Instructional Design Consulting: Teaching the How and Not Just What

[This blog is going to be my backup blog from today onwards, and contains the blogpost from my Wordpress site.]

Scene: Dental Clinic
Not one to enjoy dental trips, my anxiety grew as I waited to be worked on. The dental assistant had me x-rayed (again, to ensure the insurance company would pay for it) and inserted a tent-like contraption into my mouth. The dentist arrived, injected the gums near my ailing tooth with novocaine, and proceeded to drill and probe while her assistant poked different pieces of equipment into my mouth. Gosh, how could one’s mouth hold up to so much prodding and stretching? Overwhelmed, I raised my left hand to signal to them I had trouble swallowing and breathing at times with all the prodding in my mouth.

That’s when the dentist stopped and raised her voice:

“I do this everyday!”

I looked at her and tried to mumble:

“But I don’t do this everyday!”
Obviously, there was a lack of empathy, perhaps on both sides. But as the patient, I felt that I was not being heard and was thus traumatized. Meanwhile, she was trying to force me to do as she says except I was overwhelmed and unable to live up to her expectations. If she had explained her every step and what she was about to do, I would find the whole process more meaningful.

After this incident, I thought about our exchange and how it would transfer over to my professional context.

When it comes to instructional design consulting for online course development, I would never ever tell an instructor that “I do this everyday!” In my ID language, it would translate to something like this:

“I’m the expert, you need to listen to me and do as I say!”

That would get me fired!

In many fields and disciplines, we spend a large chunk of time covering content on the what, but little or no time on the how and the application of the what. When it comes to job-hunting and crucial conversations (Patterson, Grenny, McMillan, Switzler, 2012), many new and novice instructional designers don’t know how to clinch interviews because they have not learned essential skills on how — how to relate with clients, how to share and apply their expertise without putting down their clients or supervisors, how to “show their work” without coming across as bragging.

In short, we don’t have the skills to hold a dialogue. Of course, it takes time to develop these skills of communication and negotiation, maybe a whole professional lifetime to refine them. But they need to be explicitly taught and new ID students need to made aware of the need to develop these skills. Over the years, I’ve talked to quite a few new ID graduates and find that they are lacking in consulting and negotiation skills. Our ID programs should not say that these are left to the students themselves to develop. Many ID graduates don’t have the opportunity to apply these consulting skills before they are hurled into the real world of ID jobhunting. At this late stage, they may have to wait quite long to find a job if they have limited experience in consulting and communicating with clients.

Here are some final words from Patterson et al (2012):

Every time we find ourselves arguing, debating, running away, or otherwise acting in an ineffective way, it’s because we don’t know how to share meaning. Instead of engaging in healthy dialogue, we play silly and costly games.

So true.

Designing a Course Worth Learning 3: Course Video Make

Thinking and talking about the course has turned into action. Yes, UNIV 291 has begun. I did not create a navigation or orientation video because I had provided a lot of instructions on the website. The students didn't seem to be lost. They knew where to start. I had a Get Started button, to be sure.

Most of their questions centered around Learning Activity terms we use in Connected Learning. Were they doing things "right" and questions about social media. Why aren't my tweets showing up? There was anxiety and excitement at blasting off, but I wanted them to feel they belonged to a community right away. So I launched the site, let them navigate the course site a bit and then posted a video to let them know I'm present and available; always listening and responding. I also wanted to emphasize the affordances of the open web, knowing most of them were new to Twitter and were not familiar with Connected Learning.

The video took me considerable time to produce. The following are the tools I used and the production process:

1. PRE-PROD: I thought of what I wanted to say and wrote it out using MS Word. It would come in handy for close-captioning in YouTube later. 
2. I didn't read off the script. It was a guide so that I wouldn't have too many "Ums and Ahs." 
3. PROD: I created the raw videos in Quicktime Player on my iMac. There is an option for Movie recording. I saved both as MOV files. I had gone much longer than I intended to be - about 7 minutes. I split the first file and created another ending movie.  
4. I imported them into WeVideo for editing. [Note: I tried using iMovie but it didn't have the editing timeline I prefer to use but this option is available in WeVideo.] I have a paid account that allows me to have more storage space and editing features in WeVideo. The app didn't work too well with my older Windows machine. It worked better (without crashing) on my newer XP touchscreen laptop. (Just something to note.) In WeVideo, I clipped the videos and merged them with transitions, title and ending slides, audio and annotations.
5. I then published the final movie in WeVideo and YouTube (so that I could close caption it). 
6. POST-PROD: Close captioning was completed rather efficiently with a script in YouTube. 

