LearnShifting

 Our Human Resource team and Information Services team developed an online orientation package which was nominated for a category in this year's Chief Ministers awards. We didn't win, but we were a finalist which means we came second or third as they don't distinguish between the two. Maybe the saying that nobody remembers who came second could be rolled out, but personally it was wonderful that the program was nominated and then made into the final three.

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This entry was posted on November 22, 2011 at 6:40 AM and has received 158 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

 I am cross-posting this from my aviation blog because there are some photos of places on the outskits of Darwin that folks may wish to use in the classroom... For instance did you know that Z force was based on Catalina Island? Do you know that they breed giant clams on Channel Island?

http://www.xsymetrix.com.au/tefc/index.cfm/2011/11/16/The-new-detention-centre-from-700ft

This entry was posted on November 16, 2011 at 9:04 AM and has received 151 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

We are currently holding discussions across various agencies about learning management systems and delivery of training. I will be providing a list of solutions here that are probably a best bet. Before I do that, let's look again at the problem we are trying to solve or the efficiencies we are trying to achieve.

Common forms of training like orientation, financial procedures, health and safety are delivered face to face, sometimes involving travel and often repeated. These forms of training are good candidates for conversion to eLearning.

Additionally, many of these courses are very similar in nature and content across agencies is also very similar which means that if we can gather a common set of technologies and skills, agencies will be in a situation to share courses and content for repurposing without having to build from the ground up.

We can divide the learning requirements into training and support.

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This entry was posted on October 21, 2011 at 1:58 PM and has received 233 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

Yes they do and like all things we have to guide our students or children in the usage to ensure that it isn't 95% games and 5% other stuff. Pamela posted a great link to this inforgraphic on the positive effect games have on a child's learning and gets into specifics about what is actually improved by popular games or genres of games.

Although the space invaders icon is shown in the graphic, it didn't get a specific mention although some folks of my vintage will remember the first Mavis Beacon typing tutor and "Where in the World is Carmen San Diego?".

It is a good graphic and for the folks that need to convince others that game playing on computers is not a total waste of time, this graphic may help.

Again, all things in moderation - kids learn lots from playing on jumping castles, riding bikes, playing sport, building tree houses and going to the libray as well...

http://www.onlinecolleges.net/2011/08/25/how-video-games-are-changing-education/

This entry was posted on September 12, 2011 at 7:26 AM and has received 154 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

 When I talk about creating I think of the various media formats of sound, video, photos, artwork, animation and words. After many years of doing this work I still think that animation is the most time consuming and photography is the least time consuming providing the subject is available.

Before we start creating anything, we have to know why we are doing it, who we are doing it for and most importantly what we are doing.

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This entry was posted on June 23, 2011 at 6:47 AM and has received 328 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry. Download attachment.

 When we think about teaching something, we will normally look, from a formal sense at the outcomes required and then apply a treatment or method of delivery that will hopefully engage the intended audience. Some may call that contextualisation if they have a VET background.

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This entry was posted on June 22, 2011 at 8:36 AM and has received 320 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry. Download attachment.

We (being a whole bunch of people in education) attended a conference last week which was lead not only by our informed peers and interstate and international experts, but also by some of our customers… the students we teach.

Being a conference about technology, I don’t really need to go through the events as you can check out the conference tweets by going to http://twitter.com and typing in #ltl2011 into the search box at the top of the page.

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This entry was posted on April 11, 2011 at 1:23 AM and has received 575 views. There are currently 2 comments. Print this entry.

Skype as you probably know is a great phone and video calling solution that you can use from your computer or even your mobile phone. Recently on a trip to Singapore I was able to call landlines back in Australia for a ridiculous 2 cents a minute from any one of the free wifi spots around town.

With Skype premium you can video call and share screens with up to 10 people and only one person needs to pay for the skype premium account.

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This entry was posted on March 9, 2011 at 6:53 AM and has received 511 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry. Download attachment.

My son likes playing with Lego. Lego has been around so long that I believe on a recent archeological dig in China they found a prototype of the Great Wall of China built in Lego...

Lego has evolved to a point where you buy a computer game, let's say Lego Star Wars and as you proceed through the game, or rather you child proceeds through the game, requests to purchase the Lego spaceships and characters in the game increase.

Some may argue that we buy these games, paying money to a company advertise their wares through gameplay on our computers. That is not a discussion for this eLearning place however effective the strategy might be.

