Is your job at risk from robot labor? Check this handy interactive — from qz.com by Nikhil Sonnad
On 06/04/2014,
in career development, Google, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning spaces, professional development, teachers, teaching & learning,
by Daniel Christian
How teachers are learning: Professional development remix — from edSurge, June 2014
Excerpts:
Addendum, also from edSurge today:
- Google Launches Learning Space in Brazil
Designing a learning environment as versatile as the tools
On 04/09/2014,
in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, active learning, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Bring your own device (BYOD), communications, content development, aggregation, repositories, Daniel S. Christian, data related items, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital textbooks, digital video, distance education, e-books, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, experimentation, flipping -- inverted learning, future, human-computer interaction (HCI), innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, interaction design, interactivity, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, lifelong learning, media/film, mirroring and/or multiple devices, mobile learning, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, more voice more choice more control, Near Field Communication (NFC), online learning, online media, online tutoring, participation, personalized/customized learning, platforms, play, professional development, reinvent, second screen apps, social learning / networks, social media, staying relevant, streams of content, student-related, surviving, technologies for your home, telepresence, television, training / L&D, transmedia, trends, TVs, user experience (UX), videoconferencing, virtual field trips, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, virtual tutoring, web-based collaboration, workplace,
by Daniel Christian
CONTENTS
- Content discovery and synchronization
With access to rich data about their subscribers and what they do, operators can improve recommendation, encourage social TV and exploit second screen synchronization. - Recordings get more personal
One of the next big steps in multiscreen TV is giving people access to their personal recordings on every screen. This is the moment for nPVR to finally make its entrance. - Evolving the User Experience
As service providers go beyond household level and address individuals, the role of log-ins or context will become important. There is a place for social TV and big data. - The role of audio in personalization
Audio has a huge impact on how much we enjoy video services. Now it can help to personalize them. ‘Allegiance’ based audio choices are one possibility. - Making advertising more targeted
Addressable advertising is in its infancy but has a bright future, helping to fund the growth of on-demand and multiscreen viewing.
Some excerpts from this report:
Good content should be matched by good content discovery , including recommendations. The current state-of -the-art is defined by Netflix.
…
Today’s TV experience is worlds apart from the one we were talking about even five years ago. We’ve witnessed exponential growth in services such as HD and have moved from a model in which one screen is watched by many, to many screens (and devices) being available to the individual viewer, what is today called TV Everywhere. Having multiscreen access to content is driving the demand for a more personalised experience, in which the viewer can expect to see what they want, where, and when. While video on-demand (VOD) has been a great method for delivering compelling content to viewers, it is not always a truly seamless TV-like experience, and traditionally has been limited to the living room. The growing demand for the personalised experience is driving seismic change within the TV industry, and we’ve seen great strides made already, with time-shifted TV and nPVR as just two examples of how we in the industry can deliver content in the ways viewers want to watch. The next step is to move towards more advanced content discovery, effectively creating a personalised channel or playlist for the individual user.
…
As the tools become available to deliver personalized experiences to consumers, content owners can better create experiences that leverage their content. For example, for sports with multiple points of action, like motor racing, multiple camera angles and audio feeds will allow fans to follow the action that is relevant to their favourite racing team. And for movies, access to additional elements such as director’s commentaries, which have been available on Blu-ray discs for some time, can be made available over broadcast networks.
From DSC:
Some words and phrases that come to my mind:
- Personalization.
- Data driven.
- Content discovery and recommendation engines (which could easily relate to educational playlists)
- Training on demand
- Learning agents
- Web-based learner profiles
- Learning hubs
- What MOOCs morph into
- More choice. More control.