I was reasonably pleased with the final outcome and what I could do in WeVideo. The whole video took longer than I intended to spend time on because I had not estimated how long my initial script would take. Mostly, it's also in the little details -- what font to use, what music, what transitions, etc. Let me know if you have any questions about creating your own course videos. It's highly doable these days with the available web technologies.

With more time, I would have captured the process with a software, but I'm short of time at the moment. Something to revisit later.
    

Designing a Course Worth Learning 1

Selecting content? 

Over the next few weeks or months, my goal is to reflect on what and how I think as I design (big and small, d/Design) UNIV 291 in the roles of an instructional designer and instructor. There are many design decisions to consider. But there are a few BIG questions I must address. Uppermost in my mind is a question I borrow from David Perkins, a scholar I greatly admire for his ideas on thinking, teaching/learning, and clarity of thought.

With only 8 weeks for a summer online elective course, a big question I have is "What is worth learning?" [If there are things worth learning in a course of study, there are also some things we have to let go of, writes Perkins.]

A related question came in the form of an invitation to have a discussion with graduate students:

How do instructors "select content" for a course? 

Content means different things to teachers who adopt different pedagogical approaches. From the connectivist POV, content is external, constantly changing and interpreted (Larson & Lockee, 2014). In my course, we (my students and I) will build a network of knowledge resources together. One of the ways is to use a Diigo group bookmarking site.

Back to the main goal of my post, my response to the first question drives

• the core questions I will explore in the course with my students,
• what I will include in my course sessions (hence answering the second question), and
• the assessments I will design to gauge what is being learned, or not learned, how students are learning, etc. 

In his latest book, Future Wise, Perkins (2014) describes a scenario where a smart-alecky student raises his hand to ask, "Why do we need to know this?" Therein lies the counterpart (or counterpoint?) to Perkins' question of what's worth learning. Indeed, as instructors, we hope to avert the occurrence of such instances, albeit astute.

As I ponder this key question (what's worth learning), I thought about the more than two decades of formal schooling I've had and what of it has remained in my life.

1. Most of the academic content I've learned are stored in long-term memory. What counts as active knowledge are what I use daily -- some theories, strategies and heuristics I may refer to for design thinking and problem solving.

2. What has lingered over the years and used persistently are skills of reading, writing, thinking (problem-solving, metacognition), communicating, and relating to people.

3. The early years of learning more than one language and culture and of avid reading and journaling have been augmented by specialized learning in my later years of formal schooling. These practices have morphed into and assumed 21st century forms -- blogging and e-reading extend what I learned from my early years. These practices are a result of my metacognitive awareness and responses.

4. In graduate school, certain values and attitudes were reinforced; discipline, parsimony in writing and precision of thought. In the presence of my mentors, I absorbed via osmosis and observation abstract concepts such as their approach to research and teaching. To this day, what they taught and modeled for me are ideas I still implement in my life -- the knowledge and practice of research, scholarly writing, mentoring, teaching, and service.

All these have remained. How then do these disparate thoughts help me in crafting a course that is worth learning? Here are some preliminary thoughts based on my pedagogical approach to teaching and learning:

• How will I frame the course topic(s) so that it is generative and makes as many connections as possible to what matters in learners' lives?

• As a thinking-centered course, what context(s) will I set the course in to help them develop understanding of visible thinking and visible learning? Learning doesn't take place in a vacuum (Perkins, 2009).

• What do I want learners to understand when they finish the course? What do I want learners to get better at doing? What will learners construct an understanding of? (This has been somewhat articulated in my syllabus 1.0.)

• How will they actively explore, inquire, argue, and construct their understanding of the topic?

• What topics will the learners build a network of external knowledge sources on?

Let's see how these macro-level questions will guide me further in course design.

Meanwhile, at the micro design level, I've been working on the course site header and trying to pick the best theme, course site layout, and navigation for the site.

Do you think the header works? Till the next post.

