Learning 3.0 – Technology and implications on Pedagogy & Learning Styles

Web 3.0 has arrived. The learning 3.0 technologies would eventually turn out to be one of the critical factors to impact the future of traditional learning and teaching styles. These tools are already being implemented to maximize the benefits of learning. Mobility will be one of the key focus of Web 3.0. Emantras took the opportunity to introduce a few concepts on Learning 3.0 at the annual PADLA Conference which was held on 7th Nov 2007.

Click on the below link to view the presentation - http://www.emantras.com/Learning%203%200%20Final.ppt

From Passive to Active Learning

Created by: Michael Lamendola

Director - Digital Education, Emantras

“So, this character that looked like a file folder with eyes, arms and legs starts talking to me about the insurance billing process, right? Then he starts asking me questions, but I didn’t know the answers. This folder-person told me it was okay, and where I should go to learn for more information. I went back, studied again, and the character let me go on to the next topic. Weird, right? Here let me show you…”

Water-cooler talk! It’s what you talk about, the day after the Super Bowl or when the iPhone was announced. It’s buzz, hype, or something of interest that just needs to be shared. As an online administrator, my aim was to have my students talking about online classes around their water-coolers.

Afterall, why should an ad for a new movie be more exciting than someone’s personal education or training? Consider that FOX wanted you to pay $10 for a ticket to see The Simpsons Movie (www.simpsonsmovie.com) this summer. FOX went all out with interactive websites, teasers, and promotional partnerships to promote the movie (not including cost of development). As an educator, your school may require someone to spend over $30,000 on a degree, and you’re putting together PowerPoint presentations with a few pictures you found on the Internet.

It may seem trivial, but both activities are vying for attention. Education is inevitably becoming more mobile and customizable which is great for the end-user. Going a step further, education must become more engaging and do a better job at reaching students at their teachable moments. MySpace, Yahoo!, and casual gaming feature simple activities that attract everyday people to spend hours on their sites. The average camera angle in a television show doesn’t last longer than a few seconds because our attention spans have become so short. For your material to really sink in with a student, the same approach should be taken.

Rapid eLearning tools such as Captivate (www.captivate.com), Articulate (www.articulate.com), and PresentationPro (www.presentationpro.com) are excellent for starters. I am cautious not to overuse these programs, though – too much of the same thing becomes static and plain in the context of your catalog of courses.

If you have your own graphic designers in house, work with them on developing activities around objectives and new, creative ways to deliver content.

Textbook publishers can also help with the development of custom online courses, but this may require you to commit to textbook adoption. If you’re going this route, remember that online course development will vary from publisher to publisher, and students should have a consistent look and feel from course to course.

One of my most rewarding experiences as an academic dean was hearing that my online classes were bringing families together. In an Environmental Earth Science class (a general education course of an Associate degree program), my student’s child would ask about the animations and activities she saw on her mother’s computer screen. This class included vivid colors and fun exercises to reinforce the learning objectives. Soon after, the child became genuinely interested in the environment, wanted to learn more, and started reading more about forests and pollution.

This moment was achieved by delivering friendly and engaging content that begged to be touched and discussed, rather than passively read. Most will agree that a combination of text, images, animations, and exercises are great ways to reach diverse learners. However, these tools should be carefully designed and administered to achieve the ‘water cooler’ talk we all strive for.

--If you’d like a demo of the course described or would like to discuss anything further, contact me at michael.lamendola@emantras.com

HALO – Bridge the knowledge divide with an innovative enterprise training approach.

The Purpose

The Untied States Distance Learning Association (USDLA – http://www.usdla.org/) celebrated its first annual National Distance Learning Week (NDLW – http://www.ndlw.org/) with productive ideas for distance learning and the use of technology to facilitate learning. Maintaining the theme and spirit of the week-long event, NDLW used a new technology to allow easy access to information and also pushed small knowledge pieces to the participants through a product called HALO (Highly Accessible Learning Objects). HALO is a product designed and developed by the digital education company Emantras.

About HALO

HALO is based on the ubiquitous “widget” platform which drives information and learning to the client desktop. The value of any learning or training program is the accessibility of knowledge and enabling clients to receive and participate without having to leave their desktop, allowing increased accessibility. HALO incorporates new modalities of enablement making education available agnostic to geographic boundaries.

Emantras delivers learning to the “desktop” with its revolutionary HALO platform. SCORM/AICC and learning strategies allow easy accessibility to knowledge, thereby enhancing performance. HALO incorporates the same principle by literally creating a direct pathway between the learner and the knowledge source. You may have heard of “widgets”, now experience the HALO effect using widget technology. For more details about Halo visit http://halo.emantras.com

The Process

HALO was introduced and implemented at the National Distance Learning week program sponsored by USDLA. All registered members were given the opportunity to download HALO free of cost. HALO turned out to be a real success, providing an ideal platform for USDLA to share announcements, event schedules, articles, surveys and SCORM content. Participants and members had direct and easy access to all pre-conference and post-conference materials that were readily made available at their desktop.

HALO comes with a comprehensive administration module that allowed the USDLA to select and deploy content of various formats, thus enabling them to measure the success and effectiveness of the event during various sessions held through out National Distance Learning Week. In addition, the open APIs allowed integration into legacy infrastructure for enterprises that want to administer from a singular location. While HALO has been designed to meet most online learning and training needs, it was further customized based on specific requirements and needs identified by USDLA to increase the effectiveness of using HALO during NDLW.

The Outcome

The HALO widget performed flawlessly and the participants enjoyed the convenience of a cutting edge tool. HALO was downloaded by many participants at the National Distance Learning Week and providing an easy way of managing and distributing content. NDLW participants had direct access to multimedia content right on their desktop thereby helping make NDLW a successful event.