- Virtual tutoring
- Interactivity and participation
- Learning preferences
- Lifelong learning
- Reinventing oneself
- Streams of content
- Learning from The Living [Class] Room
![The Living [Class] Room -- by Daniel Christian -- July 2012 -- a second device used in conjunction with a Smart/Connected TV](http://danielschristian.com/learning-ecosystems/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/The-Living-Class-Room-Daniel-S-Christian-July-2012.jpg)
On 03/31/2014,
in career development, creativity, graphics, human-computer interaction (HCI), multimedia, new media literacies, online learning, online media, productivity / tips and tricks, professional development, usability, user experience (UX), user interface design, web design and production,
by Daniel Christian
W3C: Web Design & Applications
Web Design Groups on LinkedIn.com
Relevant hashtags on Twitter:
Top Designer Google+ Communities You Should Follow — from hongkiat.com by Charnita Fance. Filed in Web Design.
Excerpt:
If you are active on Google+ there are a lot of communities for web designers or UI designers to join. Google+ Communities are like online groups or forums where people can come together to talk about a common hobby, interest or career (such as Design). Only members of a given community can see your posts in their stream. As a designer, this is great because you can share your work and get feedback from thousands of other designers, for free.
In the design communities below, you’ll find lots of great information, freebies, tips and tricks, and personal design work from members. Plus, you can ask for help or offer help to others. Let’s find the perfect Google+ design community for you.
Fresh Resources for Designers and Developers — March 2014 — from hongkiat.com
Infographic: HTML5 vs. native mobile app development [updated] — from kony.com by Dipesh Mukerji — also see his posting: Developing apps with HTML5: benefits and challenges
Responsive e-learning in a Multi-Device World — from elearning-reviews.traineasy.com
Excerpt:
“Day by day, the number of devices, platforms, and browsers that need to work with your site grows. Responsive web design represents a fundamental shift in how we’ll build websites for the decade to come,” says Jeffrey Veen, CEO & Cofounder of Typekit.
New ebook all about web design for Google Glass — from glassalmanac.com by Christian Bullock
Excerpt:
Well that was fast.
As someone who didn’t really know too many people were currently all about ensuring a site’s web design was fit for Google Glass browsing, there’s now an eBook by author Joe Casabona (known for his blog People Reacting to Glass) that’s a guide to web design for Glass.
Pretty cool idea and something I could see as being crucial when Glass launches publicly. I’m sure Glass adoption won’t be as high as tablet or smartphone adoption rates, but as we’re seeing now, it’s necessary for web designers to think of other ways people are interacting with websites aside from normal desktop or laptop computers.
Addendums on 4/1/14:
- The importance of psychology in web design — from creativebloq.com
- Ethan Marcotte on how responsive web design came about — from creativebloq.com
On 03/26/2014,
in analytics, business, career development, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, data related items, game-changing environment, IT in HE, professional development, vision/possibilities, workplace,
by Daniel Christian
IT under pressure: McKinsey Global Survey results — from mckinsey.com by Naufal Khan and Johnson Sikes
Recognition of IT’s strategic importance is growing, but so is dissatisfaction with its effectiveness, according to our eighth annual survey on business and technology strategy.
Excerpts (emphasis DSC):
More and more executives are acknowledging the strategic value of IT to their businesses beyond merely cutting costs. But as they focus on and invest in the function’s ability to enable productivity, business efficiency, and product and service innovation, respondents are also homing in on the shortcomings many IT organizations suffer. Among the most substantial challenges are demonstrating effective leadership and finding, developing, and retaining IT talent.
These are among the key findings from our most recent survey on business technology, which asked executives from all functions about their companies’ priorities for, spending on, and satisfaction with IT. Overall, respondents are more negative about IT performance than they were in 2012 and, notably, IT executives judge their own effectiveness more harshly than their business counterparts do. Compared with executives from the business side, they are more than twice as likely to suggest replacing IT management as the best remedy.
From DSC:
It seems to me that an organization or team can’t expect to extract significant value from someone or something that they haven’t cultivated. That is, a sports team shouldn’t expect a player who has sat on the bench most of the year to come in and light the world on fire. That player needs actual time playing in the games/matches/meets/etc. They need experience. They need practice in developing strategy as well as some experiments — to find out what’s working and what’s not.
