Learning mobsters: #4sqchat

I've been one of the moderators for #lrnchat on Twitter for almost 2 years. Saying that amazes and humbles me...I've met more brilliant people and had the opportunity to learn from so many new friends through the serendipity of social media and my life is forever changed for the better because of the #lrnchat community.

On the other hand, I've been participating in #lrnchat for almost 2 years. And its really been the only Twitter chat I've participated in, besides an occasional #edchat or #hcmchat.

In retrospect, this seems absolutely silly. I've talked about in the past how I learn the most from the non-learning focused conferences I attend: gaming conferences, technology conferences, industry conferences...those are the conferences that typically get my mind whirring and my creativity flowing. So why have I not participated in any of the hundreds of chats you can now find on a regular basis on Twitter?

I don't have a good answer.

But luckily, some of my #lrnchat friends pointed out the obvious. We need to learn in places outside of our own backyard. We need to get out into the world and explore. We need to flashmob other chats!

If you don't know what a flashmob is, check out an example of one that I experienced myself by the Opera Company of Philadelphia here. The basic concept is that as people go on about their normal activities, a group of people come in and perform an organized event...and then everyone goes on about their normal activities. Flashmobs aren't intended to be disruptive...they are intended to entertain and enrich and often, to teach something, to expand people's viewpoints.

Tonight was our first chat flashmob. Our target? #4sqchat which takes place Mondays from 9 - 10 pm est. We didn't really know who all would show up...honestly, I didn't plan on participating. But 9 pm rolled around and I was online and I started to see my #lrnchat friends tweeting with the #4sqchat hashtag and I just couldn't stay away.

I will admit, I'm not an avid user of Foursquare and I have been skeptical about leveraging geolocation services for learning. Tonight, as part of the chat, I learned some things and got some ideas that expanded my viewpoint:

• Foursquare has the ability to post photos to a location. Very cool! Some practical applications of that may be:
• Running a game where people check in and take a picture of themselves or their team completing a task to score "points"
• Documenting a trip by assigning a photo to each check in. There's even a service that allows you to create a memory book based on your check in photos: Memolane 
• Businesses could market their products and services by adding photos to their business location in Foursquare.
• You don't have to check in to post a photo to a location. This could address some people's privacy concerns.
• Foursquare check ins could be set up for different locations within a conference, facilitating the creation of games at conferences and events. Think about checking into sessions, checking in at vendor booths in an expo hall, etc.
• Check ins could be set up in locations at your company to support the creation of a new hire orientation activity.

Want to learn more about Foursquare? Participate in the weekly chat, check out the chat transcript, or check out this local Indianapolis Foursquare blog: 4sqindy or this more general AboutFoursquare blog.

Another cool thing we saw at the end of the chat? Analytics! Check out this data from Tweetreach on the chat and notice some of the #lrnchatter names on the board :)

But the coolest part of participating in #4sqchat? We learned new things, met new people and quite a few members of the #lrnchat community who didn't know about our flashmob plans joined in as well! Oh, the beauty of Twitter...

We don't know where we'll show up next, but be on the lookout for the learning mobsters to crash another chat near you...

The problem with potential

I have a super power. I know, everyone likes to think about what super power they wish they had (I like to do that too), but I actually have one. I could go into all of the reasons of why I know this, but suspend your disbelief and pretend like you believe me.

I can see potential.

Not some vague sense or hope or glimmer. I see the future. Or, what the future could be.

That's the problem with potential...free will. Also? Hard work. Let me explain.

Suppose I came to you today and I told you that you could be President of the United States. Let's say that was something you very much wanted. And suppose I could lay out for you everything that it would take to make that happen, or at least the major steps. "All you have to do," I'd say, "is X and Y and Z, and you can be President."

Most people probably wouldn't do it. And why is that? Oh...there are lots of reasons...fear of change, fear of failure, insecurities, self-doubt, doubt of others' belief in us...and sometimes its just too much work to live up to our potential. Sometimes its too hard and too scary. Most of the time, actually.

