I'm quite thrilled to let all of you know that my effort to push social workplace learning in my team has been recognized. Post my queries posted in my blog post Social Learning Adoption, I have been slowly evangelizing social media tools and social learning to management at every opportunity I've had. It has been a great recognition for me the last week, when the manager of our team from the US, acknowledged my efforts and my knowledge in the domain, and included the use of social-networking to benefit our global team in my goals for the next year. I know this is a tough job, given the challenges I listed in my post, but never-the-less its an encouragement that motivates me to work at it in an organized manner. I believe I owe my knowledge and confidence to the community who willing contribute and encourage me. Getting listed in the elearninglearning site was very encouraging too and I thank Tony for it.
I'd like to use this post to also answer a question one of my co-bloggers Sahana raised on her blog, do people need training on how to learn? Her post suggests that when she urged one of her colleagues to use twitter, he came back to her asking her to create training on how to use it. I think and agree that the process of using social learning tools like twitter does have a learning curve for everyone. How fast one can pickup the tools and use them to their benefit depends on their 'tech savvyness' and their familiarity with Web 2.0 tools as such. But what I also want to emphasize, is that it doesn't make sense to talk of formal training on the use of such tools for the following reasons:
Trying to get to the background of the mental pattern a user goes through while using social media for learning is well explained by the Cynefin Framework. There's also this video I found useful:
So it is important for us who recommend social media to others, to understand the patterns that a new user will usually go through and help them work through those. The best way is to recommend reading the online resources available. A more theoretical insight into understanding the learning pattern is the double-loop learning concept.
To solve the problem in question, I would recommend reading specific online resources to the user:
I'd like to use this post to also answer a question one of my co-bloggers Sahana raised on her blog, do people need training on how to learn? Her post suggests that when she urged one of her colleagues to use twitter, he came back to her asking her to create training on how to use it. I think and agree that the process of using social learning tools like twitter does have a learning curve for everyone. How fast one can pickup the tools and use them to their benefit depends on their 'tech savvyness' and their familiarity with Web 2.0 tools as such. But what I also want to emphasize, is that it doesn't make sense to talk of formal training on the use of such tools for the following reasons:
- These tools are quite intuitive, and if one wants to use them, they should just go out and read relevant resources and get started.
- You cannot show the 'value' these tools bring unless you go out, use them and participate actively. You cannot expect to sit back and just have information 'come' to you from others. So it requires 'active' users to 'proactively' go out and look for information and figure out how to use these tools to your benefit. So 'pull' learning always works with these tools, as these tools are designed to promote 'pull' learning.
- Once a user figures out the tools, they need to be persistent and be able to identify their own learning patterns, interest areas, what works for them and what doesn't. So it does require mature self-directed learners. The tools promote what Web 3.0 is trying to achieve with personalization of information and limiting it to what users find useful to them. So it does call for self-directed learners.
Trying to get to the background of the mental pattern a user goes through while using social media for learning is well explained by the Cynefin Framework. There's also this video I found useful:
So it is important for us who recommend social media to others, to understand the patterns that a new user will usually go through and help them work through those. The best way is to recommend reading the online resources available. A more theoretical insight into understanding the learning pattern is the double-loop learning concept.
To solve the problem in question, I would recommend reading specific online resources to the user:
- Twitter for learning
- A beginners guide on how to Twitter?
- The Twitter network model
- Why I suck at twitter?
- The Social Learning Guide by Jane Hart
I think motivation is the key.
ReplyDeleteSocial learning is successful only when people are motivated, want to learn on their own and above all want to collaborate and learn.
When it comes to tools, there is a learning curve. But then anyone can learn to use any tool. My mother who is 50+ learnt how to blog and she does blog easily today. This was possible only because of her enthusiasm and willingness to learn.
I personally think getting people to collaborate effectively is a huge challenge.
The idea of social workplace learning does sound interesting. And once its benefits are fully established and users are convinced of it, then learning tools like twitter may not require user guides and so on.
ReplyDeleteThe idea is again one of the basic tenets (the primary one being about making information available) the internet was based upon and its ability to connect people with similar interests who are geographically separated.
But best of luck with your new goal. This does sound very innovative and can potentially improve a lot of things, if taken to with the right spirit.
I am curious to understand what Cynefin Framework, social collaboration, and eLearning have in common? Cynefin talks about five domains: simple, complicated, complex, chaotic, and disorder. You wrote that users go through these five stages during collaborative learning which helps us understanding how collaborative learning works. However, I feel it is important to establish why we need collaborative learning as opposed to class room sessions or on-the-job trainings.
ReplyDeleteHaving said that, I think collaborative learning is an interesting concept left to the thinking world (writers like us) to unravel and propagate. Nice write up!