Final Project

Well, this project didn't come out anything like what I was planning to do originally. Due to several sudden priority shifts at work, not to mention the recent reorg, I ended up putting together a much different project than what was described several weeks ago in the training needs assessment.

What I've put together here is essentially a demonstration video for one of our other products. We had an urgent need to get something like this done quickly, along with a more professional promotional video. I'm no animator, so the promo video was left to someone else to build (though I still provided the VO), and I focused on building out a couple of these demonstration videos. I rushed this one in order to get it out the door in time for this class. :-)

Since this is purely a product demo, there is no interactivity built into it. It does take advantage of some other features, however. I ended up using multiple software applications to build this video, not just Captivate.

Captivate feature: slide templates

I first used Captivate sometime in 2006. I think my first version was the beta for Captivate 2; I recall using it to create a demonstration of a new feature in Acrobat 8, which was also in beta at the time. I don't remember much about that version except that it was awfully clunky, but that may have been because it was still in beta, and performance tweaks are always the last thing to happen on a new software version.

One of the things that impressed me most about the software, though, was how easy it was to pick up and use. Sans any guidance on how the product worked, and with only a rough notion of what it could do, I very quickly figured out how to record my demonstration, annotate it, and set up timings on certain elements.

Captivate has grown up a lot since then, and there is a lot more to it now than there used to be. Some aspects are even simpler and more intuitive now than they used to be, while others have been moved back out of the limelight. Other than a very brief dabbling in Captivate 7 I haven't actually used the program since version 5.5, and I have to say that some of the new features I uncovered when preparing to write this post looked pretty darn useful. There are a lot of things in the program now that would have made my life simpler back when I was building more e-learning.

For my money, one of the most exciting features in Captivate these days is the slide templates. Like the one below, these templates give you several pre-placed elements which you can quickly replace with images and text, and then move around according to your needs. It's exactly like working with master slide layouts in PowerPoint.

I really wish these had existed a few years ago. What a tremendous time saver this feature is!

Unlike many of the other other commonly used features in Captivate, you won't find these templates on the ribbon. To access them, you need to go to Insert > New slide from and simply pick the design you want from the fly-out menu.

Although most of the templates are fairly simple, Adobe has captured the most commonly used layouts in e-learning courses, making the process of constructing new slides go quite a bit faster. Better still, the templates work with any of the themes and theme color sets available in the program, so instructional designers don't have to go through the tedious process of recoloring all of the text and objects as each slide is created. The most time consuming part of creating any new presentation now will be setting up slide and object timings for animations and audio synchronization, which is as it should be.

While there are several other recent additions to Captivate that make the program more useful or easier to use than in the past, slide templates immediately jumped out at me as something that has significant value to a very broad spectrum of instructional designers. This is a feature that can bring a lot of benefit to a lot of people.

Narrated PPT converted to Captivate

The video below is a presentation I built for an earlier class in the OLPC program, which I have subsequently narrated. The topic for this presentation is a proposed change initiative to improve the efficiency of a separate T&D group within my organization that has been having a lot of struggles lately. Ironically, I was just informed this morning that I am being transferred to this group, so the issues and changes discussed in the presentation are definitely at the forefront of my mind once again.

Learning analytics

For large organizations, or at least those with large numbers of learners, learning analytics are a valuable tool for providing additional layers of insight into the behavior of their learners. How are learners accessing the content? When? How much time do they spend in each course? Are they entering the course multiple times? And so on. With these insights organizations can refine their content and delivery to make it more effective, more widely available, and even to better account for differences in learner capabilities.

The organization I work for has the technical expertise to design and implement a learning analytics program. In fact, our core competency lies in the collection, retrieval, and analysis of large amounts of data. However, given the very small amount of training that we do, there is really no need for us to conduct these types of analysis. Even if we did, the organization's leadership would have no interest in the information and the insights gained from it. So while I can think of several companies I have worked for in the past that would benefit from the use of learning analytics, this is one case where I do not think it would be worth the effort.

Review of Siemens's "Learning analytics: the emergence of a discipline"

Citation
Siemens, G. (2013). Learning analytics: the emergence of a discipline. American Behavioral Scientist, 57(10), 1380-1400.