Which is why I have the crappiest super power ever. (In doing some research, I found this list of lame super powers. In comparison, I don't feel THAT bad about mine...). Because most people, in the end, value security over their goals and I'm left seeing all of that wasted potential of what could have been.

I'm writing about all of this today because of my oldest son. Maybe its a weakness in my super power, or maybe its a feature, but I can't see the future of my kids. I think its probably the one reprieve I get...I don't have to be tortured over the decisions of my children. Plus, all parents see, in some vague way, the potential of their kids. Some parents push their children to be the best they can be, some parents are completely hands off and let their kids find their own way. Most people probably fall somewhere in between. I always had the philosophy that I would parent by example...I challenge myself to live the way that I hope my children will live. Fearless, passionate, determined, honest, compassionate, and thankful...those are the characteristics I've tried to model for my kids.

But today, I am humbled by my son. I am humbled by his potential, the person he is, and the person I now realize he has the potential to be. Because of him, I'm seeing for the first time in a long time, the potential that we ALL have and what it takes to achieve it.

Today, my son performed an African dance.

I could point out to you which 3rd grader he is, but in the end, it doesn't matter. As part of an Artist in Residence program at his school, teachers of African dance and music worked with these kids one day a week for six weeks, teaching them about rhythm and dance and "the break" in percussion when the drums signal the dancer to transition from one style to the next. My son is quiet, a gamer and an intellectual, more pragmatic than a dreamer. He's not much for showing off.

In his 1st grade play performance, he stunned me by beatboxing to a rap song the kids performed at the end of the play. In the 2nd grade talent show, he decided to perform stand up comedy. He killed. Not that I didn't have faith in him, but I was shocked. But this year was different...this year was on stage. This was dancing.

This was going to be a challenge.

Except it wasn't. Because what my 8 year old son taught me today is what I've been trying to teach him. That you can accomplish great things, you can realize your potential, if you decide that's what you're going to do. He never doubted he could beatbox at 6 years old, he wasn't scared to tell jokes to a packed house of his peers and their parents when he was 7. Today, at 8 years old, he was fearless, passionate, determined, honest, compassionate and thankful...in front of a crowded auditorium. He never even considered another option. And so, with a joy a wish I could bottle, he performed an African dance.

In the end, the people who realize their potential are the people who see no other option...and my super power ends up meaning very little to people who are willing to settle for less.

For the record, if I ever got to choose, I think I'd rather have the super power of teleportation. Kinda like Samantha in Bewitched.

DevLearn 2010 Reflections

Tim and Lynn at the booth (photo: Jay Cross)

Back from San Francisco and just starting to come out of the whirlwind that was DevLearn 2010. This being our third year attending, presenting and exhibiting at the conference, I think we had some assumptions of what to expect...but I don't think we got close to anticipating the excitement, energy, and flat out level of busy that we experienced this year.

Me at the Dr. Strangelearn Information Station

In no small part, what kept us jumping was running the Dr. Strangelearn ARG. HUGE kudos to Kristen Cromer who did the lion's share of the work on the ARG, including manning the Dr. Stranglearn Information Station at the conference and co-hosting the Breakfast Byte debrief. I think both Kristen and I will be writing up our reflections specifically around Dr. Strangelearn in the next week or so; but suffice it to say, I was thrilled with the participation and level of engagement of the players and am excited to continue the conversations started this week around ARG design for organizational learning.

Talking about the future
(photo: Philip Hutchison)

The other thing that kept me busy was the 5 sessions that I presented. It didn't sound like that much leading into the conference, but wow...the speaking gigs kept me on my toes. From the ARG session on Wednesday, to Thursday's guest appearances at Mark Oehlert's Social Learning Camp and Alicia Sanchez's Serious Game Zone, then onto the Dr. Strangelearn debrief on Friday and ending with my Future of Learning Technologies session...it was a fun challenge to reframe the work that we do at Tandem Learning throughout the year for the different subjects and audiences.

