vision/possibilities

Hmmm…many colleges & universities keep a close eye on their peers…but who is a peer? [Christian]

On 04/20/2022, in 21st century, colleges, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, disruption, future of higher education, game-changing environment, generational differences, higher education, ideas, innovation, law schools, leadership, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning preferences, liberal arts, lifelong learning, more voice more choice more control, New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, new business models, organizational change, pace of change, reinvent, society, staying relevant, strategy, surviving, training / L&D, United States, universities, vision/possibilities, vocational / trades, workplace, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
Hmmm…many colleges and universities keep a close eye on their peers and often respond with similar strategies that their peers are pursuing. But who is an organization’s peer? The Chronicle of Higher Education‘s posting below — “How a College Decides Who Its Peers Are” — stated that “there is clearly no shared definition of what constitutes a peer institution.”

Plus, I found this item especially interesting:

Harvard University selected only three peer institutions: Yale, Princeton, and Stanford. But 22 institutions, including Bowdoin, named Harvard as a peer. Bowdoin, a small, liberal-arts college with about 1,800 undergraduate students and no graduate programs, chose 98 “peers,” including the entire Ivy League and many large universities, some of which enroll more than 10,000 students. Bowdoin itself was picked by 35 institutions as a peer. All of them were small, liberal-arts colleges or universities that primarily serve undergraduates.

I have often thought that colleges and universities should care far less about what their peers are doing. Rather, they should move forward with their own solid visions, bold actions, and well-thought-through strategies — as there can be a great deal of danger and risk in the status quo.

Too many alternatives have been appearing — and will likely continue to appear — on the lifelong learning landscapes. Most likely, these new organizations will offer in-demand credentials/skills as well as the capabilities of helping people constantly reinvent themselves — with far less expensive price tags associated with these types of offerings.

How a College Decides Who Its Peers Are — from chronicle.com by Susan Poser
Questions of institutional identity are at the core of the process.

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

The mismatch between whom an institution chose as peers, and the colleges that reciprocated, pervades the data set. It raises the question of how institutions designate peers, which is a mystery. In some cases it is likely to be decided by someone in the Office of Institutional Research or the provost’s office in response to the Ipeds survey, while in others perhaps some process leads to a consensus among administrators. Regardless, there is clearly no shared definition of what constitutes a peer institution.

Also relevant/see:

Who Does Your College Think Its Peers Are? — from chronicle.com by Jacquelyn Elias
‘An Art and a Science’: Colleges’ Tricky Task of Selecting Peers — from chronicle.com by Audrey Williams June

2022 EDUCAUSE Horizon Report | Teaching and Learning Edition

On 04/19/2022, in adjunct faculty, blended learning, change, changing business models, collaboration, colleges, community colleges, competency-based learning/education, cost of getting a degree, credentialing, digital learning, education technology, face-to-face, faculty, flipping -- inverted learning, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, hybrid learning, ideas, instructional design, IT in HE, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning preferences, learning spaces, online learning, teaching & learning, technology (general), tools, traditional / tradition, United States, universities, vision/possibilities, workplace, by Daniel Christian

2022 EDUCAUSE Horizon Report | Teaching and Learning Edition — from library.educause.edu

Sections include:

Trends: Scanning the Horizon
Key Technologies & Practices
Scenarios
Implications: What Do We Do Now?

Also relevant/see:

Webinar | Exploring the 2022 Teaching and Learning Horizon Report

Also relevant/see:

2022 Educause Horizon Report Suggests Change Is Here to Stay; No Return to ‘Normal’ — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly

Excerpt:

If the COVID-19 pandemic has been a time of unprecedented change in higher education — characterized by rapid pivots to remote work and learning and an explosion in the use of technology across the institution — the future is about reframing those changes into long-term realities, according to the 2022 Educause Horizon Report Teaching and Learning Edition, released this week. Colleges and universities are shifting their mindsets to “reflect an evolution from short-term ’emergency’ or ‘reactive’ modes of offering education during extraordinary circumstances to making strategic and sustainable investments in a future that will be very much unlike our past,” the report suggested.

6 Technologies and Practices Impacting the Future of Higher Education — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly

The Digital versus Brick-and-Mortar Balancing Game — from educause.edu

Excerpt:

The blended campus required after two years of upheaval calls for out-of-the box thinking about what to keep and what to discard from both digital and physical work and learning spaces. Technology leaders face critical decisions regarding workplace culture, physical classroom design, and traditional campus spaces.

