The Big Question – Snacking Culture Response

I was really intrigued by a post on The Learning Circuits blog regarding information snacking.  The basic premise is:

People seem to be spending less time going through information in depth and less willing to spend time on information. We seem to be snacking on information, not consuming it in big chunks.

So the post posed a few questions and I’d like to give my take on each one.

• Has there really been a shift? Are people changing their information consumption? Are they really snacking more?

I’m not sure if the question is whether people have changed or if the ability to get the information in the bite-sized pieces has increased. Fundamentally, I think people have always wanted the quick answer but were unable to just have the information so readily handed to them. It was required to read through manuals or attend conferences or read research papers to get the information they were looking for. Now, with the wealth of information that can be found quickly and easily online, people no longer HAVE to look deeper. And I’m not sure that is a bad thing.

People are now able to work more efficiently by finding their quick answers and getting on with the task at hand. So what if they don’t know the story behind the information. If that is something they feel they need to know then they can go find that information too.

• Do we need to think about instruction differently? Is it a matter of better design so that people are engaged beyond a snack?

Yes, (make that a big, resounding yes) we need to think about instruction differently. And I think the second question is the problem. People will only learn if they are interested in the topic. By trying to make people interested in something they aren’t currently interested in, aren’t we taking the responsibility of learning off the learner? Why do we feel the need to force extra information onto someone who doesn’t need it?

Now, I’m not saying, “Don’t provide extra information.” Provide all the information. Disclose everything you know about the subject but form it in a way that people can get the base idea (the quick fix) and then, if they feel compelled and interested, they can look farther.

In short, take the pressure off the instructor and put it on the student. (Side note, I’m talking about adult learning here. Children aren’t really attuned to knowing what it is they NEED to learn for the most part and wouldn’t be able to comply very well with this model.)

• Is this a problem? I feel like it’s harder to get a deep conversation going, especially in a twitter world. But maybe that’s me. How can we effectively work and learn in an information snacking world?

Snacking is not a problem.  Just like when dealing with food and hunger…are you going to sit down to a 5 course meal every time you are hungry? No way! That is just ridiculous. So why are we expecting people to sit down for hours worth of training every time they need to learn something?

I have not sat through hours of training in years (lucky me) and I’m functioning VERY well. I am learning new things every day because I snack CONSTANTLY. And the funny thing is, one snack often leads to another and to another and to another and usually each snack is something I can put to use right away rather than information that just sits around for me to forget.

Educate by Element

I have been struck yet again by the thoughts of Sir Ken Robinson. This guy is absolutely brilliant! The new video I watched today is below. It’s long but WONDERFUL! I highly recommend taking the time to watch it.

Sir Ken Robinson from NYSCATE on Vimeo.

Now, I really don’t see where this has so much to do with Instructional Design in the sense that I work with it. But as a parent, this really struck a chord. I was lucky enough with my son (first born) to not run into much of a problem in school. He is a fairly well-rounded child who loves to learn just about anything put in front of him. Other than an attention problem, he is the public school system’s perfect child.

My daughter is not the same. She is a good kid and everyone tends to tell me how sweet she is but she has no desire to learn to read or count or write. Mind you, this isn’t because she isn’t smart enough to; it is because, since the age of 2, she has decided that she will do everything on HER time schedule. She can read, when she feels like it. She can count by 5’s like a pro but by 2’s only every other day. Basically, she is having a very hard time in school because they haven’t yet broken her will (she’s in 1st grade) and she still believes she will do it when SHE feels like doing it.

However, she loves babies, children, socializing, and animals. I have no problems getting her to read if I tell her she needs to read her babies a story. If there was some way the school system could take advantage of this fact, my world would be a better place. And I have a good feeling I’m not alone.

Revolutionize schools to teach to kids’ elements (as Sir Ken Robinson calls them). This world needs a variety of people in it, there is no reason everyone needs to learn exactly the same things in school at the same age. Yes, everyone needs to be able to read to a certain level and usually need to know some math and science but why in the world do we force it upon everyone in the same way at the same age as if they were all being trained for the same job?

I wish I knew a way to change the schools to better fit the students rather than trying to fit the students to the schools. Life would be so much more enjoyable for everyone.

Changing the World

After reading “Are We Thinking Differently” I think I know why I’m so stuck. I’m so upset with the way things are that I hunger to change the things and people around me but I don’t know how. I do not have the slightest idea where to start. This isn’t only in regards to my job but that is definitely one of the areas that need changing. I feel unprepared or at least ill-prepared to do the things that really NEED to be done. So I do what little I can think of and feel like a failure and dig myself deeper into this rut.

Maybe this is typical for someone new to the field (or to any field for that matter). Maybe this is part of the post-graduate experience. I don’t know, but I don’t like it and I hope I can find a way out of it soon.