Summary
Learning analytics is a rapidly emerging field that seeks to provide better understanding of the behavior and effectiveness of learners and learning programs through the application of modern data collection and analysis tools. As with any new field, it is easy to see the potential benefits of the work being done, and stakeholders are eager to get results. However, expertise is limited, and the work to establish analytic routines difficult and time intensive. There is yet a long ways to go.

Siemens makes an important distinction between learning analytics and educational data mining, arguing that where the former is concerned with understanding patterns and trends in order to improve learning and learning environments, the latter is targeted toward finding unique types of data that occur in an educational setting. Learning analytics can take place at multiple levels, from the level of an individual course or program, to that of an entire organization or university. At each level, the types of information gathered and analyzed are bound to differ.

A brief history of the roots of learning analytics is provided, from early citation analysis techniques in the 1950s through the popular adoption and increased sophistication of e-learning. Siemens also gives a brief overview of the analytics tools in use at the time of writing. The tools available are rapidly evolving, and this has become a highly competitive, if not yet saturated, market space.

One challenge facing learning analytics is the scope of the data to be captured, which can lead to significant challengs in storage, sorting, searching, and the development of analytical algorithms. However, modern tools are making this somewhat easier, enabling organizations to personalize the learning process for learners and more accurately model knowledge domains. Other challenges facing the field of learning analytics include a shortage of workers skilled in all of the areas necessary to design and implement the necessary systems, and the necessary organizational support to engage in such a difficult and time consuming project.

Siemens argues that issues such as data quality and scope, privacy concerns, and ethics represent even bigger challenges. Privacy, in particular, is an issue when you consider the circumstance of students attending online courses across international borders. Even in a simpler case, there are questions as to who actually owns the data? The legal system is still a long ways from addressing this significant issue.

Discussion
This paper appears to be one of several written around the same time covering this topic, though it has been written from a somewhat different perspective than its contemporaries. Neither is there any new information or theory contained in the paper, merely a "round-up" of what is currently understood on the topic of learning analytics.

Although this paper is primarily focused on learning analytics for higher education, it does occasionally address organizational learning. In this regard, there is one rather striking ommission from the paper as regards privacy concerns. That is to say, simply, that the privacy of learner data is only rarely at issue when the learners are employees of the organization. It is almost universally understood that any data created by employees, whether intentionally or incidentally, is owned by the organization and not by the employees themselves. As such, this challenge is far less of an obstacle where corporate learning analytics is concerned.

The challenge of finding appropriate technical skills to implement learning analytics has perhaps been downplayed too much by Siemens. As he points out, "A systemic approach to analytics requires a combination of skills and knowledge that are likely not in the possession of a single individual." This is a very salient point, and in fact the complete set of skills required to implement a full systemic solution is exceedingly rare, not to mention highly sought after.

Conclusion
This paper provides a good summary of the current state of learning analytics research and development, as well as the issues currently facing this burgeoning field. Siemens has also done a good job of describing the entire learning analytics model, which is remarkably complex with many variables and inputs. For individuals who are trying to get a grasp on what learning analytics entails and the current state of the field, this paper is a good starting point.

Review of di Cerbo, Dodero, ad Papaleo's "Experiencing personal learning environments and networks using a 3D space metaphor"

Citation
di Cerbo, F., Dodero, G., & Papaleo, L. (2011). Experiencing personal learning environments and networks using a 3D space metaphor. Interaction Design and Architecture, 11, 64-76.

Summary
This paper describes a proposal for the creation and use of a 3D representation of the user experience conducted in a Personal Learning Environment (PLE) and/or a Personal Learning Network (PLN). This environment, named DIEL and described as an extension of the Moodle LMS platform, would track interactions and usage metrics of individual users in order to most effectively present content that is deemed more valuable to the user, while simultaneously keeping related content close together.

The authors make a clear distinction between a PLE and a PLN, arguing that Personal Learning Environment is a purely technical term which refers to a sort of "personal learning center" where content from multiple diverse sources is used, reused, remixed, and organized according to a learner's own needs. In contrast, a Personal Learning Network consists of "the people... a learner interacts with and derives knowledge from." With this subtle distinction made, the focus of the paper is on creating an interactive, 3D visualization of a PLE.

In the initial design, objects within the PLE (blog posts obtained via RSS, tweets, message board posts, shared files, online articles, etc.) are visually arranged in a spiral pattern. This pattern allows for newer, more relevant content to be placed in a position of relative prominence, while still making it possible for the user to see other objects farther down the spiral. Additionally, members of the user's PLN can share content or sections of their own PLE, causing those items to appear in a separate area of the each user's PLE. One feature that the authors are hoping to add, but which had not been completed at the time of the paper, is the ability to sort the PLE by tags instead of just by temporal elements. Such a feature would certainly make the 3D PLE more useful.