Making the move from fully in-person instruction to a learning environment that also accommodates remote students (and remote faculty) requires rethinking and redesigning physical learning spaces to provide an equitable experience for all learners. Technology leaders will need to overcome sizable obstacles to create inclusive classrooms that enable faculty and students to reap the many benefits of hybrid [hyflex] learning.

Also see some of the other most urgent issues in higher education here:

VR Technology Meets Drivers Ed Thanks To Boys & Girls Clubs [Carlton]

On 04/18/2022, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, 3D, A/V -- audio/visual, vendors, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, vision/possibilities, wearables, XR - extended reality, youth, by Daniel Christian

VR Technology Meets Drivers Ed Thanks To Boys & Girls Clubs — from vrscout.com by Bobby Carlton

How a Statewide Entrepreneurship Contest Launched 3 Indianapolis High Schoolers into a Million-Dollar Business [Newcomb]

On 04/11/2022, in business, career development, collaboration, education, education reform, engagement / engaging students, entrepreneurship, funding / grants, ideas, innovation, K-12 related, student-related, United States, vision/possibilities, youth, by Daniel Christian

How a Statewide Entrepreneurship Contest Launched 3 Indianapolis High Schoolers into a Million-Dollar Business — from the74million.org by Tim Newcomb

Excerpt:

If not for a statewide pitch competition for entrepreneurial students, three Indianapolis high schoolers likely wouldn’t have started their business. And they certainly wouldn’t have seen that company, Find Ideal Applicants, earn $20,000 in early-stage investment that valued the company at $1.5 million.

State leaders “wanted to see if they could intersect students with entrepreneurship and innovation,” he says. Students learn how to see a problem as an opportunity and come up with a plan. Wettrick says the faster students understand the benefits of learning from their mistakes, the more success they will have sooner in their lives.

Ketanji Brown Jackson to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court

On 04/11/2022, in Bias | Diversity Equity & Inclusion (DE&I), law schools, Legal operations, legal reform, legislatures / government / legal, society, United States, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
I realize I’m late with this, but I did insert it in my 4-7-22 posting and wanted to report it here as well. This is great news for the United States. I hope it is a major shot in the arm for diversifying the legal field.

The AR Roundup: March 2022 — from linkedin.com by Tom Emrich

Excerpt:

Every month I round up what you may have missed in Augmented Reality including the latest stats, funding news and launch announcements and more. Here is what happened in augmented reality between March 1-31, 2022.

“The metaverse is no longer a single virtual world or even a cluster of virtual worlds. It’s the entire system of virtual and augmented worlds,” Chalmers tells me over Zoom. “Where the old metaverse was like a platform on the internet, the new metaverse is more like the internet as a whole, just the immersive internet.”

~ David Chalmers, Philosopher and Author of Reality+

Reflections on “The University in Ruins” [Neem]

On 04/06/2022, in 21st century, Bias | Diversity Equity & Inclusion (DE&I), business side of he, career development, change, colleges, communities of practice, community colleges, cost of getting a degree, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, disruption, faculty, future of higher education, game-changing environment, generational differences, global / globalization, hearts -- matters of the heart, higher education, history, innovation, leadership, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, pace of change, reinvent, social learning / networks, social media, society, staying relevant, strategy, streams of content, surviving, United States, universities, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

The University in Ruins — from chronicle.com by Johann N. Neem
The “innovations” that promise to save higher ed are a farce.

From DSC:
First of all, I appreciated Johann Neem mentioning and/or discussing several books in one posting:

Ronald G. Musto’s The Attack on Higher Education (2021)
Arthur Levine’s and Scott J. Van Pelt’s The Great Upheaval (2021)
Bill Readings’ The University in Ruins (1996)
Ronald J. Daniels’ What Universities Owe Democracy (2021)

And as a disclosure here, I have not read those books.

Below are excerpts with some of my comments:

It’s already happening. Today, we walk among the ruins of an institution that once had a larger purpose. It’s not clear what role universities should play in society, and to what or to whom they are accountable, other than their corporate interests.

To some, that’s not a problem, at least according to Arthur Levine and Scott J. Van Pelt in The Great Upheaval (2021). They see higher education undergoing the same transformation that reshaped the music, film, and newspaper industries. Rather than place-based education overseen by tenured professors, they anticipate “the rise of anytime, anyplace, consumer-driven content and source agnostic, unbundled, personalized education paid for by subscription.”

