Posted by multistorymedia on May 19, 2009 in
eLearning
Well, I got excited when Kevin Jones asked me to be in a blog carnival…not exactly knowing what he meant, I quickly said YES!
Then, I thought, hey, cool, will folks call me a carnie now? Now we’re talkin….
Then I realized I had to connect it somehow with work and learning…oh gosh, the catch. Now what? Well, there is something that has been on my mind lately about work and learning and well it is, well, er, you see, it’s a bit personal…

Getting Personal
I have an issue. One thing that really does bother me in work environments is that we (as instructional folk) really don’t do nearly enough of– well, getting personal–in our learning design.
I just am wrapping up one of the coolest projects I have ever done. Faces of New Mexico is a learning objects grant-funded project that connects public school students to the history of New Mexico through individual personal stories. I got the idea from a bunch of old family stories I have had swirling around in my head.
Did you know that Billy the Kid, a famous wild west outlaw, liked to dance?—And well, according to many local folks, he could really cut the rug so-to-speak with the ladies. That “good dancer” connection (a more personal one that many can connect with) makes that personal connection leap into our brain and records the topic much better for us as individuals than just a bunch of text book dry facts and dates. Feel free to hear more about Billy’s dancing ways.
So how do we make that personal leap into land of work and learning you ask? Well, what about a new hire project that takes stories from “old hires.” For example, arm yourself with a video camera and ask someone about their first day at work and what it was like. Maybe something funny happened. Maybe they got lost. Maybe they got stuck in the parking garage. Something–that thing-that story- that connects us to our more personal, human selves can truly make that link into learning. Then you can more easily connect that “other information” along with it…like steps on how to get your parking garage key code, etc.
So think about making that personal connection and have some fun with stories for learning.
Any personal suggestions?
Posted by multistorymedia on Nov 18, 2008 in
Stories,
eLearning Guild
My presentation from the eLearning Guild’s DevLearn conference has just been put up here to download the pdf. What a fun conference and great time! So exciting to meet so many folks via Twitter then meet in person! I can honestly say this was one of the best conferences I have ever attended…so far. The keynotes were absolutely amazing and I came back energized and so excited for the future of eLearning….<sigh> Oh gosh, now I have to go back to work…let’s see what happens.
Also see my pres here via SlideShare. Check out other presentations from DevLearn08 in SlideShare.
Tags: DevLearn2008
Posted by multistorymedia on Nov 13, 2008 in
eLearning Guild
In San Jose attending eLearning Guild’s DevLearn conference (also attended the Adobe Learning Summit co-located). I am presenting Friday on “The Making of a Block Buster: Using Cinematic Techniques in eLearning” and it really seems to the the hot area (thanks to YouTube) in association with the exciting eLearning 2.0 theme. See conference description for details.
I have had several “A HA!” moments:
Adobe:
Software giant here in San Jose is working on an Learning Suite for next rollout! They gave us a sneak peek at Captivate 4 (captivate is one of our LX standards) and also gave some great news on how far the Acrobat software as come. PDFs now can have flash, video (and edit).
Keynotes are absolutely amazing so far:
Tim O’Reilly of O’Reilly publishing technical how-to’s and innovation. Great presentation on his coined term, Web 2.0. Really what he ended up summing up is that as eLearning folks, we need find the meaning in the 2.0, social networking era data. He also made a point of as a company/organization learning leaders is to focus on what those innovators are doing in your company. As learning leaders, we need to watch these folks and connect with them, we have new literacies (big one!) today and need to keep up!
Dan Roam. Wow! What an amazing speake and author of The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures
(www.thebackofthenapkin.com)
So impressed with his napkins drawings and apparently so are a lot of other folks including the US senate and Microsoft (some of his clients) who are as well. A very clever talk about how some of the best business decisions and communication can be done in simple drawings–like on the back of a napkin. He argued that one can truly solve any problem with simple pictures. A great presentation and think I will be drawing things out a lot more in my presentations.
Well, off to DemoFest to see what other folks are producing in eLearning (show and tell time)…so signing off for now!
Tags: DevLearn2008