I really only wanted to comment on two observations.

Reward Systems

Reward systems in these games are generally based around earning points by finding or doing something and you use those points to buy tools that will help you advance through the levels in the game. Joe's teachers over the years have used a similar strategy in the classroom. Paying attention, doing work well, working as a team member, being well behaved earn points, marbles, jellybeans and once enough "micro-credits" are accumulated, the marbles convert to a silver ball which means that with the extra strength of the silver ball, minor transgressions will still be pointed out and the threat of losing the silver ball and being relgated to collecting jellybeans and marbles is enough to keep kids in check.

When does that strategy cease to be effective? I think at about the same time that interest in the Lego Star Wars games wanes and collecting baubles and credits loses importance and is replaced with the collecting other things of importance to us. By the way this is not about materialism although it can manifest itself in the earn and trade nature of games.

Given that many kids in class do play computer games, our classroom teaching can't compete with the 3D wizardry of the multimillion dollar game companies, but we can learn from the reward systems used (which are based on reward systems in life) and as art imitates life... take the good, leave out the bad and use what you can to keep them interested and making it easy to pick up points for good behaviour or attention so they can get to level one, but not too easy that they don't care about going back to zero again.

Those of you who are teachers and have taught for a while will go "I've been doing that all my career" and that is right... Joe's teachers are great examples of teachers putting good classroom strategies in place to improve performance at both an academic and behavioural level.

This is mainly for us first time parents who realise that whatever you do to do your best for your child, you are always trying to understand the best way to provide the best path... the "do I let him" or "don't I let him" or "Would it help if we..."

So if a reward system in a computer game can keep a child engrossed for hours, I want to map the secret of that onto other activities - like getting him to eat vegetables.

Virtual World (on the computer) and Virtual World (Lego spaceships attached to child being flown around the house)

The playing of the game on the computer leads to similar play with the Lego objects in the house. I was thinking that using my iPod nano to film Joe and putting that on YouTube (or just on the computer) maybe with the right storyline we can add to the way play activities become learning activities. Making a short movie with kids waving light sabres around is one thing and it is fun for all involved, but it wasn't until I suggested that we make a "Masterchef" movie with Joe and his cousins that a real interest in cooking was sparked.

So by using a Lego Star Wars spaceship we could make a movie about a visitor from another planet travelling to places affected by climate change and reporting back to the grand council on Naboo on each of the findings. With Joe combining the two worlds of a computer game and a real world he researches, prepares and then shoots a story that presents a serious topic using a visual treatment that I know his mates would love to watch.

These observations are written as a parent and not as a teacher (which I am not - although I know some very good ones) and this is not a shameless endorsement of Lego (although you have to agree they are pretty cool).

May the force be with you!

This entry was posted on February 10, 2011 at 7:26 AM and has received 561 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

 Australia Day this year was great! I got to take my sister in law Tina and one of her three daughters Cecilia for a flight in my ultralight (next time for Bianka and Ashley when they are a little taller) and then after that we went to the Australia Day celebrations hosted by Gerry Woods, the local member for the area who has been described as a chicken farmer with enough power in our local parliament to turn a rooster into a feather duster.

The kids got to play cricket, run around, go for a ride on a classic fire engine, have a hot dog, a cool drink and fell asleep minutes after we had left the event for home.

In between the trip to the airfield and the Australia Day event I had the radio on in the car and came in part way through a speech being made by the unmistakeable voice of President Obama.

Those who know me will know that I have about as much interest in politics as a vegetarian in a butcher's shop, however I will not shun any valuable offerings that they have. In this case it was Obama's inspirational speech to congress that had me listening to it and reflecting on how I could map some of the talking points to our own situation here in Australia and in the Northern Territory. He spoke of the economic situation, how Americans had fallen behind, how education and health along with infrastructure and unemployment were big issues... and then he went on to describe how it was going to be fixed.

America has been hit hard by the recession. A friend of mine who just returned from the US said that 350k houses in Las Vegas now sell for less than 150k. That must be heartbreaking to find that your house is worth far less than the value of the mortgage you have... and then you lose your job.

Out of this grim set of circumstances, Obama crafted a speech which genuinely gave hope.

Why am I writing about this in an eLearning blog? Four reasons.

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This entry was posted on January 30, 2011 at 9:30 AM and has received 253 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.