eLearning Roadtrip

Funsuckers

Marc Prensky once famously accused instructional designers of sucking the fun out of learning at an EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative Conference a number of years back. As you can imagine, instructional designers were not amused. 

I was reminded of Marc's quotable quote during a recent conversation regarding the value and role of structure and specifications - or the lack thereof - for designing learning experiences. This is a more nuanced conversation than differentiating between formal and informal learning, or whether one is online or on-the-ground. This also includes things that lead to immersion, augmentation, mobility, and personalization. It inevitably leads to thoughts of learning analytics. Life-long learning tracking even.

It's almost as if today's emergent designers want to dance on ADDIE's grave and declare that ID funsucking is a thing of the past. Which brings me to my point.

It is inspiring to know that there are exceedingly passionate designers out there who want to create learning experiences that engage and inspire, helping the world see new possibilities with fresh eyes. Good on ya. The world needs you. 

But designers also must bring order to chaos. Most of us work in settings where we are mostly responsible for the practical, pragmatic applications of design principles to achieve tangible measurable results for individuals AND enterprises.  It does not matter if we believe something to be true with total heart and soul if it cannot demonstrate tangible value of those beliefs to stakeholders. Not in the future. Now.

So here is a message for the "true believers". When someone tells you than an idea is a little early for their stakeholders....it doesn't mean he or she "don't get it", nor does it necesarily mean that she or he is a pin-headed, short-sighted idiot. It simply means that the case still needs to be made.

To be clear, if it weren't for people believing that they have a better way of doing something and being willing to social the ideas ad nauseum we probably *would* still be sniffing ditto copies in our obligatory F2F training sessions.

All *I'm* saying is that visionary awesomeness on its own probably isn't enough. Sometimes it might just take a few funsuckers to spin all that straw into gold.

 

 

On Secret Handshakes and Making the World a Better Place with ID

I attended the 2011 annual conference of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) in Jacksonville, FL this past week. AECT is a professional association focused on scholarship in the academic disciplines associated with instructional design. Its members are primarily college professors and their graduate students; members also include school librarians, media specialists, computer center directors, public television and publishing executives.

I spoke on the topic of Secret Handshakes of Instructional Design. My presentation was based on various blog posts I have written on this topic, as well as an essay published in the inaugural issue of the Journal of Applied Instructional Design on said same. It was intended as a gentle yet pointed look at this ID thing that we do. These may be the best of times for those who understand how to create experiences that inspire and enable learning, but our practice may be better served if we make our secret handshakes more inclusive, our practice less theoretical and abstract, and all our designs more actionable.

Here is the deck Download FINAL AECT Secret Handshakes for distrib I used in my presentation. I've removed copyrighted materials. All photos used in the deck come from iStockphoto. This presentation deck is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike, Non-commercial license.

Quick reflections - It was very nice to be back among the scholars. I enjoyed seeing former students and associates. It was great to talk with old friends, some I've known since my graduate school days. It was great to meet some new friends. I was inspired by the big ideas.

And yet, I was reminded that, regardless of our epistemological roots, our professional training, the number of or lack of our graduate degrees or the places where we work, many of us call ourselves IDs. And many of us in this wild and wacky ID practice universe continue to have a hard time recognizing one another. We come at this practice from diferent and various points in the ID value chain.

I was also reminded that big ideas and great intentions, while essential ingredients in successful recipes for change, are rarely sufficient for bringing about the kinds of systemic changes to culture and practice that are required to disrupt and transform.

Education transformation really is a team sport. Old ideas don't just fade away. Old ideas can be stubborn and relentless. Systemic change calls for many contributors. There are many variables to address, much practice and dedication required to develop expert skills. Transformation demands a clear understanding of what is to be changed, AND the will to see changed implemented. And with all due respect to everyone who claims the ID badge...We simply can't afford to all think the same way.

For real change - true transformation - we need all ID hands on deck. Scholars, analysts, artists, technologists, evaluators, and managers alike. Big thinkers. Expert practitioners. Skilled producers. People who can translate big ideas into actionable strategies and tactics driving real results about things that matter to the communities and stakeholders we purport to serve.