Between Musto’s existential fears of disruption and Levine and Van Pelt’s embrace of it lies a third path. It takes the form of a wager — outlined by Ronald J. Daniels in What Universities Owe Democracy (2021) — that universities can and should continue to matter because of their importance in civic democratic life.

The article covers how the learning ecosystems within higher education have morphed from their religious roots to being an apparatus of the nation-state to then becoming a relatively independent bureaucratic system to other things and to where we are today.

Along the journey discussing these things, one of the things that caught my eye was this statement:

Hopkins, in this sense, lived up to its founding president Daniel Coit Gilman’s 19th-century aspiration that universities be places that acquire, conserve, refine, and distribute knowledge.

From DSC:
While I completely agree with that aspiration, I think more institutions of higher education could follow what John Hopkins University did with their efforts concerning the Covid-19 situation, as Neem mentioned. Generally speaking, institutions of higher education are not distributing knowledge to the levels that Gilman envisioned years ago.

In fact, these days those working within K12 are doing a whole lot better at sharing information with society than those who work within higher education are. For example, when I search Twitter for K12 educators who share content on Twitter, they are out there all over the place — and many with tens of thousands of followers. They share information with parents, families, fellow educators, students, school boards, and others. Yet this is not the case for those working in higher education. Faculty members normally:

aren’t out on Twitter
don’t blog
don’t have a podcast
don’t write for society at large. Instead, their expertise is often locked up — existing behind paywalls in academic journals. In other words, they talk to each other.

Later on…

As Daniels intuits, without a larger purpose to hold them fast, there is nothing to prevent universities from being buffeted by winds until they have lost direction. That is what Readings foresaw: Globalization liberates universities from national fetters, but at the risk of ruin.

From DSC:
While globalization may have something to do with universities becoming unanchored from their original purposes, globalization isn’t at the top of my mind when I reflect upon what’s been happening with colleges and universities these last few decades.

To see but one area of massive change, let’s take a brief look at college sports. There are now multimillion-dollar stadium projects, enormous coaches’ salaries, and numerous situations where tax-paying citizens can’t even watch sporting events without tons of advertisements being thrown into their faces every few seconds. Personally speaking, on numerous occasions, I couldn’t even access the games at all — as I wasn’t paying for the subscriptions to the appropriate providers.

Also, as another example of becoming anchored — and going back to the 1980’s — I attended Northwestern University for my undergraduate degree in Economics. While I have several wonderful lifelong friends from that experience for whom I’m deeply grateful, even back then NU had already moved far away from its motto which is based on Philippians 4:8.

Instead, please allow me to tell you what that learning community taught me and strongly encouraged me to think about:

You are only successful if you have the corner office, drive the higher numbered BMW’s, and have many people reporting to you.
If you make a lot of money.
You are supposed to compete against others vs. being in relationships with others. As but one example here, our test scores were published — by our Social Security numbers — outside our professors’ offices for all to see how we measured up to our classmates.

In fact, I’m not even sure that I would use the word “community” at all when I reflect upon my years at Northwestern. Instead, a WIIFM approach was encouraged (i.e., What’s In It For Me? where you are supposed to look out for #1). It took me years to unlearn some of those “lessons” and “learnings.”

But I realize that that’s not the case with all learning communities.

As Neem alluded to, I love the idea that an institution of higher education can — and often does — impact students’ hearts as well as minds. That was the focus at Calvin College (now Calvin University). Our oldest daughter went there and she was profoundly and positively influenced by her experiences there. In that context, students were encouraged to be in relationships with one another. There was plenty of hugging, praying for one another, etc. going on in that setting. There truly was community there.

***

Neem doesn’t think much of Levine’s and Van Pelt’s perspectives. He claims there’s nothing new in their book. He seems to discard the arguments being made about the cost of higher ed and, like many others, clings to the intellectual roots/purpose of higher ed.

While I’m not against intellect or pursuing knowledge — in fact, I’m all for it — I just have a problem when the price of doing so continues to become out of reach for soooooo many people.

Personally, I’ve tried to lower the cost of obtaining a degree within higher education for many years…but I was/we were only successful in doing so for a few years (and that was during a pilot of online-based learning). Yohan Na and I created the graphic below in 2008 for example — as I was trying to raise awareness of the dangers of the status quo:
.

.

