Update on Software Simulations Tools

I'm never sure what updates people will see, but I wanted to alert people that I've made a small update to my page: Software Simulation eLearning (w/ links to Tools)

The update primarily added some data from the eLearningGuilds Research at the bottom of the page - eLearning Tools Satisfaction. This shows satisfaction among tools that fall into categories related to software simulation: screen capture, electronic performance support (EPSS) and simulation. There are some definite issues with some of these tools not really being for the same purpose, but I was looking to get Assima (which comes under EPSS) listed next to Captivate, Camtasia, etc.

Blogging Inside or Outside the Corporate Firewall

Stephen Downes commented on my recent post - Personal Work and Learning Environments (PWLE) - More Discussion and said -

I am opposed to the trend coming from the corporate learning side of the house to treat PLEs as work tools. What is it about people in corporate learning that they feel the need to perpetuate the attitude of servitude it seems all learners must adopt. We don't exist to work for a corporation; our learning, our minds, our most valuable asset of all, ought to serve our own purposes first and foremost. But I guess it's employers, not employees, paying the bills for corporate e-learning consultants, and they wanna hear what they wanna hear. Meanwhile - for the rest of us - the reason we call them personal learning environments is that they are indended to serve our needs, not someone else's.

It was interesting to read this because when I was writing about a PLE really also supporting my work - I didn't think of it in the context of ownership of the work product. It is an interesting issue. I'm sure that some employers would prefer to own the blog, i.e., it's a Sun Computer owned blogging system, therefore when you leave Sun you leave your content behind. I don't personally think this is the right direction for individuals and in my recent presentations on eLearning 2.0, I suggested in my examples for what this looks like in a corporate environment that people use a tool like Blogger. There's a side benefit of doing this in that you can keep the content beyond your current job. You have to make the content be somewhat generic since it's public.

I did suggest that they would either use a Wiki behind the firewall or use a password protected Wiki - because that's where the work product goes.

I didn't really consider in my presentation the implications of ownership around this content, but it feels like a natural separation given the constraints of many corporate environments.

Stephen's very much correct about a PLE being for the person. It is going to be a challenge for corporations to come to grips with the ownership of the learning if it is captured in a system. Certainly, if it's in your brain, you leave with it. If it's captured in a system inside the corporate firewall, it won't go outside. I'm sure there will be some interesting discussion around this in the future.

Creating a Blog on Blogger

Great little video from folks at Google that shows how to create a blog on Blogger.



This is both a good example of a brief eLearning piece, but also helpful if you are considering creating a blog.

A Fourth Grader Wikipedia Update

I just wanted to relate something that I think shows the power of a Wiki in general and Wikipedia particularly.

My son, in 4th grade here in California, was assigned a research report on the California Gold Rush and decided to focus his report on the different routes taken by the 49ers. He used a variety of different resources and particularly used the California Gold Rush Historic Maps from the David Rumsey Map Collection. There is one map in particular that has an incredible description written in 1849 of the different routes: Map of the Gold Regions of California, Showing the Routes via Chagres and Panama, Cape Horn, &c. If you are into maps, this is a fun one to drill down on to see the description.

Of course, my son read the Wikipedia California Gold Rush page (it comes up first in Google). It had a paragraph on the routes, but it didn't include the route through Mexico. It did point us to a detailed article on the California Trail. Because it was rather limited about the routes, my son added a sentence about the route through Mexico and added the Map to the Wikimedia Commons and added the map to the article and added a link to the collection of maps on the topic.

Now 4th graders doing the same project will be able to find that same wonderful primary source.

It's actually somewhat rare that a 4th grader has a primary source like the map, so it's quite a nice little legacy to leave behind. Actually, I don't remember having anything as cool as that to study when I was in school. It's quite remarkable when I think about it.

And it shows the beauty of a Wiki and Wikipedia.

Blogging - I'm Pushing Harder Now

For people reading my blog for a while, if you had been at my recent ASTD presentation on eLearning 2.0 - you would have heard a much stronger appeal for learning professionals to blog as compared to a gentler push that I was giving last fall. When I asked The Big Question for October: Should All Learning Professionals Be Blogging? and then posted some of my thoughts in Should All Learning Professionals be Blogging? while I suggested that YOU should, I didn't push. In my summary of the responses to the Big Question - Top Ten Reasons To Blog and Top Ten Not to Blog - I again didn't push all that hard, though there is an obvious bias.

The reason that I find myself pushing harder is that I believe the evidence is mounting that it's an incredible personal learning practice.

Take a look at what Janet Clarey had to say after her first 100 days - Debriefing myself…a noob’s experience after 100-ish days of blogging:

There is a palpable difference between reading/lurking and writing that I had not fully anticipated. The difference is in the learning experience. If I were to return to a corporate training job I would blog and get others blogging. Culture be damned!