I made people DO stuff...they seemed ok with it
(photo: Philip Hutchison)

The session I was most looking forward to was the Future of Learning Technologies session, and it was so much fun ending the conference with a packed room and talking augmented reality, virtual worlds, geolocation, and social media...I think we even talked holograms, jetpacks and teleportation. What was interesting in reviewing the twitterstream after the session was that the least technology-related point I emphasized seemed to resonate the most: Start with the problem you are trying to solve. In the end, all of the cool technology in the world isn't much use if it doesn't help us solve organizational issues that can't be addressed in other ways. But I digress...

Let me close with a few highlights of the conference for me, in no particular order:

• Just being around all of you smart, interesting people. I know I'm going to miss mentioning some of you here that I had great conversations with or got to meet in person for the first time. DevLearn is still for me the one time of the year that I get to see my personal learning network face-to-face, and it was tough to walk even a few steps without recognizing a friendly face or someone recognizing mine. There's just nowhere else this happens on this scale, and it is an exhilarating ride.

  

  Hobnobbing at DemoFest
  (photo: Jay Cross)

• Finally meeting Jane Bozarth. And immediately she called me out for not greeting her with the aggressive hugging that I had promised. I quickly remedied that. 
• Hanging out in Berkeley with Clark Quinn, Harold Jarche, Charles Jennings, Jane Hart and Jay Cross, otherwise known as the Internet Time Alliance. Although I had met each of them either in person or virtually before, it was such a pleasure to spend some time getting to know them outside of the conference scene. Thank you so much for hosting a great shindig and I'm looking forward to seeing all of you again soon.
• Another "finally got to meet" was Tom Crawford, who was just as awesome in person as he's been virtually and via phone. He also co-witnessed the Irish Raverdance (not a typo...) introduced by a certain social media evangelist and I'm hoping his phone was better than mine at capturing some incriminating video.
• Introducing Aaron Silvers, Brian Dusablon, BJ Schone and Gary Hegenbart to the Blue Bottle Cafe.



Getting people moving on social media tools 

• Visiting Mark Oehlert's Social Media Tools workshop on Tuesday and noticing that Sumeet Moghe took a picture of me and Aaron Silvers. It was GREAT to meet him and it kinda made me feel like a celebrity...until I realized that Sumeet was literally the best documenter of the DevLearn conference this year...seriously, check out his blog!
• Comparing dresses and shoes with Alicia Sanchez and Gina Schreck. The gamer girls were bringing it with the fashion this year, seriously.
• Talking life, love and the pursuit of happiness with Neil Lasher. I can't thank him enough for his pep talk!
• Catching up, even if only briefly, with Cammy Bean, Kevin Thorn, Nemo and Josh from Bloomfire, Ellen Wagner, Marcia Conner, Wendy Wickham, Kris Rockwell, Stephen Martin, Michelle Lentz, Kristi Broom, Joe Ganci, Andy Petroski, Philip Hutchison, Steve Nguyen, Enid Crystal, Stephanie Daul, and probably another 20 people who I'll think of after I hit "Publish" on this post.
• Being SO excited to meet Anne Derryberry and not too long after getting into serious discussions on our views on gamification and gender perspectives on games. 
• Hearing the players of the Dr. Strangelearn ARG give great feedback, and particularly enjoying hearing the perspectives of our big winner, Rich Miller. 
• Getting to know Karen Burpee and having a lot of fun talking ARGs and bullets in military slides...
• And finally, the one interaction that will stay with me far beyond DevLearn this year, was when I met Jeanette Campos and she brought me to tears with the kind of compliment that makes you think maybe all of your hard work, passion and faith might actually count for something. Thank you, Jeanette. You probably don't know how much your kind words meant to me.

Thanks to the Tandem Learning team for their innovation and hard work both before and at the conference...Jedd, Kristen, Tim and Lynn represented on site and Jen and Marcus kept the ship moving forward in our absence.