IT organizations are key these days; and becoming more important in leading the organizations that they function in. It is short-sighted not to develop IT employees in both technical and business-related skills. As our world is increasingly being impacted by technological advances (occurring at exponential — not linear — trajectories), those companies who have leadership from the technical sides of the house should do quite well in the future.
Key items to work on:
- Creating tighter integrations with the rest of the business/organization; get more IT-based reps into situations where they can pull up chairs at more business-oriented tables/discussions/projects (product development/R&D, sales, marketing, customer service, other); affect the culture of the organization so that they can actually lead the organization
- Develop innovative, strategic thinking — thinking BIG!
- Understanding the changing landscapes and what opportunities might exist as a result of those changing landscapes
- Ability to develop potential scenarios and form responses to those scenarios
- Stop thinking about cutting costs, start using your skills/knowledge to develop new income streams, new products, and new markets! Stop seeing IT departments as cost centers, but rather key revenue generators!
- Moving more visionaries and those with the ability to persuade/sell into the IT organization
- Create/give IT staff more chances to get in the game!
Regarding the graphic below:
IT-based personnel should be kicking out a lot more new, innovative products and services. That’s where their new/additional value should come from. But that doesn’t seem to be happening.
Why is that? Is the rest of the business so used to looking at IT in certain ways? Does IT have a seat at the senior-most level/table? Are folks in the business listening or even approaching IT for their input? Are some cultural changes necessary?
Also see:
CIO ‘confessions’: 5 critical attributes of the best IT leaders — from hp.com
A new book profiles leading CIOs to learn how they thrive. It’s not about technology—it’s about guts.
What: CIOs are taking on more and more responsibilities, and while technology matters, leadership makes all the difference.
Why: Tech trends come and go, but the challenge of bridging the gap between IT and the business—and demonstrating how IT can deliver real value—remain the heart of the job.
More: Read Confessions of a Successful CIO, set for March 2014 release.
By the way, all of this is true within the world of higher education as well. Consider, for example, the need for IT/technical leadership in the worlds of online learning, blended learning, distance education, as well as in creating new revenue streams based upon technologies and the affordances that these technologies provide.
Also see:
Top 10 Strategic Issues for Boards, 2013-2014 — from The Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
Those top issues include:
- The Revenue Model
- Productivity and Efficiency
- Student Aid
- Educational Delivery
- Student Learning
- Student Success
- Market and Mission
- The Academic Workforce
- Globalization
- Institutional Risk
Top-Ten IT Issues, 2014: Be the Change You See — from educause.edu by Susan Grajek
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
- Improving student outcomes through an institutional approach that strategically leverages technology
- Establishing a partnership between IT leadership and institutional leadership to develop a collective understanding of what information technology can deliver
- Assisting faculty with the instructional integration of information technology
- Developing an IT staffing and organizational model to accommodate the changing IT environment and facilitate openness and agility
- Using analytics to help drive critical institutional outcomes
- Changing IT funding models to sustain core service, support innovation, and facilitate growth
- Addressing access demand and the wireless and device explosion
- Sourcing technologies and services at scale to reduce costs (via cloud, greater centralization of institutional IT services and systems, cross-institutional collaborations, and so forth)
- Determining the role of online learning and developing a strategy for that role
- Implementing risk management and information security practices to protect institutional IT resources/data and respond to regulatory compliance mandates*
- Developing an enterprise IT architecture that can respond to changing conditions and new opportunities*
* Tie
On 03/17/2014,
in 21st century, adult learning, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, business, career development, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, emerging technologies, engineering, entrepreneurship, experimentation, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, global / globalization, heutagogy, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, informal learning, K-12 related, leadership, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, lifelong learning, marketplaces, new business models, pace of change, professional development, reinvent, robotics, staying relevant, strategy, surviving, the downsides of how people use tech, training / L&D, trends, vision/possibilities, workplace,
by Daniel Christian
Excerpts:
If Daniel Nadler is right, a generation of college graduates with well-paid positions as junior researchers and analysts in the banking industry should be worried about their jobs. Very worried.
Mr Nadler’s start-up, staffed with ex-Google engineers and backed partly by money from Google’s venture capital arm, is trying to put them out of work.