Secret handshakes DO help us recognize each other, help us evaluate what we and our fellow practitioners know, and what we don't. Maybe we DO need to make these "know 'em when you see 'em" attributes of our ID secret handshakes more explicit.  Maybe we really can use these secret handshakes as a conceptual checklist to find more of the expert practitioners who share ideas, information and practices that are similar or complementary to our own.

When you get right down to it, perhaps the most notable secret handshake all IDs share is the passion for finding solutions that make the world a better place for learning. And that is a great place to begin.

 

ID Secret Handshakes: First Round

Regardless of where you learned your craft, whether you have a graduate degree or not, whatever the market sector where you work -  there are certain things that people working in instructional design settings do that make themselves unique from, say, a web designer or a graphic artist or an LMS manager.

While the following "know 'em when you see 'em" attributes are a little bit tongue-in-cheek, these really are some of the initial things I notice when I'm sorting "real deal" IDs from the pretenders and wanna-bes. Sort of like the elimination round on a reality show:

• "Real" IDs call ourselves IDs. And we know just what we are talking about when we call ourselves that. No need to go through the loooooong explanation that ID stands for intructional design, because of course that means we have to explain what instructional design is, and we all know what a drag THAT can be.

• We all make fun of ADDIE. If you DON'T make fun of ADDIE, then other *real* IDs will make fun of you. They won't even bother to go behind your back. If you need for me to explain what ADDIE is then you are really not even eligible to be reading this blogpost.

• We've never met a learning theory we didn't like. I'm not suggesting this is a bad thing. The learning theories we love become our "colors". Let your freak flag fly high.

• "We don't need no stinkin' numbers". I know some of us are really smart number crunchers. Still. in the World o' ID, measurement is a necessary evil, we much prefer "qualitative research", and evaluation typically dismissed by saying "oh, our customers won't pay for it". As if that's really a good enough reason to not evaluate one's work.

• In our hearts we believe we are artists. We are engaged in the creative expression of new ideas and information. We want to design experiences that engage and inspire. Nobody really understands us.

• We love new technology. We love innovation. These days we really love social media and i-products. But that will change. Trust me. There's always something new and bright and shiny.
  
  
• We love to share. We love sharing more than just about anything in the entire world. We post, we present, we tweet, we blog, we write articles and books and white papers. We especially love to share our slides. Thank you for sharing.

How about you? How do you know 'em when you see 'em? What are some of your favorite techniques for cutting the good IDs out of the herd??

Secret Handshakes of ID

I recently contributed an essay to the inaugural issue of the Journal of Applied Instructional Design. This is a new journal, sponsored by the Association for Educational Communications and Technology, aimed at giving the ID scholar - practitioner greater voice. I contributed an essay, called "In Search of Secret Handshakes of Instructional Design", that talked about the importance of finding the "know 'em when we seen 'em" attributes for recognizing fellow ID practitioners when we encounter them on the long and winding road to enterprise learning. I also observed that theoretical foundations guiding the study of the evolution of a field can fall awkwardly out of alignment with the evolution of a professional practice, particularly one so directly affected by the speed of technological change.

Here is a link to the full essay. 

And here is a 5 minute summary:

Whether we use a constructivistic approach, a social learning approach, a connectionistic approach or a behavioral approach, IDs produce value through the design, development and distribution of learning solutions. We used to look more like teachers, trainers and psychologists than artists, scripters or programmers, but that balance seems to have shifted a bit. Today's IDs work with technology tools, because so much of today's learning and performance support is enabled / managed / distributed via technology. IDs create learning content and courseware. But IDs are not just elearning content authors, either. IDs are also engaged in supporting and enabling distance learning's web collaborations and with mobile learning's apps and mediacasts, too. AND running the LMS.