My Problem

I think I’ve figured out what my issue in this funk I’m in. I’m a mentor working with people who are used to having a teacher. Most of the campus is still of the school of thought that things can only be taught in a classroom environment. I feel the classroom is not a good use of time. I want to personalize learning and they want a boxed approach. Conflicting ideals working toward the same goal.

My Dream LMS

Just for the fun of it, I’m going to compile a list of what the optimal (in my opinion) LMS would be capable of:

• Ease of use of Weebly
• Notation tools of Diigo
• Note taking tools of Amplify
• Keyword options (for faculty) of WordPress
• Keyword options (for students) of Delicious
• Voice, video, and screenshare of Skype
• Screen capture (for both student & faculty) of Screenr
• Microblogging of Twitter
• I haven’t found an assessment tool I like yet (of course I haven’t really looked)
• For the price of Moodle

Ok, that’s all I can think of at the moment but I’m sure there will be more eventually.

Broader View of the Shopping Example

Ok, that last post is a perfect example of an idea that wasn’t as well thought out as it could have been. So this is attempt #2 at making my point.

The following series of images is an example of what Amazon would look like as a typical online course in higher education.

Amazon’s Main Page:

I’m looking for a book so I click the Book link and get this:

I want an actual book so I click the link and get this:

I want a book on Arts & Photography so I click the link and get this:

I want a book on Architecture (in Arts & Photography) so I click the link and get this:

I want to see more about the book titled “Understanding Exposure” so I click the link and get this:

After falling down the rabbit hole, I finally get the information I’m looking for but it turns out to be boring and dull (completely non-engaging) but full of the facts I may actually be looking for.

So now, I pose the question again, would you shop here?

Would You Shop Here?

Amazon as a typical online course in Higher Education:

So tell me, would you shop here?

What Wagon?

I posted on Twitter last week:

“I have fallen off the blog wagon….I wish I could/would write more.“

So then today I was reading this blog post which made me come directly to my blog and start this post. Why haven’t I been blogging? Quite simply, because I don’t think I have anything important or revolutionary to say. While revolutionary posts are nice and I would love to affect people’s lives every (or any) time I write, I just need to come to the understanding that isn’t always (or ever) possible. I need to write for me. I need to write to get all of this stuff out of my head. I need to write to possible get feedback but if I don’t at least the ideas are there for me to read and re-read and improve upon.

So lately I’ve had this horrible feeling. I feel as though I haven’t been doing enough (that is pretty typical for me actually). I feel as though I should be doing more, reaching out more. But there are so many different directions I feel I could/should be going that I get frustrated and just don’t do anything. I try to reach out to the faculty & staff and ask for their input but do not receive much of a response. It has been brought to light by one person that they do not respond because they do not know what they should be learning. That I need to be telling them what they should be learning. Now this goes against most everything I stand for and is, quite frankly, something I’m not capable of doing. There are so many different positions on this campus, so many different levels of understanding, and so many different ways of doing things that I don’t feel I’m in any position to claim I know the best way to do everything and that I should dictate what they should learn. Is that wrong of me? They get mad when people control their lives but they also get mad when we don’t.

I don’t know. I just feel lost. I could sit here all day and make random demonstrations on how to do everything under the sun. That would make some people happy but not the people who don’t like online demonstrations. The people who want workshops frustrate me the most. I tried doing workshops and very few people ever show up to them. Everyone’s schedule is so different it is hard to know when a good time to schedule is. Let alone, what the workshop should cover. Maybe these are all just excuses to get me out of doing workshops…I don’t know. I just want to be pushed in a direction. Hand me a project. I do extremely well when I’m handed projects. But don’t hand me a campus and tell me to train them in… everything. I’m more than happy to support them in any questions they may have (and they seem to really appreciate that) but I feel I need to be doing more than just being the Campus Hero.

Show Me the Training!!

In the year or so I’ve been working officially as an instructional designer, I’ve made many, MANY tutorials on how to do tasks in commonly used software. I have the fear of being bland and uninteresting. I read so much stuff about online instruction that I often get confused. I am not an online instructor (most of the time), I am simply a person providing how-to’s in an online environment. It is amazing to me how different those two roles really are. If you are simply providing how-to’s it is necessary to get the point across and show the learner whatever it was they came there to learn as fast and thoroughly as possible. If you are an online instructor you must gain the audiences interest and provide them with interactive materials (that is also helpful in the how-to’s occasionally) and explain a subject thoroughly but not too thoroughly that it becomes boring and assess their learning and…. Obviously, there is a lot involved.

So, back to the voyeuristic tendencies. Since I’ve been making all these how-to’s I’ve become extremely curious how other businesses take care of these needs. If you do make your own, what do they look like? I’ve seen the tutorials at Atomic Learning and I’ve seen the videos on WonderHowTo. Where do your place of employment’s how-to’s fall? Are they somewhere I can see them? Would you be willing to share?

Random Captivate Tip

Did you know you can copy the background of a slide by pressing Ctrl-Shft-Y? That seems so random to me, but helpful when trying to replace lots of screenshots in an already-created project.