Homepage of UNIV291 summer 2015 course

Reinventing Dissertation Writing for Sharing

On June 10, 2013, I successfully defended my dissertation and officially graduated from a doctoral program in instructional design, development and evaluation. I had grand visions (delusions?) of staging it as a play. Even as I was writing it, I had considered writing it as a play. My advisor finally let me organize it as different acts/scenes in a play but it wasn't written like a play script or in a dialogue format. She asked me if I was ready to be non-conventional. I didn't know what to think at that time. I just wanted to be done with dissertation writing. (You know what I mean, right?) But the 2014 Summer of Major Changes happened and I took some time off to deal with them. Lying around somewhere is the business card of a dramaturg who I planned to work with to write the play.

Journal articles? Conference proposals? I have been mulling over this post-dissertation challenge of disseminating findings for a while. At first, I was quite sure I wanted a book to be written. People need to know about my findings (Really!). Someone recommended I write to a book editor, and I checked out a few, but I didn't follow up after looking at the requirements. I am quite sure I don't want to write a dry academic book. I had written several proposals and presented at a few conferences. But nagging at me are the stories of my participants whose voices have barely been heard. What do I do?

After chatting with my new Twitter friends yesterday from #satchatwc, I have come to some tentative plans to share these findings, beyond waiting for a play to be written and staged. By the way, Tribes the Play was my inspiration. I took a greyhound to New York in December 2012 to watch it a few months before my doctoral defense, riding right into a snowstorm. I wrote a blogpost about the trip and a strange poem about the play.

The minimalist that I am, I try to use as few words as possible to convey my ideas. So they are broadly sketched out here:

Mindmap of plans to share my dissertation findings far and wide. 

In text description, reinventing dissertation writing will include these steps:

• I will create a new blog site as a repository for the dissertation findings. 
• The findings will be presented in multiple ways. As I've always wanted to present it as a play or some art form, I will seek to represent the findings using still or moving texts, images, sound and movement/gestures. 
• I will work with UNIV 291 course students to collectively imagine how to present these ideas. It is an authentic community research problem that we can explore together. I will present these findings to them as a visible thinking product which needs more work. We can work together to solve this particular challenge of disseminating the findings beyond its present academic format. I have to organize my findings to help them work with my dissertation. But a lot of my findings include long narratives of participants. They will do quite nicely for interpretive work (dramatization etc.). 

I'm excited to see what we can come up with together as a group. Interpretive dances, sketches, maps, essays, stories, acting, ... My course continues to take a clearer form and focus. Onward!

Mythbusting Instructional Design

Yo, I'll tell you what I want, what I really really want,
So tell me what you want, what you really really want

I'll tell you what I want, what I really really want,
So tell me what you want, what you really really want,
I wanna, I wanna, I wanna really really really wanna bust out something dat been buggin' me.- Adapted from Wannabe, Spice Girls

Perspective. A to-be-finished pastel work by Yin Wah Kreher (C).

Myth #1: I'm an instructional designer just like you!

Yo, would love to write a rap song but IMA just a wannabe. I don't claim to be a rap artist. As my blog theme suggests, one of my interests is to better understand the mind so as to better design learner-centered instruction. I'd love to be a cognitive scientist but I wouldn't call myself one. Yes, I've been schooled in ed psych and learning theories in my formal education as an instructional designer (ID).

When it comes to calling oneself an instructional designer, I notice there seems to be no shortage of people in social e-media that identify themselves as that professionally. Technical writers, programmers, media specialists, e-learning developers ... are just some of the labels attached to IDs. Not so many people would call themselves cognitive scientists. Why the disparity I wonder? Of course, if even folks in my field argue over the nomenclature, I can't blame others for perpetuating the confusion. And many people think ID is not rocket science. My response? "It depends on the quality of ID work you want accomplished."

It appears that the goal of performing the tasks of instructional design is easily attainable. Teachers and trainers have to do that as part of their job, whether schooled in the discipline or not. Truly, there are many paths to becoming an instructional designer; one does not always need to be formally educated in any professional school. Talent, hard work and opportunities to hone one's skills can nurture a gifted and highly skilled instructional designer. There's no snobbery towards those who take the unschooled path. I welcome colleagues who take different trajectories to the field.

However, as in any profession, there are gatekeepers of the field and professional competencies that my colleagues and I share. Lawyers have to pass the bar, physicians have to be certified by boards, teachers need to be certified to teach in Singapore and some US states (?) -- to maintain some quality standards. In the profession of ID, instructional designer competencies are established by the International Board of Standards for Training, Performance and Instruction. In graduate ID school training, coursework and practicum lead us to a final comprehensive exam and portfolio that are assessed against IBSTPI standards. 