The authors also point out that DIEL does not currently integrate with most external social media sites, and this almost certainly limits the extent to which the tool is used. There is also considerable work to be done on finding the right visual metaphor (e.g., closed space vs. open sky vs. something else not yet thought of) which makes users feel more at home and improves the intuitiveness of the UI for new users.

Discussion
What is interesting about this paper is that it is the first one this reviewer has ever seen that attempts to tackle the issue of how best to present a PLE or PLN to users in order to maximize usability and utility. This is no small feat, as there are few options available for users who want to both have their PLNs aggregated into a single point of access and be able to readily share or recommend content with other members of their PLN. Feedly, which is one of the better tools available for this purpose, and which has been around for several years now, actually falls well short of what the authors have accomplished with DIEL, though it is perhaps somewhat more elegant in its execution.

At the end of the day, this paper does not add a great deal to the discussion about how best to use PLEs and PLNs, but it has hopefully promoted iteration toward the development of a tool that pulls together all the elements of a user's PLE and makes them available simultaneously.

What would make a tool such as DIEL more useful would be if it had a way of not only integrating with external social media and websites, but if it then had a way to track what users were actually consuming, commenting on, and sharing. As social learning continues to replace traditional content delivery methods, it becomes increasingly necessary to track the use and creation of this content. One can't help but wonder if the authors were familiar with the xAPI project and its application to this specific need.

Conclusion
This subject area needs a great deal more exploration and thought. One of the primary reasons why social media is still relegated to a tertiary role in corporate learning and development is the inability to track and assign credit for the content consumed. This remains a major issue today.

Here we go (again)

I didn't think I would ever be doing this again. Certainly not after, what, five years? Six?

I'm going to keep this post simple. Partly because I'm out of practice, and partly because of other demands on my time. I have, or had in the past, a lot of things to say about blogging, social learning, Web 2.0, and etc. In fact, these things occupied a very large portion of my professional attention for a year or so back in 2008-9. Feel free to read my old posts to find out what I was doing and thinking about back then.

My thoughts on these subjects haven't evolved much since those days. Watching Will Richardson's TED talk on the subject (and Seth Godin's brief thoughts, as well), while interesting, does not alter or enhance my point of view. I agree with what they have to say, but I already agreed with them six years ago.

That doesn't leave me with much to talk about, does it? Or, alternatively, it leaves me with a very great deal that I could say on the subject, having been down this road before. So rather than rehash the content of 30+ earlier posts from several years ago, let me try to sum up a few key things that I probably wrote about back then:

1. Without the use of social learning techniques, modern T&D and our education system will never be able to keep up with the pace at which our collective knowledge is advancing. It is said that a week's worth of the New York Times contains more information than Thomas Jefferson would have encountered in his entire lifetime. Collective human knowledge now doubles on an almost weekly basis. How can we possibly think that an educational system developed in the time of Thomas Jefferson is still the right solution?
2. The ability for anyone to create and share content on the web is not new, and we should not act like it is. I created my first web page, using raw HTML, 20 years ago this month. I was, at that time, an active participant in a community of shared content creators taking advantage of what the advent of the visual internet allowed us to do. An entire generation of human beings has grown up since that time, and yet we are just within the past few years finally latching onto the idea that anyone can do this. It isn't new, it is only easier, and therefore more accessible, than it used to be. 
3. Blogging is not for everyone. Not everyone has the desire to create content, the desire to interact with the world in that way. The same is true of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and all the rest. Part of the beauty of the internet (which, incidentally, used to be a proper noun and so I still have a hard time using a lower case i when typing it out) is that all of these options exist and that people can mix and match them in the way that works best for them. 

So that's a sampling of my thoughts on the topic of blogging for learning. It is useful. It is not going away anytime soon. It is not for everyone. Contemporary thought leaders on this and related subjects have had a lot to say about the use and implementation of social learning both within institutionalized education and corporate learning. I would invite you to take a look at some of the blogs on my blogroll, which will take you to what were, several years ago, my favorite social learning blogs. No doubt some of them have died out over the years, but their archives contain some really great stuff.