…
The threat to jobs stretches beyond the white-collar world. Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) also make possible more versatile robots capable of taking over many types of manual work. “It’s going to decimate jobs at the low end,” predicts Jerry Kaplan, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur who teaches a class about AI at Stanford University. Like others working in the field, he says he is surprised by the speed at which the new technologies are moving out of the research labs.
From DSC:
After reading the above article — and seeing presentations about these trends (example) — I have some major questions to ask:
- What changes do those of us working within higher education need to make due to these shifts? How should we modify our curricula? Which skills need to be reinforced/developed?
- What changes do Learning & Development groups and Training Departments need to make within the corporate world?
- How should we be developing our K-12 students to deal with such a volatile workplace?
- What changes do adult learners need to make to stay marketable/employable? How can they reinvent themselves (and know what that reinvention should look like)?
- How can each of us know if our job is next on the chopping block and if it is, what should we do about it?
- What kind of future do we want?
These changes are for real. The work of Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee further addresses some of these trends and changes. See:
Addendum:
Also see:
- Bill Gates: Yes, robots really are about to take your jobs — from bgr.com by Brad Reed
Excerpt:
Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates isn’t going to sugarcoat things: The increasing power of automation technology is going to put a lot of people out of work. Business Insider reports that Gates gave a talk at the American Enterprise Institute think tank in Washington, DC this week and said that both governments and businesses need to start preparing for a future where lots of people will be put out of work by software and robots.
Also see:
- Make Work More Human — from Harold Jarche
On 03/07/2014,
in content development, aggregation, repositories, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, India, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, lifelong learning, professional development, social learning / networks, social media, streams of content, training / L&D, UK, user experience (UX), workplace,
by Daniel Christian
A series re: The Learning Flow — by Jane Hart
(1) Beyond the Course: The Learning Flow – a new framework for the social learning era
(2) The Learning Flow and the User Experience
(3) Three Types of Learning Flow
(4) The role of the Guide in a Learning Flow
Excerpt:
- S/he needs to be a knowledgeable expert in the relevant domain.
- S/he needs to be a curator – but more than a curator.
- S/he needs to able to pick out key resources and materials from the mass of material shared online. In other words s/he needs to be able to extract the “signal from the noise”.
- S/he needs to be able to “join the dots” between resources – and show how one relates to the other.
- S/he needs to be able to contextualize resources and make them relevant to the participants – drawing out the salient point(s) of the resources s/he shares.
- S/he needs to be able to model good knowledge sharing skills.
- S/he needs to “think small” – and create short manageable micro-learning activities.
- S/he needs to “think social”- and how she can inspire and encourage short social learning experiences.
- S/he needs to “think flexible” – and how she can support autonomy and choice in users’ participation.
From Micro-Learning to Corporate MOOCs — from idreflections.blogspot.com by Sahana Chattopadhyay
Excerpt:
I see MOOC as a dissemination model that offer a unique opportunity to integrate both—micro-learning and learning flows. It is an approach that – if done right – can integrate all aspects of the Pervasive Learning model – Formal, Informal and Social – popularized by Dan Pontefract in the book, Flat Army. I will discuss this in a later post. In this post, I am going to focus my attention on how micro-learning and learning flows can be an integral part of a MOOC and how this may benefit the corporate world.
On 03/03/2014,
in A/V -- audio/visual, active learning, attention, collaboration, communications, creativity, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital video, education technology, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, flipping -- inverted learning, ideas, innovation, interactivity, K-12 related, media/film, multimedia, professional development, social learning / networks, social media, streams of content, student-related, teaching & learning, television, tools, TVs, vendors,
by Daniel Christian
Bringing the Wonder of the Web to Video (emphasis DSC)
Our mission is to usher in a new age of expression.
Anyone can easily create professional-quality videos combined with all the interactivity you expect to find inside a browser. We call these TouchCasts, a new medium that looks like video, but feels like the web.