So from a cost/access perspective, Levine’s and Van Pelt’s perspectives here sound pretty good to me. It appears to be much more affordable and realistic for the masses. Otherwise, the image/reality of the ivory tower is maintained…allowing “intellectuals” to continue to live and operate within their own sphere/hive/tribe.

Also, we need an AI-backed system of presenting which skills are needed and then how to get them. The ways things are set up today, institutions of traditional higher education have not been able to deal with the current pace of change out there.

As a final comment here…
The changing directions/purposes of institutions of higher education present a good example of why I entitled this blog Learning Ecosystems — as the systems that we use to learn and grow in are constantly morphing:

People come and go
Tools and vendors come and go
Purposes, focuses, and/or mission statements change
Our sources of information (i.e., our streams of content) come and go
Etc.

Osso VR nets $66 million for surgical training [Pringle]

On 03/31/2022, in health, higher education, innovation, instructional design, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, learning preferences, learning spaces, nursing, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, vision/possibilities, XR - extended reality, by Daniel Christian

Osso VR nets $66 million for surgical training — from axios.com by Sarah Pringle

Excerpt:

Why it matters: Surgical training hasn’t evolved in 30-plus years, but Osso VR is looking to change that by empowering health care professionals with virtual reality.

Training and assessing surgeons more efficiently can drive up the adoption of modern and hard-to-learn medtech, and democratize surgical education.
“The innovation from the medical device industry is providing us an incredible opportunity to treat patients much more consistently and with optimized outcomes,” said Justin Barad, Osso’s co-founder and a practicing pediatric orthopedic surgeon.

From DSC:
Not that this is exactly related, but the above item made me think of it:

The Healing Power of Learning — from chronicle.com by James M. Lang
After a health crisis, an academic finds that learning is not just joyful but restorative.

Now we just need a “Likewise TV” for learning-related resources! [Christian]

On 03/29/2022, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, 5G, A/V -- audio/visual, adult learning, Alternatives, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, assistive technologies, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, collaboration, colleges, communities of practice, community colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, convergence, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, future, future of higher education, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), Hyflex learning, ideas, innovation, instructional design, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, internet, K-12 related, law schools, learner profiles, learning, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, learning spaces, lifelong learning, marketplaces, media/film, microlearning, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, more voice more choice more control, multimedia, Natural Language Processing (NLP), New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, online learning, personalized/customized learning, platforms, reinvent, skills, smart classrooms, smart/connected TV, social learning / networks, society, streams of content, technologies for your home, telepresence, television, tools, ubiquitous learning, United States, universities, vendors, videoconferencing, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, vision/possibilities, vocational / trades, web-based collaboration, by Daniel Christian

Likewise TV Brings Curation to Streaming — from lifewire.com by Cesar Aroldo-Cadenas
And it’s available on iOS, Android, and some smart TVs

All your streaming services in one place. One search. One watchlist. Socially powered recommendations.

Entertainment startup Likewise has launched a new recommendations hub that pulls from all the different streaming platforms to give you personalized picks.
…
Likewise TV is a streaming hub powered by machine learning, people from the Likewise community, and other streaming services. The service aims to do away with mindlessly scrolling through a menu, looking for something to watch, or jumping from one app to another by providing a single location for recommendations.
…
Note that Likewise TV is purely an aggregator.

Also see:

From DSC:
Now we need this type of AI-based recommendation engine, aggregator, and service for learning-related resources!

I realize that we have a long ways to go here — as a friend/former colleague of mine just reminded me that these recommendation engines often miss the mark. I’m just hoping that a recommendation engine like this could ingest our cloud-based learner profiles and our current goals and then present some promising learning-related possibilities for us. Especially if the following graphic is or will be the case in the future:

Here’s what I’ve learned about building skills and how skills shape your career.
A visual thread (1/11) ?

1. Degrees don’t age well. Your current skills and skill level tell organizations more about your real value. pic.twitter.com/Z1edxrYAB1

— Jeff Kortenbosch ?? (@jeffkortenbosch) March 13, 2022

Also relevant/see:

Samsung’s New M8 Monitor Combines Entertainment and Work — from lifewire.com by Cesar Cadenas

From DSC:
Some interesting/noteworthy features:

“The 32- inch display has Wi-Fi capabilities to supports multiple streaming services, can stream smartphone content, and comes with a removable SlimFit Cam.”
The M8 has Wi-Fi connectivity for its native streaming apps so you won’t have to connect to a computer to watch something on Netflix. And its Far Field Voice mic can be used w/ the Always On feature to control devices like Amazon Alexa with your voice, even if the monitor is off.
“You can also connect devices to the monitor via the SmartThings Hub, which can be tracked with the official SmartThings app.”

