eLearning 2.0 for Law Firms

Workplace Communities

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 18:07:00 +0000

This blog entry is my notes on the Introduction to Workplace Communities webinar, presented by Mzinga.

Drivers:

Removal of the intermediary - People support themselves and other

Emergence of a more tech savvy consumer - stereotypes regarding tech users is being changed.

Ubiquity of the web

Talent shortages because of boomer retirements

The first web natives "millennials" are the primary employment market

We need to rethink training, hiring, personnel development

Loss of knowledge of retirees

New cycle - Rethink retirement - career deceleration rather than retirement

Communities support the new cycle. Informal work environment

The difference between a top preforming partner vs. a new associate is so extreme that a tool is needed to allow the top performers to support/mentor the newer associates. Online communities support this.

Millennial Implications

Social networks help to recruit. They can spread the information very quickly if your company embraces these tools.

Millennials don't have the knowledge structure.

Deloitte youTube recruiting videos

Alumni and Community

Spans all generations

Keep in touch with the talent that has left the company. Summer associates, lateral moves, moves to in-house or government positions.

To bring back someone, it costs between 1/3 to 2/3s of new recruit.

Rehires more than 40% more productive.

Can be used for recruiting new personnel, new business.

Learning and development drivers
What we do as trainers, low effect on learning. Informal learning 87% - Formal learning 13% (Jay Cross - Informal Learning)

We are spending most of the training money for formal learning

Content development Traditional Courses and curriculumn outside of the relationship to real workflow and requires more time and expertise to develop.

Ace Hardware - Platform for hardware dealers to share and seek advice.

Increases sales resulted in 500% ROI in 6 months.
1/3 of Ace dealers use the site at least weekly.

Training is delivered through offical channels, learning often happens in spite of the offical channels. We have no clue of who knows what, how they learned it, or how to find the real experts.

TutorAuthor NG

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 18:05:00 +0000

TutorAuthor is a tool created by TutorPro for creating and editing online courses. It is used by TutorPro to create the TutorPro online courses available for the legal industry. They have created their newest Office 2007 courses in it and if you purchase TutorPro courses, you get TutorAuthor to allow you to edit the content if you desire.

I'm previewing the newest version of TutorAuthor (NG).

This new version allows you to create all types of online learning. Meets all of your online content creation needs, not just software simulation

More control of the the look and size and feel of the content. Buttons, text boxes, slides.

Everything is editable within TutorAuthor. Doesn't require you to jump back and forth to Powerpoint.

Everything is definable, text boxes can have multiple lines and turns into a scrollable box if necessary. Size, color, font are all modifiable. Even the event style can be edited. Yeah. The actions can use our convention of all anticipated actions (events) being bold and black.

Authoring uses a framestrip view.
Can publish directly to AICC and SCORM directly.
Can publish to Web Page or EXE
Can publish to text document formats to help in the creation of documentation.

Has Import/Export frames capabilities.

Frame designer allows you to add captured screens or create screens.

If you want to learn more about TutorAuthor NG, contact Robin Murphy

To sign up for a session, please respond to SupportUS@tutorpro.com indicating the date and time of the session you wish to attend and you will be sent the details for your session.

January 28 – 10am EST
January 28 – 1pm EST

January 30 – 10am EST
January 30 – 1pm EST

February 6 – 10am EST
February 6 – 1pm EST

February 13 – 10am EST
February 13 – 1pm EST

February 20 – 10am EST
February 20 – 1pm EST

February 27 – 10am EST
February 27 – 1pm EST

Learning 2.0 - The Business Case

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 18:08:00 +0000

I attended a presentation on the business case for Learning 2.0 conducted by mzinga today. This was an interesting graphic that they presented. I really felt it caught the meaning.

Learning 2.0 has increased flexibility & learner empowerment.

Learning 2.0 is multi-dimensional and much lower technology skills required to be a learning developer.

Learning 2.0 presents the wisdom of the masses, not just the "anointed few". Learners create the structure and relationships between the content for themselves, rank and rate content.

My saying was that an elearning project is never completed, just delivered. Web 2.0 promotes this even more. Let users build courses. Video submissions of best practices. What about promotion for major roll-outs like Microsoft office 2007. Chrysler has a You Tube competition. Wikis, blogs can be used by learners to add content.

