Christie Mason

I apologize Nancy, I've been immersed "behind the curtain" of web development for so long I forget how warped I've become because I'm always trying to see past the presentation to the organization of the content.

Web presentations occur in layers.  Very simplistically there is the presentation layer (the curtain) and there is a content layer (behind the curtain, really it's behind the stage).  Amazon.com has tight control over the content layer and how/when one type of content relates to another type of content.  The "product" content and the "user/customer/rater" content is structured so that they can relate to each other and/or be separate and/or relate to other types of content.  Each of those relationships is well defined. tightly controlled, and rigorously enforced.

Amazon.com then also tightly controls how this content is displayed, but they offer so many different types of display options that the user perceives that they are in control.   Only if you start to think about what you can't do and can't see do you begin to see what/how/when Amazon controls the presentation layer.

There isn't anything on the web that isn't tightly controlled "behind the curtain".  But, if the presentation "curtain" allows the user to select the color, the material, and that curtain's transparency then the user perceives they have control.  It takes more control, more layers of structure, behind the scenes to create a sense of user control than it does to offer the user no control.

I think that's why Flash had such a brief flash of popularity on the web.  Web users expect to have some control but Flash insists on total control of the content AND presentation.  That's probably also why there are only two areas where Flash usage has grown - marketing and training. 

Christie Mason

There are people in this discussion with a lot more familiarity with Wikis than I so I'll leave that one alone because it's something I've never been able to connect with.  I've never been a fan of blogs (unless there is a comments section) and RSS.  I think it's because those are controlled push platforms instead of pull and they're single channel.  I was just looking at an application called FeedBlitz that may overcome some of my quibbles.

I've found the online Project Management applications to be useful.  I also have some other potentially useful links under Collaboration and Content Management Systems and Social Network Analysis. 

But what I can't find is an application that gives me even 20% of what I consider to be the best informal learning platform available on the web today.  What is that platform?  Amazon.com.  Look at how it supplies the full range of choices from linear, static (buy the book) to unstructured (read the reviews and learn more than from the book.  There is KM participation and community (rate this book, rate the raters and "my lists") and faceted classification (I last counted 11 ways to search but that doesn't include any of the search within a search).  It's graphical and textual and contextual.  It appears learner controlled but there's a very structured control "behind the curtain".

Christie Mason

I think calling anything informal learning is redundant.  All learning is informal, occuring at several levels of intent and conscious commitment.  Some learning is externally motivated, but I suspect most learning motivation is internal.  Teaching and training are external and formal but they are only casually, not causally related to learning.  Formal teaching has a Venn diagram overlay type relationship to learning.  There's a lot of teaching/training that occurs w/o learning and a lot of learning that occurs w/o teaching/training.

What do we know about how people learn?  Very little.  Even what we've learned about how neurons interact appears to be incorrect.  There is a large opportunity to "unlearn" what we "know" about learning.  It's very similar to how every "knows" that plants grow towards the sun.  Actually, plants do NOT grow towards the sun, they grow away from the dark.  Dark causes certain cells on the darkest side to expand which pushes the plant towards the sun.  It looks the same as growing towards the sun but the motivational direction is totally different than what we think we "know".

There are lots and gobs of studies on how to teach, most of which appear to be based on small samples of college students still embedded in the command/control educational system, but little on learning. 

There are many learning theories and the theory that is the closest match to my experiences is Constructionist.  I was especially intrigued when I aligned this set of learning theories to Maslow's hierarchy of motivation.  People can be motivated to learn but they cannot be taught.

I haven't entirely unmuddled what is a learning style vs a learning theory because both approaches to understanding learners have some validity to me.  As far as learning styles, I've found this matrix the most useful - active/reflective, sensing/intuitive, visual/verbal, and sequential/global. Yes, I've even found personality styles like DiSC to be useful -  task/social, detail/decisive.

Christie Mason

Ah but Jay, I didn't say "actively" or "intentionally" deciding to learn.  I believe that many times we decide to learn what we know we need to learn w/o conscious commitment.  At any one point in time I have lots of learning quests occurring at many different levels of conciousness.  I'm alert to opportunities to learn.

I have to stand with my learner-controlled requirement as opposed to teacher/trainer controlled.  Yes, there are topics and timing that may force a teacher/trainer controlled presentation but I can still decide not to learn. 

I don't know how you would structure your platform.  There really is a surprising dearth of trustworthy information about how people learn.  About the only thing we do know is that different people learn in different ways and no individual uses the same way to learn every time.  I see a continuum of presentation types that would be easy to accomplish using web standard tools but impossible to accomplish using what passes as "eLearning" training tools. 

The same content could be offered in different shades of presentations from the red of typical, static, linear "Click Next Button" to the blue of Googlized search and the many shades of purple between the two end points.  Controlled to guided to filtered to unstructured.  The learner controls their own mix of content and presentation type.

eCommerce sites do it all the time for their consumers, no reason why the same couldn't be done to support organizational/instituitional/individual learning.

Christie Mason

Would I be pushing it too far if I pointed out that where individuals gather around a campfire is the edge of comfort between the too bright heat of the fire and the cool shadows of unfathomable darkness?

Christie Mason