eLearning and Knowledge Management: Trends and Innovations

1
eLearning and Knowledge Management Trends and
Innovations

• Dr. Lisa Neal
• eLearn Magazine
• www.eLearnMag.org
• lisa_at_acm.org

2
Overview

• Impact of economic and technological trends
• Intertwining eLearning and Knowledge Management
• Directions for the future

3
What I could say

• Ghostwritten article What does eLearning offer
  over the classroom?
• CEO
• Training Director
• Manager
• Employee unlimited access to learning
  opportunities unconstrained by time and location

4
What I believe

• eLearning initiatives driven by
• Capacity
• Cost-reduction
• Compliance
• Knowledge management initiatives driven by
• Community
• Cost-reduction
• Catastrophe

5
Treading water

• Economic factors
• Peter Senge, author of The Fifth Discipline,
  advises us to go for mastery life-long
  acquirement of knowledge and skills
• Self-management
• Enrollments are up
• Failed business models
• Technological innovation
• Incremental changes, not innovation
• More mobile devices have led to better
  connectivity but not m-learning

6
Fundamental issues

• Technology and Internet access is not universal
• Little dramatic technological innovation
  smaller, faster, cheaper, cooler
• Technological solutions require fundamentals
• Cognitive and literacy skills
• Learning to be an online learner
• Enjoyment, comprehension, and behavior and
  performance change

7
eLearning plagued by standards

• Standards compliance offers integration
• De facto standards for online courses destroy
  creativity
• Especially apparent in poor quality catalog
  courses
• Page-turners

8
Design courses creatively

• Design course based on topic, audience, and
  setting
• Make relevant with real world challenges
• From passive to problem-based to collaborative
  learning
• Learning by teaching and explaining
• Learning by application and context
• Instructor and peer interaction is costly but
  essential

9
Learning communities

• Coupling formal and informal learning
• Leveraging knowledge managements strengths
• Access
• Storytelling
• While avoiding known problems
• Incentives to share
• Rewards for using
• Monitor and filter for currency, reliability, and
  importance
• Facilitate and nurture communities of practice
  and interest

10
Learning communities
11
Technological advancements

• Games, simulations, and role playing
• Ex immersive, realistic, and multi-player
  simulations
• Disaster planning and recovery
• Role playing students as participants and
  observer/critics
• Virtual worlds
• Last ex video

12
Video

• Video can add value over text, graphics, and
  audio
• Sense of urgency, sequencing, realism
• Credibility or authenticity
• Captures attention more than other media
• Engagement and social connectedness

13
Conclusions and directions

• Innovative applications of technology
• Learning communities
• Organizations will better facilitate, nurture,
  and manage communities of practice and interest
• Greater recognition of value of face-to-face
• Encompassing instructors, mentors, and peers for
  highs, lows, and context
• Better blending and use of awareness indicators
  and cues
• Better integration into work and personal lives
• Need and time