This short post resonated with me so here it is from:

Moving at the Speed of Creativity

I found this quotation about the mind of a learner this evening on the blog of the Tennessee State Board of Education:

We are to regard the mind not as a piece of iron to be laid upon the anvil and hammered into any shape, nor as a block of marble in which we are to find the statute by removing the rubbish, nor as a receptacle into which knowledge may be poured; but as a flame that is to be fed, as an active being that must be strengthened to think and feel–to dare, to do, and to suffer.
– Mark Hopkins, Induction address as president of Williams College, 1836.

Brent Education creativity, knowledge

We live in a world where the social Internet brings unheralded opportunities to grow and develop as a lifelong learner and as a productive employee or entrepreneur. Social media tools are simple, meaningful and necessary in the work we do with others.

My consultancy’s purpose is to introduce social media tools, showcase their benefits and support their use by practitioners and organizations who recognize the value of social media for bringing positive change to people, organizations, networks and community. My services center on supporting and using appropriate social media tools with organizations and individuals so that communities are strengthened, learning is enhanced, networks are stronger and workers are engaging their clients with the most effective tools possible.

Brent purpose about, purpose, socialmedia

Brent Presentation social media/tech

The Work Literacy course ran from September 29 through November 7, 2008. Although new activities are no longer being added, the community and course content will remain online and we invite new participants to join in and explore the topics below.

Week 1- Social Networking–Ning, LinkedIn and Facebook
Week 2–Social Bookmarking and Tagging
Week 3– Blogs
Week 4–Aggregators and RSS Feeds
Week 5–Wikis
Week 6–Pulling it all Together

Below is a post I made on the subject of reflective practitioner.

Week 3: Blogging for Personal Learning – Work Literacy

“Don’t tell me you don’t have time or that other things are more important. Is anything in your work life more important than continuing to be better at what you do? Because that’s what reflection is about–considering what you can learn from your experiences and then doing more of what works and less of what doesn’t”.

“After reading the blog post from Michele (quote above) on Becoming a More Reflective Practitioner I was motivated to write. Her comments really address my own inertia and the inertia I see in others when I’m promoting the use of blogs and social tech/media for learning, working and professional development.

I’m an active blogger for personal learning over the past 5 years and I use blogs in my projects over that time period. I’m a dyed in the wool blog evangelist however I’m not the best at adopting a more rigorous approach to my reflective practice. I think that at times I am stuck in the shiny toy syndrome where I become enamoured with the latest social media tool. I get distracted in my reflection time by my interest in consuming new ideas and concepts that others are writing about.

Michele’s post especially resonated with me today as I’m facilitating a workshop tomorrow titled “Thinking Critically to Improve Programming”. It’s a series of workshops coupled with online learning via our blog that tries to help youth work practitioners be better at what they do – working with youth experiencing poverty and homelessness. I’ll be adding some of the resources that Michele used in her post to the mix of activities in my workshop.

Like Charlie Bluglass who commented earlier, I’m introducing social media to the youth service community in my Region and really enjoy the challenge of showing how these tools can increase impact and engagement outcomes. By following Charlie’s post, I found the larger Youth Work Online ning site which was very inspiring for me as I plan on doing a similar initiative as my project winds down over the coming months.

In closing, I am leaving my highest recommendation for a book that taught me a lot about learning and reflective practice. It’s called “crucial conversations – Tools for talking when stakes are high’.
There are many books out there that help me learn, particularly with social media but for me, this one tops them all. It is about communication between people and the bonding that can occur when crucial conversations happen. I believe these crucial conversations happen within the blogging community, creating unique learning experiences for a wide variety of writers and readers. So this exercise has got me to reflect about how I’m blogging and how I can be a better blogger by taking time to reflect about my important conversations and experiences. I’ll be working on these practices in the coming weeks, months and years.

Brent Education, portfolio course, eliteracy, onlinelearning, social media/tech

Stephen Downes has so many great slide shows and speeches. This one looks very fascinating, particularly in respect to his references to complexity and chaos theory.

Brent Education, Presentation social media/tech

Personal Learning Environments are created when you use a variety of web 2.0 tools. Stephen Downes illustrates his PLE with this slide show.

Brent Education, Presentation ple portfolio

A good article that can help understand the learning styles of different generations.

Online Recruitment – Recruiting the Generations

Different generations respond to different online recruiting techniques–and to different aspects of employment offerings.

By way of background

Today, a lot of attention is being given to generational issues, and with good reason. For the first time in United States history, there are four generations in the workforce.

In order to effectively recruit and manage the various generations it helps to first understanding what constitutes a generation.

Neil Howe and William Strauss, pioneers in the field of generational studies and authors of “Generations” and “Millennials Go to College,” among other books, indicate that “a generation is defined by a common age location in history and a collective peer personality.” Howe and Strauss identify members of the Silent generation as those born from 1925 through 1942; Baby Boomers as people born from 1943 through 1960; Generation X as born 1961 through 1981; and Millennials as born from 1982 to the present.

However, when defining the generations, other experts, including Leigh Branham, author of two highly-acclaimed books, “Keeping the People Who Keep You in Business” and “The 7 Hidden Reasons Employees Leave,” and Founder/Principal of the consulting firm Keeping the People Inc., rely on slightly different parameters of inclusion.

Branham refers to the oldest generation in the workforce as Traditionalists, indicating these are people born in 1945 or before. Baby Boomers are people born from 1946 through 1964; Gen-Xers from 1965 through 1981; and Millennials from 1981 to the present.

Regardless of years and terminology used, most experts agree there are characteristics specific to each generation. Communicating effectively with each group for the purposes of recruitment requires an understanding of these characteristics.

Brent Business digitaldivide inclusion, millenials, training

Thank you Michele Martin for sharing a not too severe rant about blogging. I believe your comments got at that grey area space between reading (lurking) blogs and creating content. The majority of people who read blogs, myself included are primarily lurking but many of these people will take that leap and eventually start producing their own content.

Your blog and the course work you have created at Work Literacy, along with the Connectivism Course offered by Stephen Downes and George Siemens at the University of Manitoba encourage people like me to take more command of their learning by sharing more of themselves on line and contributing to conversations that result in ongoing learning.

The Bamboo Project Blog: The Power of Blogging ISN’T Just in Reading Them

(RANT ALERT!) In a few weeks we’re going to be looking at blogs in the Work Literacy course. As we think about that module and the fact that for most people, their primary interaction with blogs is to read them, I’m growing impatient with this idea from a learning perspective. In fact, I have to go on record right now as saying that reading blogs is only a small part of what makes blogs powerful for learning. Yes, there’s a lot of great stuff available out there, but honestly, if you think that reading blog posts is the key to learning with blogs, then I think you’re missing the boat. Read the full post here…

Brent Learning Community, purpose blogging, blogs