Also see:
- Engaging with the YouTube Generation — by Ayelet Segal
. - The Future of Personal Broadcasting: Consider this your invitation — from touchcast.com by Charley Miller
Excerpt:
The very idea of who a “broadcaster” is (the “we”) is about to change. It’s about to become you.
On 02/22/2014,
in 21st century, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, business, career development, entrepreneurship, innovation, pace of change, professional development, robotics, student-related, technology (general), the downsides of how people use tech, workplace,
by Daniel Christian
What jobs will the robots take? – from The Atlantic by Derek Thompson
Nearly half of American jobs today could be automated in “a decade or two,” according to new research. The question is: Which half?
Excerpt:
It is an invisible force that goes by many names. Computerization. Automation. Artificial intelligence. Technology. Innovation. And, everyone’s favorite, ROBOTS.
Whatever name you prefer, some form of it has been stoking progress and killing jobs—from seamstresses to paralegals—for centuries. But this time is different: Nearly half of American jobs today could be automated in “a decade or two,” according to a new paper by Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael A. Osborne, discussed recently in The Economist. The question is: Which half?
A Guide to the Job Market in 2034 — from mashable.com by Todd Wasserman
Excerpt:
Whether you’re an aspiring lawyer, policeman or programmer, you should be aware that at some point — maybe a decade from now, maybe two, perhaps less — many jobs in those industries will be replaced by an algorithm.
That’s what many economists predict and in some cases it looks like it will happen very soon. For instance, algorithms currently perform some tasks previously executed by paralegals, patent attorneys and contract lawyers. In Doha, Sao Paulo and Beijing, municipal governments use cheap sensors on pipes, pumps and other water infrastructure components to watch out for water leaks, a practice that has led some to speculate that fewer law enforcement workers will be needed on patrol once more sensors are deployed. Even programming — once the epitome of a safe-as-milk job in the 21st century — could be taken over by the bots as machine learning lets algorithms make and optimize design choices in coding.
All told, some 47% of U.S. employment is at risk of being automated over the next two decades, according to a 2013 study by Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael Osborne of the University of Oxford.
…
Feudalism 2.0?
Workplace automation, fewer jobs and an increasingly winner-take-all society do not necessarily bode well for democracy. In 2013, the top 85 individuals in the world owned more wealth than the bottom 50% of a planet of 7 billion. Conflate that with the 47% claim and for some you have the makings of Feudalism 2.0.
Online labour marketplaces: job insecurity gone viral? — from theconversation.com by Veronica Sheen, Research Associate, Political and Social Inquiry at Monash University
Excerpt:
Some of the newest enterprises online are those which link workers to anyone who wants a job done. They’re not concerned with employment or jobs but with “tasks”. These are small, one-off, discrete portions of work for completion within a short time frame at short notice.
They are different from employment websites like seek.com which have essentially substituted for newspapers in employment advertising.
Websites Airtasker, Ozlance and Sidekicker show what’s on offer: home help tasks like cleaning or painting and small administrative jobs (Airtasker); web based assignments that can be done online (Ozlance); or explicitly business oriented, (Sidekicker), offering helpers for office work, events, hospitality, and promotions. Others include Odesk, Freelancer and Elance mostly offering online work like programming, web design and translation.
Futureproofing Your Career Part II — from WorkStrong/weddles.com
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
As I mentioned in my last post, futureproofing is now a core competency of successful career activism for one simple reason: In today’s workplace, there is only one certainty – tomorrow will be different from today.
We’re now seeing more change more frequently than at any other time in the past 100 years or more. And that change is increasingly disruptive … to our jobs, occupational fields, industries and, as a consequence, our careers.
How do you implement futureproofing so that it works for you? It’s a five step process that should be repeated twice a year:
Entrepreneurs & freelancers: Add more value or find another job — from hongkiat.com
Excerpt:
Everything changes. Change is the only constant in this Universe said Heraclitus of Ephesus. It’s funny how something talked about 2,500 years ago still isn’t understood by the majority of people. If you’re trying to succeed in business, whether you’re a freelancer or an entrepreneur, your first objective is growth.