I wonder how what we call the TV (or television) will continue to morph in the future.

Addendum on 3/31/22 from DSC:
Perhaps people will co-create their learning playlists…as is now possible with Spotify’s “Blend” feature:

Today’s Blend update allows you to share your personal Spotify playlists with your entire group chat—up to 10 users. You can manually invite these friends and family members to join you from in the app, then Spotify will create a playlist for you all to listen to using a mixture of everyone’s music preferences. Spotify will also create a special share card that everyone in the group can use to save and share the created playlist in the future.

Guiding Young People Not to Colleges or Careers — But to Good Lives [Koenig]

On 03/28/2022, in higher education, ideas, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, passions, skills, society, student-related, United States, universities, vision/possibilities, vocational / trades, youth, by Daniel Christian

Guiding Young People Not to Colleges or Careers — But to Good Lives — from edsurge.com by Rebecca Koenig

Excerpts:

“We should not be designing programs and interventions without the direct input of young people,” says Allison Gerber, director of employment, education and training at the Annie E. Casey Foundation, a philanthropy based in Baltimore that makes grants to expand education and skills-training for youth and adults. “The more engagement and ownership young people have in the entire thing, the more likely it will meet their needs, they’ll want to stay, feel a sense of belonging, and it will be attractive to them and their peers.”

Along the way, you’ll meet teenagers:
dealing with STRESS, seeking INDEPENDENCE, searching for job SATISFACTION, engaging in EXPLORATION, honing their LEADERSHIP skills, dreaming of HELPING OTHERS, worrying about MAKING MISTAKES, craving STABILITY, and AIMING HIGHER to make their families proud.

What Colleges and Job-Training Programs Can Learn From Teenagers’ Hopes and Fears [Koenig]

On 03/26/2022, in attention, career development, colleges, education, education reform, Emotion, engagement / engaging students, hearts -- matters of the heart, ideas, Learning Experience Design, passions, student-related, vision/possibilities, vocational / trades, youth, by Daniel Christian

What Colleges and Job-Training Programs Can Learn From Teenagers’ Hopes and Fears — from edsurge.com by Rebecca Koenig

Excerpts:

American teenagers don’t all have money, connections or other advantages. But they all have dreams.

Some adolescents are encouraged to follow their dreams. Others grow up hearing that their aspirations are a luxury—nice to have, but hard to afford.
..
The adolescent brain is wired for passion, purpose and experimentation. This drives young people to seek pathways to vocation, not shortcuts to work.

But young people want more than good livelihoods. They want good lives.

Reflections on “Do We Really Want Academic Permanent Records to Live Forever on Blockchain?” [Bohnke]

On 03/19/2022, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, adult learning, Alternatives, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Blockchain, business, career development, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, CMS/LMS, colleges, communities of practice, community colleges, competency-based learning/education, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, credentialing, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, education, elearning, formal learning, future, future of higher education, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, informal learning, innovation, instructional design, K-12 related, law schools, learner profiles, learning, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, learning spaces, liberal arts, lifelong learning, love of learning, microlearning, more voice more choice more control, online learning, open courseware and systems, participation, professional development, project-based learning, publishing, real-world assignments, social learning / networks, society, student-related, technologies for your home, the downsides of how people use tech, training / L&D, United States, universities, user experience (UX), vendors, vision/possibilities, youth, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
Christin Bohnke raises a great and timely question out at edsurge.com in her article entitled:
Do We Really Want Academic Permanent Records to Live Forever on Blockchain?

Christin does a wonderful job of addressing the possibilities — but also the challenges — of using blockchain for educational/learning-related applications. She makes a great point that the time to look at this carefully is now:

Yet as much as unchangeable education records offer new chances, they also create new challenges. Setting personal and academic information in stone may actually counter the mission of education to help people evolve over time. The time to assess the benefits and drawbacks of blockchain technology is right now, before adoption in schools and universities is widespread.

As Christin mentions, blockchain technology can be used to store more than formal certification data. It could also store such informal certification data such as “research experience, individual projects and skills, mentoring or online learning.”