Video Sharing in Education – Does it create an impact?

Being a regular user of YouTube for some time now, One question remains at the back of my mind on how it could be used for teaching and learning. I bet the current epidemic of YouTube is here to stay, in many ways beyond its social networking debut.

The YouTube generation has been coined as the group of internet users who are making use of today’s technology of video sharing with the ease of personal video uploading. Vblogs are an offshoot of this group, allowing users to blog their lives and experiences in writing, and accompany the whole package with a video rendition. Video sharing is exploding into a variety of industries, including mass media advertising, and learning. Students who use You Tube and other social networking sites today are not only bombarded with friend’s messages and links, but also with the rise in advertising and media-sponsored videos.

Education using multimedia and other visual aids has always been a strengthening component of many subjects and curriculum. Today’s educators are taking steps to incorporate the Internet and media-based tools to improve participation and learning. Still, video sharing on a small scale could prove to have multiple benefits.

The impact of video sharing in education benefits both educators and students. Responsibility and ethics with internet use are certainly factors that play a strong role in making the best of today’s technology. There is great potential for educators to create effective policies and allow students to participate in a positive and productive way.

mLearning: Digital learning in your pocket

Learning with mobile devices (mLearning) is fast being recognized as a key subset of eLearning as it provides another flexible delivery option for learners. With a growing buzz around the globe about the unique and advantageous facets of mLearning, the interest generated by technology experts and learners have already stated leading to exciting results.

For instance, mlearning benefits users in various ways. “I am studying a foreign language so to practice listening, I call up a phone number that simulates various dialogues with me…such as, buying a bus ticket…, says a user. “Now that’s something else! It gives me feedback on my understanding or even on my pronunciation instantaneously!.” The vast possibilities fostered by these devices extend from sharing pictures or documents to collaborative game playing, reading and writing.

Mobile Learning in Your World Today

The contemporary scenario of mobile learning is heading down an interesting path following the rapid advancements in technology. These advancements are becoming the norm as quality and capability are constantly increasing while costs continue to drop. On the other hand, even after continuous advancement in technology the are still limitations when it comes to mLearning which the industry must overcome. However, this issue is being combated systematically. Currently, few of these devices are ubiquitously connected, the screens are small, the processing is slow, and the storage capacities are limited.

The concept of elearning is a combination of relevant content with engaging graphics, animation etc that covers both the conceptual material as well as illustrations. In addition, it also includes vital interactive practice activities, which allows the user to participate and provide personalized feedback. Following the ideology of elearning, conscious efforts should be made to ensure all learning applications integrate or interface with a Learning Management System (LMS). This is essential in order to track performances and update records as well as enable certification. When tracking learning, it is imperative for outcomes to be stored systematically and reported back. This information is crucial in order to meet learner needs, to be able to reward outcomes, and to manage corporate knowledge. Usually, based on user action, the learner platform can communicate the outcome to the management system. However, this solution does not work with intermittent connectivity. These same mechanisms do not possess the ability to save or maintain outcomes until connectivity is restored.

Another major issue that must be overcome is successfully facilitating managed learning through an intermittent connection. Ideally most providers would prefer that individuals take responsibility personally for their own learning, but many constraints suggest that there are benefits from having systems track and manage learning. Cross-platform solutions are another issue, meaning enabling all learners to have access to all materials independent of particular system preferences.

Ongoing research focused on improving the capabilities of standard web mechanisms and mobile device connectivity and capability will soon eliminate the distinction between mLearning and elearning. With seamless wireless networking, high-powered supercomputers, high resolution flexible full color screens (or integrated into our visual field through special glasses), and flexible input from pen to keyboard, the distinction between desktop and mobile will disappear.

mLearning is the perfect delivery tool for JIT (just in time) teaching. Imagine having content, reminders, assignments, updates and discussion questions sent directly to your portable device. Like the AOL announcement “you have mail" soon, you will soon hear devices echoing, with "You have an assignment"!

Do Games Help In Enhancing Learning Experience?

This is completely a legitimate question which I have asked to myself many a times. And the answer is? You bet they work! Games have a high presence in non-formal and informal segments of learning. Unfortunately, in formal education, games are still too seldom seen just as a serious activity. However, there are some areas where the game-based learning model is used very successfully, particularly in business, corporate training, healthcare, science and mathematics.

In many cases, the application of serious games and simulations for learning provides an opportunity for learners to apply acquired knowledge and to experiment and obtain feedback in the form of consequences, thus obtaining the experiences in the “safe virtual world”. The unique attitude of game-based learning is the social aspect where such categories as critical thinking, group communication, debate, and decision-making are improving.

Can innovative learning approaches such as game-base learning and playful interaction change the acceptance of learning and turn it into an enjoyable and stimulating activity?

The power of gaming in learning is that, the second a question is asked, the brain automatically goes into search mode to find the answer. What makes games so effective is their ability to bring out curiosity and a competitive spirit. Games in learning have been found to:

• Break the mode of what a typical training class is like.
• Keep learners' attention by engaging and motivating them.
• Make learning more fun and participative.
• Enhance and energize any learning experience.
• Speed up learning process and increases knowledge retention.
• Provide bottom-line benefits such as increased productivity and more engaged, motivated, happy and capable workers

Game show training programs can be easily customized and are appropriate for a full range of learners. A higher level of participant engagement in training creates a greater emotional stake, and emotions are tied to memory. As a result, the knowledge retention capability is high when the information is presented in a game show format.

Think back and analyze how your favorite teachers taught you in schools to make you understand a particular concept - most likely they were the ones who really engaged you at a very emotional level.

Play on and learn more!