Jane's Pick of the Day

Facebook at work: slacking or networking?

Facebook is all pervasive; it ranked 27= on our Top 100 Tools for Learning List - but are employees slacking when they use it at work?

Richard McManus discussed exactly this issue in his recent Read/WriteWeb posting.

Facebook at work: slacking or networking?

His conclusion:

"... social networks are part of our media climate these days, so looking at just the cons of them is missing the bigger picture. Facebook can and does have many networking benefits, that ultimately may help the bottom line. And if it doesn't, well give your employees a break - they are only human!"

[Read the comments of our contributors about Facebook]

15 productive uses for a wiki

"We’re all familiar with wikis, of course — Wikipedia being the most famous example, but many other useful wikis abound on the Internet. But one of the most productive forms of wikis is the personal wiki."  Web Worker Daily lists 15 uses for a personal wiki.

Web Worker Daily, 13 July 2007

[There are 46 wiki tools listed in the Directory which could be used to create a personal wiki - and more resources about wikis in our Guide to Learning Tools. 

Defining and Understanding Virtual Worlds

Here's a great overview article about virtual worlds from Karl Kapp at Learning Circuits.

"It is enough to make a learning professional’s head spin. Every day there is a new story about online worlds providing new learning environments. Articles and books are describing how a generation raised on video games is invading the workplace and demanding new online learning environments. Unfortunately, for those not on the bleeding edge of game technologies, all this talk of virtual worlds, avatars, MMORPGs, metaverses, and microworlds seems right out of a science fiction novel and, in some cases, it is   ...  Learning professionals are left in the unenviable position of trying to sort it all out. What is the difference between a metaverse and a MMORPG? What is an avatar? Is Second Life a MMORPG? Is there an online world built specifically for learning?"

Defining and understanding virtual worlds

[For more articles and resources about virtual worlds, take a look at the Games & Virtual World Reading List in our Guide to Learning Trends & Tools]

Are Great Teams Less Productive?

"Learning promotes performance—is there any argument? Without learning, organizations, teams, and managers are stuck in yesterday's world.

In fact, says Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmondson, there are built-in tensions between learning and performance, which smart organizations must learn to recognize and deal with. For example, an organization that has just completed a learning initiative may see a drop in productivity, at least in the short term.

Edmondson and doctoral student Sara Singer explore the problematic relationship between learning and performance in a recent working paper, "When Learning and Performance are at Odds: Confronting the Tension." In this interview, Edmondson discusses her work and practical considerations for organizations looking to sharpen their learning skills, i.e., any business hoping to be successful in today's quickly changing world."

Are Great Teams Less Productive?

When Learning and Performance are at Odds: Confronting the Tension [pdf]

Podcasting Reviewed

This useful guide from UFi/learndirect and kineo is for "people in the learning and training community who are new or relatively new to podcasting and videocasting (vodcasting) and want to explore its potential as part of learning solutions".

It explains:

• What podcasting is
• What’s in it for learning
• 8 steps to effective podcasting
• How some organisations are successfully using podcasting
• Where podcasting is headed

Podcasting Reviewed [PDF]

[For more resources about podcasting,  see the Podcasting Tools section of the Guide to Choosing & Using E-Learning Tools and the Podcasting page of the E-Learning Resources Collection]

The Change Management Toolbook

Often the topic of change management comes up when discussing the implementation of e-learning.  Here is an interesting resource on change management: The Change Management Toolbook

"Are you personally ready for change? Is your team in serious need of new ways to work together? How can your organization deal with a change project which lacks focus or direction? Do you want to know why change is inevitable but hard to achieve? Do you want to surf on the waves of change? You will find some of the answers to your questions here.

"The Change Management Toolbook is a collection of more than 120 tools, methods and strategies which you can apply during different stages of personal, team and organizational development, in training, facilitation and consulting. It is divided in three principle sections: Self, Team and Larger System."

The Change Management Toolbook

Five heuristics for designing and evaluating web-based communities

"From a three-step analysis of online communities, a set of five heuristics emerged: interactive creativity; selection hierarchy; identity construction; rewards and costs; and, artistic forms. These heuristics were generated from concepts appearing in past research, and then tested by a content analysis with focus groups using the case examples of two well-developed Web-based communities, Facebook and MySpace. The users saw this type of social technology as a flexible form of their own expression to create their own identities, social relationships, and meanings. Overall, MySpace was seen as offering greater creativity and artistic form than Facebook. The users in this study used online communities for gaining social rewards; e.g., forming and maintaining friendships, with little concern for social costs such as time expended or privacy concerns. This study contributes to a set of heuristics that can be used to evaluate other Web-based online communities in social contexts such as gaming, communities of practice, and business"

Five heuristics for designing and evaluating web-based communities

By Linda M Gallant, Gloria M Boone, Austin Heap.  In First Monday, Vol 12, No 3 (March 2007)

7 things you should know about digital storytelling

Here's another resource in Educause's "7 things you should know about ..." series.  This one on digital storytelling.

"Digital storytelling involves combining narrative with digital content to create a short movie. Digital stories can include interactive movies with highly produced audio and visual effects or presentation slides with narration or music. Some learning theorists believe that as a pedagogical technique, storytelling can be effectively applied to nearly any subject. Constructing a narrative and communicating it effectively require one to think carefully about the topic and the audience's perspective."

7 things you should know about digital storytelling

The best user manuals EVER

This is an interesting posting from Kathy Sierra  about the importance of good user manuals, and describes a company, Parelli, that charges its users "big money for high-quality learning materials, and people are thrilled to pay it". 

She also provides some ideas on what makes world-class user learning materials with examples from the Parelli materials.

The best user manuals ever

Mobile talk moves to Web 2.0

"With a growing demand for a better browsing experience on our mobiles, there is, according to the industry, demand for Web 2.0 on the go."

A nice little summary from the BBC's Click programme.

Mobile talk moves to Web 2.0

You can also watch a video of the TV programme.