IDs used to mostly come to the practice out of graduate instructional design and educational technology programs. Today, perhaps as many as two-thirds of today's ID practitioners come to the practice of ID from applied settings.  We come from creative professions (e.g. artists, designers, producers). We became IDs when assigned with learning and development responsibilities. We are the IT professional who is put in charge of the enterprise LMS. We are the training manager who gets put in charge of the new elearning – mobile learning – game based learning – virtual world learning – initiative that the enterprise wants to explore.

Regardless of our epistemological roots, our professional training, the number of or lack of our graduate degrees or the places where we work, we call ourselves IDs.

Do we know how to recognize each other when we see each other??

To be continued....

(Of course it will. You don't think I would get this all queued up and walk away do you??)

 

Seven Steps for Using More Rich Media in Learning

Many of the best tips for creating rich, engaging digital assets for learning come from sources that are probably not first-of-mind for most learning designers or IDs, much less trainers, professors, or instructors.

Case in point: My so-called seven steps for ramping up the engagement level in digital learning assets, below, are a thinly disguised version of a comparable list that appeared in today's eMarketer FYI newsletter. In an ad for Adobe's Scene7 platform, no less. Do you even know about Adobe Scene7? You probably do if you are a sales and marketing professional, but I would be surprised if many elearning or education professionals did.

In any event, by changing the word "customer" to "learner", and making a few other obvious modifications, these tips for making commercial online sales sites more engaging for customers this holiday season seemed particularly relevant for those of us looking for ways to engage our stakeholders in more compelling ways:

1. Mobilize your website. When it comes to the small screen, think big. Engage with full-screen video and interactive zoom. Remember how you like to use your mobile devices. There will be many devices with different operating systems, so be sure to choose an approach that makes sense for you and your learners.

2. Socialize your rich media. Blogs and Facebook are perfect homes for rich media. Post your online “catalog” of courses, assets, links and resources  in Facebook and go after word of mouth promotion of your resources by making your multimedia viewers embeddable by bloggers.

3. Cover your rich media bases. Learners are hungry for visual information. Cover all the bases, from visual search to to pan and zoom on all images and angles. Put up online examples, games and apps. (Chatroulette, anyone?)

4. Enrich your online image. Don't be static this term. Engage learner with rich-media activities and messages. Give your learners reasons to keep checking back to see what ELSE is new.

5. Persuade, delight & inform with videos. Speak to your learners with moving images; lectures, demos, interviews, field trips. Self-produced or links from YouTube.    

6. Invite user-generated content. Ask your learners to share their product experiences with photos and videos. Getting members of your learning community to contribute content makes the experience more authentic.

7. Let learners have fun designing one-of-a-kind assets and apps. Give learners the tools to personalize or design an online experience of their own. Use configurators to keep assembly simple and to help deliver a great online experience regardless of their technical abilities.

Perhaps those of us who design and produce intentionally targeted communications that are intended to bring about a call to action, a change in memory, performance or emotion have more in common than we might realize.

The Pecha Kucha Instructional Design Smackdown Challenge

While at DevLearn this past November my friend Jay Cross asked me to participate in a video interview. Jay is maniacal in his devotion to "walking the talk", using new media and pushing people out of their comfort zone. I love that about him. Even though my appreciation means that I have to be okay with the occasional video conversation.

Jay asked me where I though elearning was going (based on DevLearn presentation I had just completed) and I responded with some highlights from the preso. A few days later I saw a discussion of the interview between two people I follow on Twitter, suggesting that I only talked about the "what" of the future, not the "how". Well, of COURSE I jumped in and asked if they really expected that one should take on a problem/solution answer with elearning people in less than 5 minutes - in some circles we would still be defining this thing that we do!  Well, not too surprisingly both jumped in almost immediately, saying "yes!, underscoring the value in getting to the point. And in that instant I uttered something to the effect that "well, then maybe it's time for a pecha kucha ID video smackdown".