So what exactly does an instructional designer do? 1. Check the IBSTPI competencies. 2. Instructional designers solve learning problems, although the solutions are not always instructional in nature. Training is not always the answer. Human Performance Improvement (HPI) is the ID-related field that deals with human performance in organizations. Check out ISPI.

In short, I consider myself a learning advocate and I solve learning problems. My goal is to help optimize learning conditions to facilitate learning.


Myth #2: Instructional design precludes learning design. 

One of the grossest bits of misinformation out in Twitterverse and the web about the ID field is that instructional design does not focus on learning design. It's all about instruction.

If your understanding about IDs come from reading or creating job ads, I want to dash your misperceptions by stating that many job ads are written by department managers to fill vacancies for employees with certain required skills for their department needs. These job ads are thus not aligned with ID definitions or competencies listed by the gatekeepers of the discipline. If you think an instructional designer is someone who codes standards-compliant HTML, XHTML and JavaScript, understand agile software development, have SCORM/AICC expertise, methinks you are NOT looking for an instructional designer. Nor understand the term as defined by those in the field or discipline.

There is what in the field we call small id and BIG ID. Design can be about design alone or what we call instructional systems design. ID is evolving like any discipline. An ID who strictly does id and no production/IDev work (say prototyping) is not quite common in these elearning times because of confusion over the terminology.


Myth #3: Instructional designers are so prescriptive. 

If you have this perception, I'm not sure who you've been interacting with? In ID schools, we study learning and instructional theories/philosophies just like any professional would study theories/statutes in their field. We learn heuristics and organizing schemes. They guide me conceptually. In practice, I don't spout theories with my client. I make connections. I synthesize. I customize a learning solution for my client. That is the joy of my profession. Good ID starts with strong conceptual design grounded in how people learn and the realities of the context. And, if you insists you already have a grasp of learning psychology through real life -- "Bravo! You are gifted!" Or by reading Bransford et. al's book alone - "More depth please?"

I recommend you read Gordon Rowland's (1992) article, What do instructional designers actually do? to obtain an awareness of how IDs at the expert level function. No, I don't start with say, an ADDIE model or whatever scheme you think I use to craft a learning solution. Linearity in any theoretical model/framework is scoffed at, BTW. ID is a creative iterative process. Design is intuitive to me. I have internalized all the ID and learning theories/models I have learned over the years in my head. Novice IDs, with no disrespect intended at all, learn heuristics so that they can gain a headstart in the profession.

As a certified and credentialed ID, I have tools I have learned in formal ID school and along the way. They are part of my toolkit, developed through the long arduous process I've gone through in graduate ID school. I have no attachment to any particular tool. Being certified in that tool does not mean I endorse a tool. I use tools as they best serve the learning purpose. If I do have any affinity, it is towards human beings and their life worlds. I admire a few learning scientists. I love their ideas and how they inspire me to be a better designer. That is why I go to conferences. To interact with humble emerging and great scholars and practitioners and learn from them. I have a high learning rate and ID changes rapidly in the field of e-learning.

Again, the field is evolving. We are now considered, arguably, a sub-discipline of learning science and so at the conceptual level, I'm a learning scientist. I learned to do research about learning. I know this will start another debate among detractors. That will be fodder for another blogpost which I'm not sure I will get into.

P. S. There is ID and there is heterogeneity among IDs. I happen to be an ID who likes to draw, write, think, speak multiple languages and synthesize all my skills and experiences to create products and excellent work for passion-driven learning. I'm happy to start a respectful conversation if you want to know more. Let's not create walls between disciplines.


Reference:

Rowland, G. (1992). What do instructional designers actually do? An initial investigation of expert practice. Performance Improvement Quarterly, 5(2), 65-86.

The 4Ps of Co-Consulting

... subheading, The Promise and the Practice

My colleague, Stan, and I have been working with two instructors to convert their face-to-face course to a blended course before it is fully delivered online. What makes this co-consulting distinctive in our case are the following key features:

1.    People

There are two consultants in this session interacting with two clients (at times 3!) in real time.   This entails a negotiation of roles and the values, beliefs and behaviors that come with the enactment of those roles.  I am an instructional designer and Stan is an instructional technologist. To some people, these two labels mean the same thing. Our job responsibilities overlap but our foci differ somewhat.  At the risk of oversimplification, Stan’s the technology guru and I’m the pedagogy pro. (In no way does this suggest Stan knows nothing about pedagogy or I’m a luddite.) We have interdependent roles.  