The keeping of extensive records via blockchain certainly raises numerous questions. Below are a few that come to my mind:

Will this type of record-keeping help or hurt in terms of career development and moving to a different job?
Will — or should — CMS/LMS vendors enable this type of feature/service in their products?
Should credentials from the following sources be considered relevant?
- Microlearning-based streams of content
- Data from open courseware/courses
- Learning that we do via our Personal Learning Networks (PLNs) and social networks
- Learning that we get from alternatives such as bootcamps, coding schools, etc.
Will the keeping of records impact the enjoyment of learning — or vice versa? Or will it depend upon the person?
Will there be more choice, more control — or less so?
To what (granular) level of competency-based education should we go? Or from project-based learning?
Could instructional designers access learners’ profiles to provide more personalized learning experiences?
…and I’m certain there are more questions than these.

All that said…

To me, the answers to these questions — and likely other questions as well — lie in:

Giving a person a chance to learn, practice, and then demonstrate the required skills (regardless of the data the potential employer has access to)
.
Giving each user the right to own their own data — and to release it as they see fit. Each person should have the capability of managing their own information/data without having to have the skills of a software engineer or a database administrator. When something is written to a blockchain, there would be a field for who owns — and can administer — the data.

In the case of finding a good fit/job, a person could use a standardized interface to generate a URL that is sent out to a potential employer. That URL would be good for X days. The URL gives the potential employer the right to access whatever data has been made available to them. It could be full access, in which case the employer is able to run their own queries/searches on the data. Or the learner could restrict the potential employer’s reach to a more limited subset of data.

Visually, speaking:

I still have a lot more thinking to do about this, but that’s where I’m at as of today. Have a good one all!

A group of workers are shown paving a new highway in this image.

From DSC:
What are the cognitive “highways” within our minds?

I’ve been thinking a lot about highways recently. Not because it’s construction season (quite yet) here in Michigan (USA), but because I’ve been reflecting upon how many of us build cognitive highways within our minds. The highways that I’m referring to are our well-trodden routes of thinking that we quickly default/resort to. Such well-trodden pathways in our minds get built over time…as we build our habits and/or our ways of thinking about things. Sometimes these routes get built without our even recognizing that new construction zones are already in place.

Those involved with cognitive psychology will connect instantly with what I’m saying here. Those who have studied memory, retrieval practice, how people learn, etc. will know what I’m referring to.

But instead of a teaching and learning related origin, I got to thinking about this topic due to some recent faith-based conversations instead. These conversations revolved around such questions as:

What makes our old selves different from our new selves? (2 Corinthians 5:17)
What does it mean to be transformed by the “renewing of our minds?” (Romans 12:2)
When a Christian says, “Keep your eyes on Christ” — what does that really mean and look like (practically speaking)?

For me, at least a part of the answers to those questions has to do with what’s occupying my thought life. I don’t know what it means to keep my eyes on Christ, as I can’t see Him. But I do understand what it means to keep my thoughts on what Christ said and/or did…or on the kinds of things that Philippians 4:8 suggests that we think about. No wonder that we often hear the encouragement to be in the Word…as I think that new cognitive highways get created in our minds as we read the Bible. That is, we begin to look at things differently. We take on different perspectives.

The ramifications of this idea are huge:

We can’t replace an old highway by ourselves. It takes others to help us out…to teach us new ways of thinking.
We sometimes have to unlearn some things. It took time to learn our original perspective on those things, and it will likely be a process for new learning to occur and replace the former way of thinking about those topics.
This idea relates to addictions as well. It takes time for addicts to build up their habits/cravings…and it takes time to replace those habits/cravings with more positive ones. One — or one’s family, partner/significant other, and friends — should not expect instant change. Change takes time, and therefore patience and grace are required. This goes for the teachers/faculty members, coaches, principals, pastors, policemen/women, judges, etc. that a person may interact with as well over time. (Hmmm…come to think of it, it sounds like some other relationships may be involved here at times also. Certainly, God knows that He needs to be patient with us — often, He has no choice. Our spouses know this as well and we know that about them too.)
Christians, who also struggle with addictions and go to ~~the hospital~~ er…the church rather, take time to change their thoughts, habits, and perspectives. Just as the rebuilding of a physical highway takes time, so it takes time to build new highways (patterns of thinking and responses) in our minds. So the former/old highways may still be around for a while yet, but the new ones are being built and getting stronger every day.
Sometimes we need to re-route certain thoughts. Or I suppose another way to think about this is to use the metaphor of “changing the tapes” being played in our minds. Like old cassette tapes, we need to reject some tapes/messages and insert some new ones.