Traditional courseware has not had the impact on retention of learning that was hoped for. Learning 2.0 typically shorter, provides a point of need response. Will this have a better impact?

Can we adapt to putting learning content on devices that are available at all times? Should we convert existing courses? or use Learning 2.0 methods, podcasts, blogs, text messages so you can access learning where you are and when you have downtime.

We are social creatures and learning is social activity.
Highest retention - Teaching others
Biggest value from learning - Debriefs
Identify true subject matter experts

Gartner says "Enterprise social software will be the biggest new workplace technology success story of this decade."

Cultural drivers for Learning 2.0
Talent shortage (as boomers retire)
Millennials leave and breath technology-over 50% of workforce knows technology inside and out

Intel - Employee Wiki to share Intel information with other employees
20,000 articles in less than 2 years
200,000 page views per day
They have gotten 20,000 articles some from employees who may be retiring. Way to capture disappearing company product knowledge.
People like to share their knowledge.

Cisco - created an internal wiki to develop new business ideas
400 business ideas to date
10,000 employees then added their ideas
3 new markets opportunities developed - $3 billion that might not have been made
Employees empowered to help develop revenue. Employees have greater involvement, longer retention.

Ace Hardware - Platform for dealers to share & seek information. Find rarely requested items, merchandising display strategies, business customer sales leads
Increased 500% ROI in 6 months

Are these training, or knowledge management, or online support. Yes!

The Next Evolution of eLearning - 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 16:05:00 +0000

During the panel discussion, here's some of the questions and responses.

Where do creative ideas for eLearning come from?
Dr. Michael Allen: Although you have a lot of information, it's not effective to just put the information into a course. "Knowledge is nice, but skills are power." Some people have an innate ability, but what about for the rest of us. Look at four critical components: CCAF Context, Challenge, Activity, Feedback

What do you want them to be doing when they end the training. Start with the activity, the performance they should be able to do.
What are the challenges to apply these skills?
Not interesting to solve boring activities. Put the learning in an appropriate context.
Effective feedback in intrinsic feedback. I can see the effect of what I did. I know why what I did has an impact.

Feedback, Challenge and Activity all fit within the context.
Putting learners at risk and providing them with the help they need.

Virtual Classrooms - How would you make them more effective and learning oriented.
Jennifer Hofman, InSync
What works in online classroom environments and what doesn't work.
Only 30% of learners, learn well in an auditory environment.
Participants need to be active part of the communication.

Break out rooms - small group work online, let participants build the content by using their expertize
Synchronized web browsing or online courses, and then bring them back to share their knowledge
Bring back the skills you learned for classroom.
Slides make us talk and don't lead us into activities.
Participant guides provide a way of taking notes, building on information. Not just print out of the slides.
Learn to fully utilize the virtual classroom software
Help the learner become fluent in the capability of being a student.
How do you judge the body language over the bandwidth? Experience
Practice, observing best practices, take as many online courses as you can, to learn best practices, what works, what doesn't work.
Use the same standards that you would for face-to-face classes
Teach managers how to support learning via virtual classrooms.
Spend time to learn how to utilize the virtual classroom.
Informative vs. learning - learning requires constant activity. She says every 3-5 minutes. I'd say ever 1-2 minutes. Otherwise the learner is doing other activities.
My suggestion: Have your learners create blog entries while they are listening. Evaluate the blog entries. I'm doing that at this time.

Where are we going in the eLearning space? Brent Schlenker - The eLearning Guild

Social networks, RSS, blogs, wikis are the technologies that are beginning to actually being used in learning. Become mainstream for learning. Empowering learners.

Anyone can go out and talk about company and learning. Does this need to be secured, limited?
Two types of learners. Personalities that know how to go out and find out what they want, others need to be handheld, walked through. Goal to design courses for both types of learners.
Mobile devices - location based learning, GPS or bar coding. Make suggestions for learning based on location.
Failures - in the process of trying new technologies, failures will occur. Trying to move a new empowered technology into an organization that doesn't support empowerment.
Five ables for new content: searchable, linkable, taggable, feedability, bloggable,
Not everyone will use each technology. Can't be mandated, must build from a personal desire. New associates who are experienced using these technologies may use these tools, while older partners may not. If you make it available, they will come.
Use the coolness of the new technology to hook learners.