Our clients are passionate about their cause and course. They want to create the best educational experience possible for their students. The group culture is a highly motivating one.


2.    Promise

The promise of co-consulting is:

2 + 2  > 4

Our collaboration with our clients, who are subject matter experts, produces (we hope) a candescent synergy that does not come about through individual consulting.  Keith Sawyer (2007) calls it “group genius” or emergent creativity.

How to make this knowledge visible beyond our small group is something that is frequently on my mind. It will be the subject of another blogpost!


3.    Philosophy

Improvisation or “improv,” as the jazz greats call it, means we adapt spontaneously to our clients’ concerns about course design as the consultation unfolds. It’s a bottom-up approach driven by our clients' needs; nothing is scripted in advance between Stan and I or our clients and us.  Frequently, we cannot predict what design issues our clients might bring up.  Through the unique backgrounds we each have about learning and teaching, we turn tacit into explicit knowledge through our interactions. We co-construct knowledge at each encounter (virtual or in-person) as we externalize and internalize  ideas (Nonaka, 1998).


4.    Practice

Who speaks when, what and how are decisions we make on the fly as the project progresses.  Initially, I took the lead to provide some structure to the sessions. This practice was eliminated when it didn’t work well with our clients.  An increasingly improvisational approach to co-consulting was adopted when we became more familiar with our clients.

Clear and accurate communication is vital to productive consulting outcomes. They are not unique to co-consulting. However, expectations about communication involving 2 consultants are different. What is the protocol and when to speak respectfully without jeopardizing creativity is a process we learn to navigate during each session.

For me, it flows out of the respect for the tacit and explicit knowledge that we bring to our formal and informal consulting sessions.  I try to listen more than I speak. I let my clients’ fully express their thoughts before I comment. I am also not afraid to question to clarify ideas.

One dimension of Visible Thinking (Ritchart, 2002). Image copyright, Kreher, Y. W.

Documenting thinking is a routine act. I practice graphic facilitation during the process. I also capture thinking after each session. I do this not for the sake of recording my efforts. I believe in modeling effective pedagogical behaviors supported by research. I convey my beliefs about making thinking visible for learning engagement.  Modeling provides a bridge for the learner to move from surface to deep learning.

My role in co-consulting is fluid; I wear different hats at different times:

*Facilitator – group dynamics process expert
*Consultant – instructional design and technology content expert
*Coach – support client thinking
*Trainer – support client skills and knowledge development
*Leader – support group effectiveness by diagnosing and intervening in group processes
(Schwarz, Roger M., Davidson, Anne S., Carlson, Margaret S., & McKinney, Susanne C., 2005)

To conclude, four different people with different backgrounds and perspectives have the potential to produce magic. However, sometimes, differences made visible have the potential to derail productivity. This means all of us have to make some adjustments to self and others to foster the production of creative outcomes.

What makes a strong narrative for design?

Source: imdb.com

A great story is based on a profound yet simple question. Can I sum up the story in a short question?

I’m a movie buff and what moves me is usually a story based on a very simple premise. Midnight in Paris is a case in point. Long after the movie was over, I was still relishing the scenes and characters that Woody Allen put together so ingenuously. Gil, Inez, Gabrielle. Why? Because Woody Allen — who claims to write for the Everyday Man — captured an idea that rings true in many people’s lives. We think if we only had the chance to live in some nostalgic past, we will be happier. The golden age of our predecessors fascinates us. Yet, when we get there, we find that the people who dwelt in those times think that their lives aren’t as great as we thought it was going to be. They long for another distant past themselves. What a twist! So, the film asks, "How will you live your life joyfully and contentedly despite life’s muddles?" Will you settle for contentment or find your joy somewhere out there? 

What is the narrative in your design? What tale can you creatively spin that will ensnare your user to learn, to think, and to retain the experience? How will you do it?

Make your story simple and focused.  Can you summarize your design or the learners’ or consumers’ needs with a simple question? That is it.