Our Master of Ceremonies: Brent Schlenker
(photo: Jay Cross)

And last but not least! A huge thanks to the E-Learning Guild, in particular Brent, David, Heidi, Luis, Juli and Mary, who put on such an amazing conference every year. We can't wait to do it all again in Las Vegas next year!

Tandem Learning at DevLearn 2010

The Tandem Learning team is gearing up for next week in San Francisco at DevLearn 2010. By now you may have heard some of the buzz about what we'll be up to at the conference, but here's a complete list of where you'll see us at the conference. Hold onto your hats, everyone! Tandem is bringing the learning to the city by the bay...

Do this now:

• Sign up for the alternate reality game (ARG) that we are running - Dr. Strangelearn: www.drstrangelearn.com 
• Download the DevLearn 10 app for your smartphone. Its amazing!

Wednesday 11/3:

• Visit us at booth 410 in the Expo Hall.
• Register to win an Extreme Makeover: Learning Edition! at our booth
• Check out our "Why in 5!" Five-minute information sessions at our booth, where we'll be introducing new, emerging and exciting learning technologies and WHY you should be thinking of integrating them now.
• Come find out more about ARGs (and maybe find some clues) at the Dr. Strangelearn Information Station (next to the Serious Game Zone)
• If you haven't already, definitely sign up to play Dr. Strangelearn - it's not too late to see what all the excitement is about!
• 4:00 - 5:00 Understanding Alternate Reality Games and Why They Work in Salon 4.

Thursday 11/4:

• Visit us at booth 410 in the Expo Hall.
• Register to win an Extreme Makeover: Learning Edition! at our booth 
• Check out our "Why in 5!" Five-minute information sessions at our booth
• Come find out more about ARGs at the Dr. Strangelearn Information Station 
• If you haven't already, definitely sign up to play Dr. Strangelearn
• 11:00 - 11:40 am Come hear me talk about Emerging Social Learning Ideas at Mark Oehlert's Social Learning Camp
• 12:00 - 12:40 pm Come hear me talk about Emerging Game Technologies in Alicia Sanchez's Serious Game Zone

Friday 11/5:

• 7:15 - 8:15 am Dr. Strangelearn: ARG Debrief is a Breakfast Byte in Nob Hill AB
• 9:45 - 10:45 am New and Emerging Learning Technologies session in Salon 14-15

We are all really excited about the conference this year! Besides the activities listed above, there will be some onsite announcements and surprises as well. Stay tuned and see you at DevLearn!

Design considerations for conference alternate reality games

If you've been following along, you've probably heard that Tandem Learning is running an alternate reality game (ARG) at DevLearn 10. Dr. Strangelearn is our sophomore ARG at DevLearn, and we're excited to get everyone involved and playing. (If you're going to DevLearn, you really should sign up now. Really. Do it now. I'll wait...)


As I've been writing about ARGs for learning, I hoped to make some correlations between our conference ARGs and the ARGs that we've designed as learning experiences. But there are distinct design differences between the two types of ARGs because of the different play contexts, and for people investigating the use of ARGs for learning, its important to understand these differences.

In no particular order:

• At conference ARGs, the ARG is not the main attraction. Unless the event is designed around the ARG, the game is likely to be a supplement to the conference. In these cases, people are there for some other reason...and typically, the reason is to interact with the other people at the event. Because of this, its important to design conference ARGs to supplement, not take away from, the main event. If you don't, people will abandon the game play to focus on the main attraction.

• When designing ARGs for learning, presenting complex problems to be solved is part of the learning. For conference ARGs, complex problems seem like work. Designing for simplicity of play at events is critical...if the game is too complicated or the puzzles/challenges are too difficult, players at an conference are more likely to give up or stop playing.

• Learning-focused ARGs can challenge the players to follow a path, or to find hidden information. For conference ARGs, give players LOTS of opportunities to play and join in on the fun. If the path to play or win is too linear, players are less likely to join an conference ARG if they feel they joined too late or can't keep up.