Free online learning webinar

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 20:25:00 +0000

Do you want to stay current with what's happening regarding online learning, check out the free Online eLearning Summit scheduled for January 23, 2007. Sorry for the late notice, I'm been neglecting my blog lately.

http://presentations.inxpo.com/Shows/ZiffDavisEnterprise/VTS/01-23-08/Website/program.htm

The kickoff event is a panel intitled "The Next Evolution in eLearning - 2008 and Beyond". One of my favorite experts in the industry, Dr. Michael Allen of Allen Interactions (the father of Authorware) is one of the speakers.

Other sessions of interest include "Delivering Effective Software Rollout Training with out Travel". I imagine this will be on using WebEx to deliver distance learning as one of the sponsors of the summit is WebEx. And one of my new areas of interest is covered in the "Emerging Trends in Collaborative Learning" session that includes wikis, virtual worlds and blogs.

Hope to see you there!

Is learning a new language one of your resolutions?

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Mon, 31 Dec 2007 02:37:00 +0000

Web 2.0 tools are fantastic for help in learning a language. Do you want to find a native language buddy to practice writing in the new language? Want to get help with punctuation? Want to listen to movies or music in a different language? Want to practise speaking and listening? Do you want to download a free textbook for learning. You can do all this and more to help you reach your New Year's resolution.

Here are some sites to check out:

www.italki.com
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Spanish/Contents
http://babelfish.altavista.com/
http://english.hanban.edu.cn/market/HanBanE/412360.htm

Happy New Year!

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 05:08:00 +0000

What did you learn about learning in 2007?

From Tony Karrer and other's I learned about eLearning 2.0 tools. I've been concentrating on WBT and LMS for years. I was more concerned with EOD for Authorware and what tools I would be using to replace it. I was also disappointed in the elearning I was creating and that many companies seem to equate converted Powerpoints with eLearning.

Using Web 2.0 tools in learning is really exciting to me. In the Forum for the Future, I explored some of these tools and how we could use them within our firm. We've identified two projects for wikis (in support of training) and are looking at how we can use eLearning 2.0 for actually providing learning activity to our learners.

Forum for the Future

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 20:43:00 +0000

I haven't written this week, because it was a very full week for me. The global training team at Latham put on a Technology Trainer's Summit where we learned, shared and planned training for the future at Latham. Our big topic this year was Office 2007 and Vista and our theme was
"Changes".

One of the sessions I helped to present was called Forum of the Future. In this session we talked about making training more accessable to the learner. If I can figure out how to link in a downloadable file, I'll share my presentation. Otherwise, I'll start copying in pages of it. We discussed blogs, wikis, rss feeds and other elearning 2.0 tools.

We are expecially interested in finding a different way to use our tip sheets. We have written over 500 nicely formatted tip sheets in Word format. They contain great information in a How To task approach and are great for using in instructor-led classes. Students take them back and store them in binders or in that pile we all have on the desk. We have them posted on our CDC, but they are searchable only by title and category. We are looking for other ways to host the content. We need them to be totally searchable, indexed by How to headlines and easy to access. However, we still need the nicely formatted tip sheets for class, so a wiki doesn't seem to be the best format for that. Our web development team is working with Work Product Libraries and new search tools to access documents in our document management system (interwoven) So we will be looking initially to using this feature.

We are looking at using wiki's (probably through Sharepoint) for our Technology Team bi-weekly meeting minutes. In fact we will be approaching our senior technology managers about putting all of the different technology meeting minutes in such a format. Now they are in Word documents that can be accessed from the appropriate team webpage, one at a time. If you want to find the date for a roll-out and you know it was discussed in one of last month's meetings, you have to search each one. I'll keep you informed on how this works.

Jennifer

eLearning 2.0 on LA Times front page

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 20:04:00 +0000

Do you want to study philosophy with Yalies, string theory with MIT students, just go to iTunes. Apple's free iTune University provides podcast downloads of lectures from many top universities. Communters and truck drivers download and listen to lectures while they are driving. Retired lawyers listen while they jog or work out.