According to Wikipedia, Pecha Kucha (ペチャクチャ), usually pronounced in three syllables as "pe-chak-cha", is the onomatopoeic Japanese word for the sound of conversation. The equivalent term in English is "chit-chat".  Pecha Kucha events were originally conceived as a venue through which young designers could meet, show their work, exchange ideas, and network. They usually consist of around a dozen presentations, each presenter having 20 slides, each shown for 20 seconds. Each presenter has just 6 minutes 40 seconds to explain their ideas before the next presenter takes the stage.  The format keeps presentations concise, fast-paced and entertaining. In 2004 PK events began running in a few cities in Europe, and has since spread virally since has become a worldwide phenomenon, now running in more than 260 cities all over the world.

Young designers? Well, why not young INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGNERS?? Or old instructional designers who still have a few tricks up their sleeves? Why NOT encourage big thinkers to capture the essence of a position, a platform, a solution, whatever, in 20 slides, 20 seconds per slide, timed. 6 minutes, 40 seconds to share.

Maybe it was Jane Bozarth who mentioned "smackdown". Or maybe Janet Clarey. In any event, next thing I knew we had a pecha kucha ID video smackdown tweetstream going on. All kinds of (instructional design people who use Twitter) people wanting to get in on the fun. 

Several suggested refinements involving kimchi, mudwrestling, jello, tequilia and a few other suggestions best left alone.  I was also getting a few direct messages from people saying "you know, I don't really know what you are talking about, but as long as I don't have to wear liederhosen and a beanie in public I'll be okay with whatever it is."

Something uttered in the tw-heat of the moment should not constitute a binding agreement, so I wasn't planning to hold anybody to doing anything...nevertheless, I'm thinking that maybe its time to introduce The Pecha Kucha Instructional Design Smackdown Challenge. Still not sure what the Challenge part of this is, yet - except to challenge you all to think about how you might describe your ID work and what you love about it in 20 slides, 20 second per slide.

Cammy Bean and Koreen Olbrish and I are doing a presentation at the upcoming Learning Solutions conference;  I have included a pecha kucha component to our session. I have no doubt we will be exceptional.

Aaron Silvers' Mentat Beard (yes, it's a nom de plume) has written a fabulous rap entitled ADDIE is a Methodology not a DESIGN that is an obvious candidate for a pecha kucha interpretation.

I am working with Megan Raymond to host a pecha kucha activity at the upcoming WCET Annual Conference in beeeeyoutiful La Jolla, CA. Nov 10 - 13. (I will be doing a separate blog post about the WCET Call for Proposals in the next day or so, so stay tuned!!) We're looking for big thinkers who have something to say about accelerating the adoption of learning technology innovation in post-secondary education settings. in 6 minutes, 40 seconds!!

We have challenged Brent Schlenker from the eLearning Guild to bring his bongos and triangle to San Francisco for DevLearn 2010 to get us started with DevLearn pecha kucha. Actually, it wasn't much of a challenge - he VOLUNTEERED to bring the bongos and triangle.

So. Who's else is in?

ADDIE in 5 Screen Shots

I had a g-r-e-a-t discussion on Friday with 10 instructional designers that I happen to follow on Twitter. Serendipitously, I am working on a presentation that is germane to the discussion that follows. We were, once again, spinning around the workflow process model known as ADDIE.

And yes, @gminks, I knew what I was doing when I tossed the "A-bomb" out the window. Research. Yeah, that's it - research.

This is also a lesson in Twitter 101. I know that many of you out there are highly experienced tweeters. I also know that there are many of you who read this blog that wouldn't know a tweet if it bit you. Still can't imagine why anyone would care about what other people are doing at any given time, and THEN posting a message about it.

Well, get a clue, my tech-resistant darlings. This is something you need to know about.

I took screen shots of the Twitter feed and have posted them in order. I did this because (1) It is Sunday, I am lazy and this was a fast way to replicate the back-channel without asking people to create an @edwsonoma search column. Also (2) I wanted to show some of my tech resistant buddies what a tweetstream looks like, and this is an easier way to do it.  You will notice from the time-stamps that the tweets are best read from bottom to top in each of the 5 sections. However, you will also notice that most tweets can be read somewhat out of sequence without sacrificing too much meaning. It's a bit like walking into the middle of a discussion at a cocktail party. You'll catch up.

If you are an experienced Twitter user, don't bother to read this next part.

