that makes you think could it really work? Would your children learn more in this format.

I found this article by Richard Garner (The Independent), "No more school as council opens 'learning centres'" via David Warlick's post this morning So What Would My Daughter Do?. In an attempt to rebuild their secondary school program Knowsley Council in Merseyside (UK) is going to close all 11 of it's secondary schools. Instead students will be able to access learning centres throughout the week where they will work online at their own speed on programs specific to their learning needs and interests.

"They will be given their day's assignments in groups of 120 in the morning before dispersing to internet cafe-style zones in the learning centres to carry them out", writes Garner.This new program will be focused towards 21,000 youths in secondary education and will be accessible from home as well.

Perhaps if this indeed the way of the future of educating children, as David wonders, have we begun to prepare kids for knowing how to seek out information electronically. Should we be focusing their education more and more on elearning tools, clarifying PLE's, teaching education technology? If so what gets left behind? Dissecting frogs? Do second language courses disappear and become "technology language" courses? As always, something new to ponder and worry about.

What can Britney Spears Teach You About Blogging? - You'd be surprised

Ok, the elearning world in terms of my own personal experiences is a little slow at the moment. The LMS contract is still not signed, so I have nothing to play with. The elearning courses I am taking are on hiatus for the summer, so I have nothing to complain about (and I did pass with flying colours the last course, of which some assigments I posted on here in June and complained about). So for now I shall share some of my stumblings that I come across.

After reading Tony Karrer's quest for explaining the "power of blogging," I then came across Matt Huggins' 55 Essential Articles Every Serious Blogger Should Read and within that 6 Lessons Britney Spears Can Teach You About Blogging. It's actually a very informative article. I'll summarize the points here and you and read the expanded post if you are intrigued too:

1. Be bold. Be unique. Be different.
2. Look after your baby
3. Keep good relationships
4. Be careful who you associate with
5. Keep your site looking good
6. Always wear underwear

Hey, it's fun for a Monday.

Podcasting Toolbox: 70+ Podcasting Tools and Resources

I haven't even begun to really think about podcasting, okay maybe a little, but this article from Mashable here seems to have a very extensive collection of tools that maybe useful to other who are venturing down this road.

Podcasting Toolbox: 70+ Podcasting Tools and Resources

How does one use Facebook for learning?

My new e-friend Cammy, suggested to me that she wanted to find a way to use Facebook as a learning tool. Since then I have been thinking about her idea and wondering just how does one use Facebook for learning. So far for me and my friends it has only been, just as intended (I think), for fun. We share photos, news, messages, and miscellaneous nonsense. Mostly nonsense. As for learning from one another on it, so far I've learned several things perhaps I shouldn't post on there and embarrassing photos of you will surface periodically.

I'm sure there could be some seriousness to the network. You certainly can create groups that truly are driven by a purpose and I belong to a couple. I've also come up with the idea that it could possibly be used for online class work by having students connect with one another and using it as an "offline" discussion area for class/group work. When that element of interaction is missing from an online many facilitators try to find a way to compensate for that with discussion boards within the learning platform. I have always found these to be very dry and I lose interest in my fellow classmates quickly. A Facebook network may be a way to get the class to interact more continuously in a fun manner outside of the elearning platform.

I'm open to any other ideas and suggestions for utilizing this particular social network tool.

UK's National Archives ask us to rethinking how we save information electronically

"Unless more work is done to ensure legacy file formats can be read and edited in the future, we face a digital dark hole," says Gordon Frazer, Microsoft's UK Managing Director.

The problem we are facing, and if you think about it have been facing, is that files are being sorted and saved from programs that are either no longer readable by today's current programs, the programs no longer exist and sometime the equipment to read them is nonexistent. When is the last time you saw a 3.5" floppy drive. They're not a standard device on today's computers.

The BBC reported yesterday that the UK National Archives has "580 terabytes of data - the equivalent of 580,000 encyclopedias - in older file formats that are no longer commercially available. "

Reading the article reminds me of a show I watched last night about an ancient civilization in South America that disappeared with very little to show for their existence. Could this happen to us? Could we perhaps fall into that "digital black hole" that the article is reporting?

This issue will need to be seriously considered and addressed globally to persevere virtually everything we keep track of as a society.

I'm 74% addicted to blogging.

I tried a fun little quiz I found through David Airey and his posting The Psychology of Blog Publishing. I thought his entire post was actually very true and very informative. I tend to see a few things that I want to write about each day and he suggests only one a day. So perhaps my addiction is true, maybe I do comment on too many things. Maybe I read too many things that stir up my interest and I want to remember/post.

But true to question 14...of the quiz about how addicted to blogging are you? I had to add this link. Give it a try yourself.

Broadband use up 5%

One of the recurring issues that came up in my last class was the need for e-educators/designers to think about access limitations that our participants may face. Specifically was the idea of not including too much or any at all multimedia into courses. The reason was not everyone has access to broadband connections and many still are using dial up. Perhaps that is a Canadian realm though. We certainly don't have broadband access everywhere and friends of mind that are only 2.5 hours from Toronto only have dial-up. (Mental Note: If you know any Canadians, you know we measure distances here in the time it takes to drive somewhere, so 2.5 hours equals about 150 miles.)

I found it strange that we were learning how to make course material more interactive and more engaging, however we were being told to avoid multimedia (video, sound, etc). Well I just read a lovely article from Pew Internet/American Life Project which reports that:

• "47% of all Adult Americans have a broadband connection at home as of early 2007, a five percentage point increase from early 2006."
• "Among individuals who use the internet at home, 70% have a broadband connection with 23% use dialup."

While they report that broadband use has not continued to grow as rapidly as previous years, in fact it's growth rate has decrease, it is still penetrating the market while dial-up is slowing disappearing.

What a wonderful world to imagine if everyone could have "instant" access to all the internet has to offer.

Pew has some great reports that come out frequently and recently had an interesting on on teen cyberbullying as well a few weeks ago when that was a common thread on blogs.

Not much seems new today

Another long weekend marking the middle of the year has come and gone. 200+ feeds to read and really not much is new. Here's a few of the tidbits I scanned over:

Google is buying this, that, and the other. Facebook has another couple of useless, but amusing time wasters to add on to your page (adopt a pet, emotes, grow a garden, rock-paper-scissor challenge a friend). Iphone is everywhere except Canada. I read that many people got paid by others to wait in line for one of them. I hope they got paid well. The million year old tooth thing. CNN has made their site more web 2.0, more video, blogs, interactivity. Britain is under high alert. William and Harry held one heck of a bash. Kudos to Seamus O'Regan from CTV's Canada Am program for not missing one "stadium wave" while interviewing during the Diana concert. Elearning Guild put out more of the schedule for the upcoming conference in November...must figure out how to attend.

Other then that. Not much has tickled my fancy so far today, but news comes so fast I'm sure something with surface.

A Million Year Old Tooth Found

Okay this isn't about elearning, but I just discovered it while elearning and think it's fascinating.

From the Discovery Channel News: Spanish researchers this past Friday claim that they have found a human tooth that is appx. 1.2 million years old. WHAT!?! The fossil was found in Atapuerca Sierra in the northern province of Burgos. In 1994 similar fossils at a nearby site were discovered dating back 800,000.

Bermudez de Castro, one of three paleontologists leading the expedition says, "For the time being we have no idea what species but there is no doubt, from the (geological) level where the tooth was found, that it belonged to the oldest European found to date."

Happy Birthday Canada

Happy Birthday Diana