• For conference ARGs, keep the content light, with opportunities to take-away content from the game to review after the event. Although there may be learning opportunities during the event embedded in the game, sparking a learner's interest and providing great content that can be explored after the conference is a more successful strategy than trying to actually train people at the event. For learning ARGs, the training is an important part of the design and the expectation is that players will have much more time and attention to focus on the content as they play through the game experience.

There are lots of other subtle design considerations that make conference ARGs different from ARGs for learning. The main focus of ANY serious ARG design should be the basic question: what do you want people to learn by engaging in the experience? After that, understanding your audience, the context of the game play, and the resources you and the players have available are the parameters within which you design. 

FINALLY some research! Games improve corporate learning results

For years, the serious games industry has danced around the questions of whether games are better for learning. We've pushed past objections about something being too "game-like" or "fun." We would come up with other words for games, like "competitive environments." All the while, we have held our conviction that well-designed games really DO improve learning outcomes.

And now there's some research to prove it.  (Source: sciencedaily.com and article link here)

A University of Colorado Denver Business School study found those trained on video games do their jobs better, have higher skills and retain information longer than workers learning in less interactive, more passive environments.

"Companies have been designing video games for employees for years but so far it has all been done on a hunch. They suspected the games helped but they could never actually prove it," said Traci Sitzmann, PhD, assistant professor of management at the Business School whose study will be published in the winter edition of Personnel Psychology. "We now know video games work, and we know why they work."

Sitzmann spent over a year examining 65 studies and data from 6,476 trainees and discovered those using video games had an 11 percent higher factual knowledge level, a 14 percent higher skill-based knowledge level and a 9 percent higher retention rate than trainees in comparison groups.

I only hope there will be more research and data where that came from.

What can alternate reality games do for you?

I've written a lot in the past about design considerations (here and here) and lessons learned (here) for alternate reality games (ARGs) for learning, but another important question to address is: what are ARGs good at teaching?

This is a multi-layered question, as ARGs are complex learning experiences and most are not designed as a simple linear process like you would see in a typical e-learning module. Because ARGs are storyline driven and depend on learners to engage with the content to complete the game tasks and/or inform their game decisions, it is important to consider two key questions when determining whether an ARG is an appropriate learning activity.

1. Does learner interaction with the content positively impact the learning goals?

This is a basic, but important question. Sometimes you just want people to know something, or do something differently. Company policies, learning a new process...these are training initiatives that are important, but they don't necessarily require learner interaction nor are they subject to interpretation. There are a lot of topics, however, where learners actively engaging with the content is critical to learning it. Think about topics like leadership development, project management and team communication, sales strategy, or quality assurance review. In all of these training areas, learners get better by practicing and engaging with the content. Designing an ARG that encourages critical thinking and learning by doing is a great application of an ARG.

2. Is it difficult to get learners to engage with the content effectively in other formats?

Sometimes its difficult to motivate learners to engage with content. Most training professionals don't like to admit this, but we all know its true. Training exercises can feel forced, and often it depends on each learner's personal motivation to get something out of the training. One reason for this may be that the delivery mechanism of the training isn't appropriate or creates barriers to learning. For example, can you develop a sales strategy for your customers after watching a PowerPoint presentation on developing a sales strategy? Can you lead a team after an e-learning module on leadership skills? Will you know who to contact or where to find the information critical to your job after sitting through your HR orientation? Probably not. And that's because the format of the training doesn't provide you with the proper opportunities to practice or the motivation to engage with the tasks. ARGs can be designed to address almost any topic or content in a way that allows for more interaction and with an overlying competitive element that provides additional motivation to learn and engage. 

ARGs allow for flexible design that can encourage problem-solving, communication skills, leadership skills, information gathering and critical thinking skills. Do you have a need within your organization to help learners practice these things? An ARG can help.