One of the front page stories of the Saturday, 11/24 issue of the Los Angeles Times discusses this phenomenon. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-podclass24nov24,1,6060431.story?ctrack=1&cset=true

Could this method be used to reach busy attorneys and other firm employees with training?

What is an RSS Feed and why would I use it?

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 23:01:00 +0000

I'm really excited about learning more about elearning 2.0 and the use of eLearning in law firms. However, the amount of time I have to research these topics is limited. On top of that, over 1% of all blogs are someway related to elearning. Oh my! Can I keep up and have any time left over for the rest of my life?

RSS feeds to the rescue. They allow you to easily track new updates on blogs, news sites and wikis that you are interested in checking out information on. To learn more about RSS feeds and how to use them, check out this video RSS Feeds in Plain English. http://www.blip.tv/file/205570/

To use the RSS Feeds, you need a software service call an RSS Reader. Outlook 2007 can be used as an RSS Reader.
However, until I get all my computers on Office 2007, I decided to use Google Reader. (www.google.com/reader ) This free service from Google, can be accessed from any computer I log into. So I can quickly find out new information about elearning 2.0, and blogs of my friends and family.

There are other RSS readers if you have issues with Google. http://blogspace.com/rss/readers

Who's Blogging?

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 02:37:00 +0000

The growth of blogs is growing at an expotential rate. Let's take a look at why people blog. For more information check out this article. http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/blogging_digestion_phase.php Professional blogging - Can you make a living as a blogger? Making a living from a blog is difficult. In each vertical market - gadgets, technology, politics, celebrity gossip - there are a few very successful blogs that get a large volume of traffic. In the long tail, and even in the middle tier, there is simply not enough traffic to run a blog as a sustainable business. How do you make money on a blog? Ads and subscriptions.

Blogging for professional and personal pleasure - Many find that blogging is an incredible learning experience. I've learned more about Web 2.0 and eLearning 2.0 in the last two weeks than I'd learned in two years of reading and listing to podcasts/webinars. I also expect to build connections in the legal learning industry as a result of this blog. I also get a good deal of pleasure from learning and sharing information. Could I make some money? Yes, it might be possible by using AdSense to add advertisements from my blog. Maybe in the future.

Blogging for a cause - While some bloggers hope to make money from their blogs, many blog because they are passionate about their cause. Top causes? Religon and politics. The upcoming presidental primary has generated a large number of blogs. Currently the Democrats beat out the Republicans in the number of blogs.

Personal blogs - Money making and blogs for causes make up a small portion of the blogosphere. The long tail is all about self-expression. Are you a closet poet? Want to share your passion for kitties? Want to stay connected with a spread out family? Personal blogs proliferate.

Spam blogs - Most posts find their way through the blogosphere only to be republished on so called splogs (spam blogs). These fake blogs work by scraping the content of legitimate blogs, republishing it, driving traffic via search engines and selling ads. They are completely useless, but are clever pipes that just make money for the owner with little-to-no work. Very little can be done to stop these blogs, since they've gotten great at remixing the content. They are so good sometimes that you do not realize right away that you are reading a fake blog.

What does this mean to law firms? Most bloggers are in their late teens and early twenties. If history is a guide, they will carry skills and knowledge about weblog capabilities into workplaces. Does your firm allow employees to blog? Do you block blogs? Do you have any blogging policies?

CLTI Conf. - Let's get real about the virtual

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 22:05:00 +0000

This session is on virtual worlds for learning by Steve Mahaley from Duke Corporate.

Take people out of their comfort zones and drop them into a virtual learning experience.

Learning occurs when we use our senses. Recess as a learning experience. Games, working together, creating.

New tools bring new uses - Can we build it? Yes we can (but should we)

Design for humans on the adoption curve - Can they build it, Yes they can (within limits.)

Links for learning in a virtual world
http://youtube.com/watch?v=ZUNAhzwZkdU - Berkman Island, Harvard Law School
http://sleducation.wikispaces.com/ - in Education
http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSN1028324920071011 - in Business

Problems:
Can be expensive to develop
Difficult for users to navigate around 2nd life
2nd Life blocked by many corporations
Learning required just to use the systems.
Hard to hold on to participants. Too many distractions.