If you are a Twitter newbie, this paragraph is for you. A little bit of guidance to understand what you are looking at. These are individual microblogged posts that were published to the Twitter website, sorted using my user name (since this was a conversation I was following). For each individual post into what is called the "tweetstream" each contributor sending the message will show up as the first user name, in bold red. The sender's picture shows up with each tweet they make. The string of letters following each "@" is a Twitter user name. People who send a tweet will often add the name of people, prefaced by "@", that are part of a particular online conversational thread. If you see an RT in front of a user name it's because someone liked a post so much that they forwarded it. If you are intrigued about Twitter sign up for a user name at http://twitter.com.

If you are an instructional designer, might I suggest that the people involved in the following conversation should definitely be on your "follow" lists.

And now, back to ADDIE. I hope you enjoy the following discussion as much as I did.

If you haven't seen the Beard's Posterous post on ADDIE's a Methodology, not Design please scroll to the bottom of the page (after you read the conversation below, of course) and I will be very happy to share the link. I would like to believe that his genius was inspired in part by this fine discussion.

And yes, Cammy and Koreen and I will offer an ID pecha kucha smackdown performance at Learning Solutions. Gauntlet has been tossed. We're there.

 
 

 

Don't you just love doing research?

The link to the Beard's Posterous site is http://thebeard.posterous.com/addies-a-methodology-and-not-design-full-lyri. Definitely worth the trip.

New Skills for IDs

During the week of March 22-26 I'm taking the Roadtrip to Orlando Florida to participate in the eLearning Guild's Learning Solutions (formerly Annual Gathering) Conference. Cammy Bean, VP Learning at Kineo and I are going to be co-hosting a session on Tuesday 23 March as part of the Guild's eLearning Foundations Intensive. We'll be exploring the topic of how instructional design for the classroom differs from instructional design in elearning. (Yes, we were both a little surprised by that title, too. But then we got it...)

And then Friday morning 26 March Cammy Bean, Koreen Olbrish (CEO of Tandem Learning) and I are going to be sharing what we have learned about New Skills for IDs. Now, in the spirit of true disclosure, none of the skills that I see being demanded of today's IDs are particularly new. But I have come to realize that some of the choices one makes about which skill one chooses to develop has a lot to do with where one ends up spending one's professional time. And that, IMHO, makes this a topic worth talking about.

Cammy, Koreen and I share a deep interest in Instructional design for technology-mediated learning.  Each one of us comes at our elearning/design practices from different perspectives, experiences and professional training, but it's interesting to see how in spite of those difference we all speak the same language of ID.That is a very good thing about the systematic processes that seem to shape elearning practice, if you think about eLearning in a "big tent" kind of way.

But OMG ID practitioners love to fuss about the models we use to articulate and share our unique brand of workflow management!!! VERY strong emotions about the process models used to represent the process of ID. Why, just earlier today there was a momentary bit of Friday madness via Twitter with some of my favorite eLearning tweeters - Gina Minks (@ginaminks), Cammy Bean (@cammybean), Koreen Olbrish (@koreenoldbrish), Aaron Silvers (@mrch0mp3rs), Brent Schlenker (@bschlenker), Chad Udell (@visualrinse), Dick Carlson (@techherding) about our favorite ID girlfriend, ADDIE!!

You Remember ADDIE, right? The Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement, Evaluate ADDIE that has become the quintessential visual representation of Instructional Design practice? Even if many IDs themselves roll their eyes when this acronym is mentioned. Because it's not like we really hate it...it's just that it is NOT a learning model. It is not even really a design model. It is most certainly a process workflow model. And most of those of us who call ourselves IDs already know how our work flows.

(Parenthetically - I think that the description of ADDIE that currently sits on Wikipedia needs some work. Just in case anyone here wants to take a shot at a revision.)

So I've been giving far less thought to process and workflow, and far more thought to competencies and skills. When I think about how instructional design skills tend to be taught we sorta pretend to follow the ADDIE model or some analogue thereof. And I've noticed that our various personal iterations of models like ADDIE typically reflect the environments in which we work. That suggests that the notion of a one-size-fits-all workflow, except at the most conceptual of levels, really doesn't hold up very well.