In place of text CVs, platform lets freelancers blog their work history — from springwise.com
From Germany, Somewhere is a visual blogging platform that enables freelancers and small teams to show potential employers and clients a more engaging story of their work.
On 01/03/2014,
in 21st century, collaboration, communications, creativity, education reform, engagement / engaging students, K-12 related, learning ecosystem, learning theories, maker movement, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, more voice more choice more control, online learning, professional development, teachers, teaching & learning,
by Daniel Christian
From DSC:
I originally saw this via a Scoop from Jim Lerman who pointed out the article:
Diving Into ‘Deeper Learning’ with High Tech High’s MOOC
One school network takes charge, offering a glimpse into innovate school models
Excerpt:
It combines the principles behind project-based learning, inquiry-based learning and Maker activities to give students more agency through collaboration, communicating, and thinking critically.
HTH Chief Academic Officer Ben Daley says, “Shallow learning is about racing to the textbook, trying to cover all the topics before the year rolls to an end. Deeper learning is about covering a smaller number of topics in a greater depth, making things, and presenting to a real audience.”
Over the course of nine weeks, the MOOC will offer a glimpse into how Deeper Learning is applied in schools like Expeditionary Learning, Big Picture Learning, Envision, and of course, High Tech High. Activities will include looking at student work from these schools, experiencing a “protocol” where teachers use a structured framework to guide a conversation, and a final project that will ask participants to design and implement their own deeper learning activity.
From DSC:
In briefly reviewing this endeavor, what I appreciated about these efforts was:
- Giving more agency to the students — I took this to mean, “More choice. More control.” It seems to encourage student voice.
- It encourages self-directed learning, something we all will need in our lifetimes — but does so in combination with other forms of learning that involve collaboration and communication (two other skills we all need)
- It seems to have been a team-based approach – something I think will often be required to be successful in the future
- The active, well-thought through experimentation going on; putting learning theories into practice in new ways that will hopefully connect with learners more and engage them at deeper levels
Also, slightly-related items 🙂
- Standardized Achievement Tests: What Are They Good For? Hint: Not Cognitive Ability. — from blogs.scientificamerican.com by Scott Barry Kaufman
- College course asks students to develop Google Glass apps as homework — from psfk.com by John Pugh
On 12/20/2013,
in 21st century, economics, education, education reform, faith, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, global / globalization, health, hearts -- matters of the heart, higher education, history, journalism, learning, legislatures / government / legal, liberal arts, media/film, Michigan, music, presentations, professional development, psychology, religion, society, sociology,
by Daniel Christian
Many of these presentations will be live streamed at:
Also see:
On 12/16/2013,
in collaboration, communities of practice, global / globalization, ideas, innovation, professional development, teachers, technology (general), web-based collaboration,
by Daniel Christian
Eight NEW Global Collaborative ideas to Flatten Your Learning! — from 123elearning.blogspot.com by Julie Lindsay
Excerpt:
Celebrations and sharing well considered ideas for future collaborations have been part of the exciting culmination to the Flat Classroom Certified Teacher Cohort 13-2 this past week.
This professional learning course started 3 months ago, and together we have journeyed through the ‘7 Steps to Flatten your Classroom’ into ‘Global Project Design and Management’. Cohort members came from Australia, USA, Vietnam, Singapore, USA and New Zealand. We met most weeks for a synchronous meeting (you can appreciate the time zone challenges!) and connected asynchronously through our wiki portal and through the Flat Connections teacher community (which is open for anyone to come and join!)
What is significant about this course and this cohort is the diversity of teaching positions and experience and individual place on the global collaborative learning pathway, however as a community of learners we have thrived – learning with and from each other at each turn of the road.
Let me briefly introduce and describe each teacher and each project.
On 12/16/2013,
in corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, lifelong learning, professional development, training / L&D, United States, workplace,
by Daniel Christian
$164.2 billion spent on training and development by U.S. companies — from ASTD.org
ASTD releases 2013 State of the Industry report.