Important words on making the complex understandable

Check out this blogpost:

Patti Shank, PhD, published in Learning Solutions Magazine: 

Well-designed infographics have perceptual, motivational, and cognitive characteristics that make them exceptionally valuable for instructional content, including improving:

• Clarity and conciseness
  
• Ability to make sense of complex information
  
• Focus on key information
  
• Engagement and ease of remembering
  

What are students learning these days?

How are we preparing students for the workplace? What are they learning? How are teachers teaching? How is curriculum and instruction being designed? Who decides?

I have this whole series of questions after watching how some graduate-school-educated peers were not getting jobs or unable to solve what I consider "simple" problems as graduate students of the 21st century. Seriously, what is going on in schools that there is such a disconnect between what they learn and what workplaces want?

I have no easy or quick answers. The opinions voiced here are mine alone. I venture to say that there is a whole set of systemic factors involved where the whole gigantic education enterprise is stuck in old ways. Education is trapped in knowledge transmission modes -- feed the students with content instead of teaching them to create knowledge or co-create knowledge with others. Teachers are not empowering students to learn and reflect critically or to problem-solve. Mind you, I know teachers are good people, but the education enterprise and students themselves are demanding performance that pushes teachers to focus on  students being able to pass exams and move up to another level. So they are churning out 'automatons.'

That was my initial dissertation topic, sort of. My current dissertation topic is still somewhat related to this, but in a different setting. This is my rant, sorry. I have been wondering what to do and what my role is. Try, try, try.

ID and Educator's Role in Online Learning Part 1

As a certified Quality Matters peer reviewer, I was following the QM thread on online facilitation and teacher engagement in a community board. It brought me back to those days when online learning was just a buzzword. I'd taken ID courses and read quite a bit initially due to my professional interest. I'd even advocated for workshops on facilitating online learning (inspired by a terrific book by Collison et. al) to my boss. Little wonder that I was fascinated by the discussion  in the QM community. The debate on TD (transactional distance) is intriguing. Kay Shattuck, the director of QM, shared some research from various perspectives - Vandergrift, Anderson, Garrison etc. Research, of course, thus far, is inconclusive.

Take these as my evolving thoughts. I've been ruminating about the significance of instructional design vs. the teacher's/educator's role for a while since my Research Apprenticeship study. I've also watched people who weren't trained in ID succeed in instruction way better than those who were. They have a compelling way of teaching. It seems to boil down to delivery which is influenced by teacher characteristics like teacher experience (leading to effective improvisational teaching) and positive affective learning climate supported by the teacher. I've also read bell hooks' amazing book on Teaching to Transgress and couldn't agree more that it takes collective effort to make learning exciting. I don't question which is significant, rather which appears to be more influential most of the time. To me, the teacher holds the key to success in learning: he/she is the instructional designer and delivers the instruction. I definitely think that faculty development or teacher ed is extremely important. I must state outright that the processes of teaching and learning are very complex. I am not demeaning any particular field or discipline by stating that any factor is more important.

With regards to F2F vs Online Learning (OL), I can't say it better than Mike Scheuermann, Associate VP of Instructional Technology Support at Drexel U on LinkedIn when he wrote that "F2F vs. OL is NOT the issue - it is simply not the venue that determines the meaningful learning experience. Instead, it is and always will be - the instructor/facilitator. -- A great teacher can make a bad (or mediocre) course great!" On the other hand, "a mediocre educator cannot make a great course - a great course."

What is critical is channeling resources and efforts to support and enhance how educators function in all learning spaces. [Think Richard Clark, it is not so much the media that makes the difference!]

Designing Brain Training & Other Experiences

A web start-up, Lumosity, claims to provide brain exercises to train your brain become "brighter". Mhm. Read about it here at Mashable. I haven't found time to try it out yet. Let me know if you have and if it does what it claims. 

The other thing that I learned today is about design. As an instructional designer by training and practice, I was struck by what Sawyer wrote on his blog:

"A curator designs experiences, whether presentations, performances, or art spaces."

Basically, that's what I do too? Designing and developing learning experiences.

Creative Problem-Solving in Reality

(Image Source: Tashi Mannox website: http://bit.ly/f8jkfN) 
Note: I learned about these clouds through Dr. Julia Marshall's presentation. Beautiful and iconic -- representing nature, energy, heaven. And I stumbled upon Tashi Mannox by accident. Gorgeous design!