Cammy and I have been spending a fair amount of time lately looking at ID job descriptions to see if our workflow process models and the public expectations of what folks like us are supposed to be able to do are aligned. We're finding that the job descriptions tend to cluster essential skills in a framework that looks a bit more like this:

 

This is all I really want to say about the sessions for now. Except to tell you that I really have been giving very serious thought to how to bring the Pecha Kucha ID video smackdown challenge I've issued to Jane Bozarth, Clark Quinn, Janet Clarey, Tim Martin and several others to life in this session. Wayne Hodgins has given me a crash course on the fine points of Pecha Kucha, and I expect that we will have a demo of such.

No doubt we will have some fun ways sharing some of the things we've learned. Please take a look at Cammy's blog if you'd like to contribute to this conversation - and of course feel free to post a comment or note if you have things to say to me directly.

How We Recognize Each Other

When I was in graduate school my advisor made me  map and track instructional design models. He wanted me to see the variations and similarieties in how people described the processes used to develop a unit of instruction. Which was sort of different from designing a curriculum. Which was kind of different from designing a system.  I remember having vague disdain for the ADDIE model because it was so...simple.

My respect for the power of ADDIE was born after sitting in a product marketing meeting a few years back, hearing my product team co-workers talking about ADDIE as if it was the instructional designer's sacred code. They had developed a strategy to map product requirements definition (PRD) to the stages in ADDIE. I had the sudden shocked realization that my co-workers saw this model as THE representation of what instructional designers do. Even if we don't. And I know they are not the only ones. 

With all due respect, to the rest of the world, this IS what we do. I was not able to persuade otherwise. At some level or another, this ADDIE model is, for better or worse, love it or hate it, the simplest, clearest, most direct way of describing what the quintessential ID does in their work. it is one of the only truly international signs through which an ID in India would recognize an ID in Brazil, an ID in the US would recognize an ID in England. Whether working in education, government, defense, media, financials services or manufacturing.

I was thinking about this just today when Clive Shepherd invited us all to vote in his CreateaDebate site. The anti-ADDIE people are pretty far ahead in the voting. My contribution to the vote and commentary was to suggest that ADDIE is how instructional designers recognize each other. We can make fun of it or love it or hate it all we want, We still all know what we are talking about. 

Can you name me anything else that we all know, no matter where we live and work? I would love to have a few more alternatives, especially these days. I would so much rather have our practice acknowledged - and recognized - for things that really matter.

The Best Ever Instructional Design Model List.

On Friday I had the pleasure of giving the closing session in the eLearning Guild Online Forum series on Instructional Design. I suppose presenters aren't supposed to say this, but I had so much fun with the group that had virtually gathered to conclude this two day event. I know there are a number of points in the recording where I am cracking up at some of the very funny and insightful things that came up in the chat. I just have to say, sometimes I'm amazed at the depth and quality of the interpersonal interactions that occur when a group of self-directed people with shared interest find each other, whatever the platform or medium of exchange.

In any event, we had a great conversation about instructional design models. And ADDIE. (Of course, how could I not???) I've been struck by just how many of us in the learning technologies biz use ADDIE as the thing we share, one of the primary things we have in common.

But for today, I went on a different quest, one looking for info about ID models.  I found this fantastic resource courtesy of Dr. Martin Ryder at the University of Colorado-Denver School of Education. Everything you ever wanted to know about instructional design models theories, frameworks, you name it:

http://carbon.ucdenver.edu/~mryder/itc/idmodels.html

I was especially delighted to find this, as Martin and I had been friends and co-workers a bazillion years ago when we both worked at the Boulder Valley Vocational Technical Center. Martin was an electronics teacher. I was a media production technician, supporting myself through grad school. (And yes, it does kinda makes me wonder what is in the water in Boulder that made both of us develop this rather arcane interest.)

Hope you enjoy the list. And a big "Hey!" to Martin.