Don’t give me pretty graphics…
Many people think graphics are solely about aesthetics, making it pretty. Graphics communicate meaning, the same way words communicate meaning when you speak or write. In fact some of the human race’s earliest recorded communications were graphics. Learning people should be especially attune to the power of graphics Why? Because our brains are wired for the visual. Research has demonstrated our memory is able to recall visuals better than text. This phenomenon has it’s own name: the pictorial superiority effect (PSE). Richard Medina sites studies that show when information is presented orally, people remember about 10% when tested 72 hours later. If you add graphics that figure goes up to 65% . (234, Brain…
The Future of Books
The Future of the Book. from IDEO on Vimeo. What will books of the future look like? How will we store them? Will there still be libraries? How “social” will books become? As an avid reader these are a few questions I have pondered. IDEO has provided a great visualization of books of the future. Three eReader prototypes: The Debate and Opinion eReader: Here an informational layer(s) is envisioned to future books that feature ongoing discussions, fact check and current media links as well as historical debate time lines and visualization of the arguments. This type of reader would be a great support of developing critical thinking skills. Professional Development eReader, supporting learning in the…
Career
21st Century Skills
This is more a drive home thought than a full blown post. I was thinking about what it takes for career success in today’s work environment, two contrasting skills came to me: self-directed and collaborative. Self-directed, the ability to see a need, take ownership (or proceed with minimal supervision) and solve the problem. Self-directed in your learning about the problem or learning of additional skills to solve the problem. Collaborative, reaching out to others to develop the best ideas, for support in areas where you are not the expert, bringing together the right mixture of people to provide insights. For career success today one must be both self-directed and collaborative. What other 21st century skills…
Instructional Message Design
Pecha Kucha
I’m forcing myself to reflect on the Pecha Kucha I attended here in Denver. Fun. Entertaining. At times thought provoking. Community-ish. Sharing. Does sharing always make for community? Community of the moment versus longer sustained community. I was glad to have my husband’s company. I was surprised that there wasn’t more intimate types of sharing. For example, most of the presentations were around someone’s work. Granted work is personal, but work projects aren’t always so personal. Not that I want people baring their souls to strangers. I think I was searching for meaningful. There was the married couple who found meaning their work as fabric designer, family unit and ultimately community builders. This in contrast…
More Mayer
Mayer’s makes some very good points about learning. He uses research [and big words] to make his points! Spatial Contiguity Principle: We learn better when corresponding words and images are presented near (rather than far) from each other on the page / screen. (p81) Our learning involves us in “sense-making efforts.” In learning, we are active as we attempt to connect the “why,” “context” and “meaning” of what we are learning. But, our cognitive abilities for processing are limited. Medina’s and Meyer’s research fit together nicely on this point. Integration of images and words help our working memory to process better. We don’t waste processing capacity on searching a screen / page for corresponding text…
Logic + Emotion, Visual Thinking and Blogging
Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR. I love some of these slides. They came from the blog Logic + Emotion. Creator, David Armano. His focus is on the marketing side. He lists his area of interest as …”where passive consumers become active participants.” Marketing aside (and maybe it isn’t so aside – marketing teaches you to edit your message), some great examples of visual communication. His blog also has a good following. Be sure to check out the comments area for some interesting discussions. “Top 10 Signs You Might be A ‘Weblebrity’” made me laugh, in light of the fact that we’ve just started using Twitter, Slideshare and every other tool in there! Maybe we are all…
Multi-Media Learning by Richard E. Mayer
First, let me say, Mayer seems to be obsessed with the dichotomy between Behavorialism and Constructivism. He refers to Behavioralism as the “information-delivery theory.” He repeatedly draws upon the differences between the two theories in his book. My head rather hurts from this author’s witting style. However, he has very interesting things to say. First Basic Definitions per Mayer: Instructional Message – a communication that is intended to foster learning (p. 3) Multi-media learning – dual coded learning, in its broadest sense pictorial representation with verbal (p. 2-3) better learning – improvements in retention and understanding of the material, focus on transfer as a measure of understanding (p. 64) Mayer cares about the end results. …