I feel like an instructional designer with a complex problem that requires a novel solution! How ironic! I am studying myself constantly, because 1. I have read up a LOT on creativity, and 2. never tire of learning about it. When someone told me he was interested in studying innovation but not creativity, I am perplexed. How can a person be interested in one (outcome) and not the other (process and means) when they are intricately linked? Why bother? What for?

With my earlier dissertation topic, I knew I wanted to study creativity and sought to match it with the instructional design field because I wanted to extend knowledge in both fields. Now, I have this complex and very important real-life problem I want to solve and I'm figuring out how to craft the most creative and valuable solution. I find this approach to be more engaging and authentic, a tad easier than problem-finding. Maybe the real creative challenge is in finding a problem, which I think Mark Runco wrote about somewhere. I'm really really grateful to be a part of a team that is seeking to solve this complex problem. Kudos to the Access team: Mj, Mi and R and my wonderful friends Mm and EY!

IDE 735#13: More reflection

So the course has ended, but I feel it's just begun for me. There's just so much to catch up on because of the course schedule and my own work schedule. I didn't get to really read and chew on what I've read. There's a lot of readings I want to delve into; I want to rewrite my final paper for a conference submission; it's just a first draft. I have so many things I want to clarify, so many concepts I still have not a firm grasp of yet: like, microworlds vs virtual worlds; are virtual worlds all microworlds? not all microworlds are virtual worlds? I don't know. How about VR? Are all virtual worlds VR? But not all VR are virtual worlds? Wish I could ask someone. I've tried to google and read some of the listed articles, but no resolution yet. Still seeking.

At the AACE conference, Second Life was on the lips of everyone. Glad I've done a paper on it, phew. Games in education continue to be big. A forum is going to be started and I'm going to join the SIG.

I feel like I haven't learned enough. The course seemed to be stunted by the short few weeks. I need more time to let it all sink it. I guess the rest is up to me to do independent informal learning. But it's definitely piqued my interest to go more indepth and read more on the topics.

IDE.735#12: SL for relaxation

With such limited time and so much to do, I often have all these thoughts I want to blog about but don't because I just don't get to a computer on time and those moments/thoughts are lost.

I posted 2 questions on Clark's blog after asking one of them during his guest speaker appearance on June 14.

I'm now trying to gather my thoughts and findings about SL to create my final paper. Started well but researching on SL is frustrating. Today I tried to attend a major event hosted by the University of Southern California Center of Public Diplomacy and was booted out several times. I reappeared at the gate so many times the greeter said, "You again Kollette, sheesh!" Hey, that was some courteous greeting! Anyway, won't write about this event here as I'm including it in my final paper. I have big dreams of submitting it for a conference, LOL.

Anyways, I also tried SL as a form of relaxation though my husband thinks I suffer from computer addiction and am wasting time, especially after what I told him about USC getting a $550,000 grant for studying about philanthropy in virtual worlds. He was like, whoa, that kind of money can be better spent in the real world. Hmmm... my husband doesn't get it that these avatars represent real people who by participating in the virtual world are using it to complement their real world philanthropy.

So anyways, here's what I did for relaxation after the stress recently of cramming for this course:

1. Swimming in a pool at Kanes Project (143, 42, 37) 6/19

No one was around, so it was a lonely dip. However, I miss swimming since I have hardly done any of it since coming over to the US.

2. Sunbathing at Kanes Project (174, 38, 39)

Here I'm all stretched out alone in the only clothes I have; no LindeX to buy any swimwear or anything.

IDE.735#11: The Fascination of SL

I'm beginning to find SL very addictive. There's just so much going on. It's a game, so it's fun and engaging, but it can also be educational. I'm also learning a whole new vocabulary. Do you know what a prim is? I didn't until I googled to check it out as Miss SL 2007 kept using it in her blog.

Personally, I think SL has great potential, setting aside all the pc crashes and motion sickness I get.

Here's a bit about what I've learned -- thanks to Natalia, Miss SL07:

1. There's really a lot of help for newbies contrary to the initial frustration we had. Once you get in, you can go to lots of places for help to customize your avatar and learn about SL.

2. Just like real life, there are places to visit, events to engage in, sports to play, relationships to form, shopping to be done, etc. What a life!

3. Educational - besides experiencing events and phenomena virtually, one can receive support for healing and engage in discussions with others too.

