Khan Academy: simple tools, powerful content

A great example of what you can do with simple tools.

Why you should focus on social learning

Thanks to Jane Hart for pointing to this slide deck from Charles Jennings.

8 Reasons to Focus on Informal & Social Learning

View more presentations from Charles Jennings.

Jane's blog Social Media for Working and Learning is well worth subscribing to.

Making online education more social

Great post about why online education needs to get social.

Social learning tool Curatr

Paper training feedback forms - why?

Surely there is a better way to gather and use feedback from training sessions? I can't help feeling that if feedback is committed to paper then it won't get read by many and will be filed away - probably never to be seen again. This has certainly happened to some of the feedback forms I have had from sessions.

This feedback is invaluable and could be used in such better ways. On a very basic level it could be used in the same way recommendations are used on Amazon. See what others said about this course etc

And for the trainer comments could be used for testimonials, a way of carrying on the conversation with delegates to enhance the training etc.

Clearly confidentiality is key so only delegates who want to make comments public should.

Is this course right for me?

How can you answer this question other than reading the course outline and asking who typically goes on the course and what they typically learn?

The only way to do this is to ask someone who may have been on the course already. Traditionally, this would have been easier said than done. But add a networking tool, such as Yammer, into the mix and you have an opportunity for former delegates to ask prospective delegates whether a course is right for them or not.

This happened recently in my workplace. The discussion enabled a prospective delegate to learn at what level a technical course was pitched. They realised it was not advanced enough for them and so could cancel in time to let someone else attend in their place.

The discussion on Yammer also served other purposes - it helped promote the course and enabled others to see who was right for the course.Obviously, such communication would have saved the company some money - I hope it would have delivered a set of delegates who were right for the course.

Interesting social learning discussion

Today Jon Ingham hosted a webinar on social learning. Here is the Twitter back channel - which is well worth a look.