Benefits:
Private land allows you to control and have invitation-only events
Public land - data gathering, running a SL business, interviewing
Building tools - team exercises, prototyping objects
No RL Physics - No need to support a bridge because no gravity, etc
Avatar appearance - different from self, role playing, gender issues, diversity
Inventory - evidence collection, treasure hunts
Groups - set up and maintain relationships between individuals in a group
Chat vs. Voice - structuring conversations, capturing histories

Corporate Learning: Trends and Innovations conference

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 17:20:00 +0000

A group of eLearning gurus decided to deliver a totally free online conference delivered on the web. It started today 11/14 and runs through 11/20. If you 'd like to join, go to http://www.complexive.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

Following this morning's opening session, Tony Karrer is now speaking on the topic of this blog, eLearning 2.0. Discussions on how to learn about this new technology. Going to blogs, like this one and Tony's http://elearningtech.blogspot.com/2006/02/what-is-elearning-20.html

Using a tool like Del.icio.us and follow the tags like "elearning2.0". Here's a link to a really good videos on Web 2.0, http://www.commoncraft.com/ Check out RSS in Plain English.

Because of the speed of change, the most important skill is to learn how to learn.
"The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn". Alvin Toffler

Get actively engaged in learning. Shift activity from relying on print, but move into scanning with RSS reader and blogs, following tags in social bookmarking, building a network via LinkedIn.

RSS Readers include Google Read. Check out the following site for information on RSS Readers. For keeping up on technology: http://www.techcrunch.com/

Would it be interesting to have a new associate blog about their first year at the firm. Could it be used for recruiting? Would this be too dangerous?

Leading Attorneys to Training

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 04:14:00 +0000

What's one of the most difficult things to do? Train employees who don't come to class and won't take the online courses. For law firms, attorneys are the hardest to get to take training. Even one-on-one training cuts into billable hours. Can eLearning 2.0 tools help us provide training to attorneys and other employees too busy for training? Definitely!

Let's look at some of these tools and how they can be used for training the elusive attorney.

Podcasts are audio or video files that can be downloaded to personal mp3 devices like iPods. They can then be viewed or listened to at the learner's convenience; commuting, working out, standing in line at the grocery store.

How can podcasts be used for training? Engaging short pieces which motivate users to come to training. Rationale for why a new technology is important to the firm. Success stories from respected senior partners. Introduce new technology. Can be used for CLE courses. Unfortunately for technology training, the size of video podcasts makes it a poor screen for representing computer screens.
http://lw.com/Resources.aspx?page=Webcasts

Blogs or blawgs as legal blogs are called are sites where people can create their own online journals. Many blogs provide commentary or news on a particular subject; others function as more personal online diaries. Blogs are archivable and searchable. They can be used to provide short training lessons on specific topics. They could be messages from the technology partners regarding what the technology plans are and how the technology will benefit the firm.
http://www.ihearttech.com/
http://www.law.wisc.edu/blogs/wisblawg/

RSS Feeds are often found on blawgs. They allow you to subscribe to the blog and get updates sent to your RSS reader or e-mail address.

DevLearn and eLearning 2.0

noreply@blogger.com (Jennifer Zapp) — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 03:42:00 +0000

I just got back from eLearning Guild's DevLearn conference. It was an eye opener for me. I was most impressed with the idea of using Web 2.o tools for learning, tagged with the name, eLearning 2.0. I decided to start exploring and researching this topic by using one of the eLearning 2.0 tools, blogging. So welcome to my blog.

What is Web 2.0?

Let's start by comparing examples of Web 1.0 to Web 2.0

Web 1.0 --> Web 2.0
Netscape --> Google
Favorites --> del.icio.us
Britannica Online --> Wikipedia
Ofoto --> Flickr
mp3.com --> uTube
personal websites --> blogging
publishing --> participation
media producers --> personal media creation
streaming video --> podcasts
discussion lists --> social networking

A central principle of Web 2.0 is it allows us to embrace the power of the web to harness collective intelligence. Users no longer are limited to browsing content developed by others. Web 2.0 makes it easy to collaborate with others. Amazon allows you to share your opinions. Wikipedia allows you to add to and edit their encyclopedia. If you aren't familiar with the Web 2.o terms above, google them and join with me on this exploration.