IDE.735#10: Miss SL 2007

This lady's blog is supercool. She has a Second Life guide, lists fascinating places to explore, produces tutorials on how to create nice avatars, and listen to this, she is.... ta-dah!!!! Miss Second Life 2007 - Natalia Zelmanov! Is this surreal or what? I have to try out the links she posted myself. Many many to explore.

IDE.735#9: Guest Speaker Clark

I visited Clark's site numerous times to read and prepare for the session on Thurs 6/14, so I was a bit disappointed not to get to ask all my questions. Still, I'll have a chance to post them.

I posed him a question about the lack of a standard lexicon or terminology in the field. Honestly, my head at this point is swimmingly full of jargon about sims. He said that his effort in creating the glossary blog was a start in the direction to standardization. Hmmm... I thought so but I wonder how this would take place.

Is there a national or international society of simulation experts? Like IBSTPI? Or PMI or ...?

Oh, I should record the glitch we had due to human error. The interesting thing is that technology did not fail us during the session, but the server controller forgot about the session and had to be reminded via an emergency call. Thankfully, I was able to call 2 other persons who finally got her number.

IDE.735#8: Roaming SL again

Well, today I explored SL again to see if I can find anything educational or informative. I teleported to this Angel Island Isle and met 2 persons who actually interacted and chatted with me. Whoa!

This lady, Sunshine Sparrow, is from a Florida state community college. She actually told me what this island was about - for Angel LMS to orientate potential clients to their software. Cool! So other competitors might be in SL too for this reason - like Blackboard, D2L, etc. She told me where I could go for information but the kiosks were all full. So I couldn't attend any classes and there wasn't much to do around there so I flew around and then quit.

IDE.735#7: Clark's Classification of Simulation Genres

This is the first one I played: a McDonald's game that is an example of interactive spreadsheets. I can't figure out why the word spreadsheets is used but according to Clark, it's because some form of statistical feedback is given through numbers, charts or graphs.

Here's a mini-game I played - Howard Dean's Recruitment Campaign. Quite fun and addictive.


Another mini game. Was quite difficult to play though. I kept not being able to serve the right beer to the customer.

This one is a branching story sim. I wasn't too patient with this one because there were long narrations and a lot of text. Wait time was too long for me and on first impressions, it wasn't fun. I probably have the hypertext mind that Prensky talks about.

IDE.735#6: An emerging mindmap

My brain synapses are not connecting very well; isolated ideas roam helter-skelter looking for a node to connect. All the readings I've done - not enough I'd venture to say - have been so random, not in order. Instead of moving from core to optional, I've been desperately trying to put out bush fires to cope with the numerous discussion forums (fora?). I realize I'm just bombarding my poor brain with all sorts of ideas about games, simulations and all the new vocabulary and nothing is getting ordered in any schemata. I have little islands of expertise looking to form a large continent of expertise.

I've read some chapters of Shaffer, flipped through Prensky & Alessi; read Dorner, Sterman, some Gredler, some on modeling - Seel, etc... explored some gaming, modeling and simulation platforms, been to SecondLife numerous times (finally getting to the point where I can teleport to some places), and now I'm frantically trying to understand Clark Aldrich's ideas about simulations.

I want to badly be able to consolidate and synthesize these disparate ideas.

I enjoy Shaffer and realize his idea of epistemic games is very broad: games that are about learning to think in innovative ways (p. 10). And then he mentions how every game has at its core a simulation (p. 69). Later, on reading and listening to Clark Aldrich's podcasts, I'm beginning to link Aldrich's teaching of cyclical content to Shaffer's epistemic games. Systems and cyclical content must be present in simulations to create epistemic games. And Shaffer mentions Dewey's idea of the kind of learning that harnesses the power of authentic activities. So the kind of learning that takes place as students develop the Digital Zoo helps them develop knowledge that is contextualized in a particular professional setting. And Shafffer claims this kind of learning of professional knowledge, the ability to use specialized language is the biggest predictor of success in school. As in performance in tests and exams?

This really had me thinking. To what extent is this true? I am thinking of how far this is true in this course. There are so many new words, new jargon relating to games, modeling and simulations. The more I understand them, the more concepts I clarify and link together in my neural map, it appears the more sensemaking is created.

When I first entered Clark Aldrich's blog, I was overwhelmed by all the terms there. What was it all about? How can I respond to a list of terms. Then slowly as I read them and began to connect the professional knowledge, the more I felt I had a grip on the subject. Phew!