What are the cognitive highways within your own mind? How can you be patient with others (that you want to see change occur within) inside of your own life?

Anyway, thanks for reading this posting. May you and yours be blessed on this day. Have a great week and weekend!

Addendum on 3/31/22…also relevant, see:

I Analyzed 13 TED Talks on Improving Your Memory— Here’s the Quintessence — from learntrepreneurs.com by Eva Keiffenheim
How you can make the most out of your brain.

Excerpt:

In her talk, brain researcher and professor Lara Boyds explains what science currently knows about neuroplasticity. In essence, your brain can change in three ways.

Change 1 — Increase chemical signalling
Your brain works by sending chemicals signals from cell to cell, so-called neurons. This transfer triggers actions and reactions. To support learning your brain can increase the concentration of these signals between your neurons. Chemical signalling is related to your short-term memory.

Change 2 — Alter the physical structure
During learning, the connections between neurons change. In the first change, your brain’s structure stays the same. Here, your brain’s physical structure changes?—?which takes more time. That’s why altering the physical structure influences your long-term memory.

For example, research shows that London taxi cab drivers who actually have to memorize a map of London to get their taxicab license have larger brain regions devoted to spatial or mapping memories.

Change 3 — Alter brain function
This one is crucial (and will also be mentioned in the following talks). When you use a brain region, it becomes more and more accessible. Whenever you access a specific memory, it becomes easier and easier to use again.

But Boyd’s talk doesn’t stop here. She further explores what limits or facilitates neuroplasticity. She researches how people can recover from brain damages such as a stroke and developed therapies that prime or prepare the brain to learn?—?including simulation, exercise and robotics.

Her research is also helpful for healthy brains?—?here are the two most important lessons:

The primary driver of change in your brain is your behaviour.
…
There is no one size fits all approach to learning.

The Metaverse Will Radically Change Content Creation Forever [Fatemi]

On 03/09/2022, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, 3D, 5G, A/V -- audio/visual, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, career development, change, content development, aggregation, repositories, convergence, Daniel S. Christian, future, health, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, interactivity, interface design, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, Metaverse, multimedia, New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, platforms, play, technologies for your home, telemedicine / telehealth / virtual health, telepresence, tools, training / L&D, user experience (UX), vendors, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, vision/possibilities, web-based collaboration, Web3, XR - extended reality, by Daniel Christian

The Metaverse Will Radically Change Content Creation Forever — from forbes.com by Falon Fatemi

Excerpt:

Although the metaverse promises to touch nearly every person in our society, there’s one demographic that will almost certainly see disproportionately strong disruption: creators. The metaverse has the potential to fundamentally disrupt the content creation process.

The metaverse is slated to help creators make more interactive and immersive content, thanks in large part to advances in VR and AR. The stakes will be raised as creators will be expected to build more immersive and interactive content than ever before.

Also related/see:

The Amazing Possibilities Of Healthcare In The Metaverse — from forbes.com by Bernard Marr

Excerpts:

What’s generally agreed on, however, is that it’s effectively the next version of the internet – one that will take advantage of artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), and ever-increasing connectivity (for example, 5G networks) to create online environments that are more immersive, experiential and interactive than what we have today.

Metaverse involves the convergence of three major technological trends, which all have the potential to impact healthcare individually. Together, though, they could create entirely new channels for delivering care that have the potential to lower costs and vastly improve patient outcomes. These are telepresence (allowing people to be together virtually, even while we’re apart physically), digital twinning, and blockchain (and its ability to let us create a distributed internet).

From DSC:
That last paragraph could likely apply to our future learning ecosystems as well. Lower costs. A greater sense of presence. Getting paid for one’s teaching…then going to learn something new and paying someone else for that new training/education.

Learning Ecosystems

Hmmm…many colleges & universities keep a close eye on their peers…but who is a peer? [Christian]

2022 EDUCAUSE Horizon Report | Teaching and Learning Edition

The Digital versus Brick-and-Mortar Balancing Game [educause.edu]

VR Technology Meets Drivers Ed Thanks To Boys & Girls Clubs [Carlton]

Ketanji Brown Jackson to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court

The AR Roundup: March 2022 [Emrich]

Osso VR nets $66 million for surgical training [Pringle]

Categories

Tags