The One-Room School House

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Rob Paterson’s post on School and Learning Engagement really struck a chord with me. I spent Grade One in a one-room schoolhouse. It was a remarkable experience. My age cohort was three students, and we shared a row with the Grade 2 pupils. We were given assignments, some individual and some group activities. We had to work on our own as the teacher had to help all seven grades. The entire school worked on the Christmas play and other activities. We all played in the same school yard. I don’t remember any bullying, and I was one the youngest students.

School in Albert Canyon BC circa 1962

Rob thinks that the one room school house was an emergent design, developed over time, to meet the educational needs of the community. In this way it was a “natural organisation”, sized to fit the needs of the community, without overpowering it. Larger schools are based on an industrial model, designed for administrative efficiency and not human learning needs.

Given the easy access to web-based learning resources, one room schools would be easier to build and maintain today than they were many years ago. Having a small school within walking distance would involve more parents, and keep a close eye on developing children. The whole idea of age cohorts is a bit mechanistic anyway. Few of my current friends and colleagues were born in the same year as me. Why should my children be forced to spend their days with 30 other children of the same age? I think that a modern variant of the one room school is an idea ready to pilot in the Maritimes.

Strategic Planning for Educational Organisations

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educ-system.jpg

I like to use system models when analysing an organisation, especially for strategic planning purposes. This system model is based on models by Geary Rummler and Roger Kaufman.

I developed this model as a means of communicating with educational institutions. It’s not comprehensive but it gets the conversation flowing. I’m always interested in finding graphical metaphors for the way we work and learn.

Organization of the Future

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Gautam Ghosh poses the question about what future work organizations will look like.

Taking the trends of how organizations develop, maybe it won’t take long for organizations to not even attempt at being ‘long-life’ entities.

Maybe, just maybe organizations should eventually become that ultimate knowledge organization – A movie unit !

I’ve heard and discussed the film crew metaphor many times over the past five or so years. It makes sense that in order to address the constantly changing market needs that a more flexible work organization is necessary. The film production crew model seems viable, but the dark side, according to Gautam, is that the producer gets the lion’s share of the profits, and the superstars command the enormous fees, while the average worker just survives. I think that a more cooperative model, like the independent productions, where more of the workers share in the risk and the profit, is more sustainable. This is becoming evident as the barriers to production are coming down – such as lower priced digital editing suites.

I am using this model with some of my business partners, and it works. We share the risks and profits; though someone is named as "Director" for the duration of the "shoot". That role could change for the next gig, and so it goes.

Web Browsers

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I switched to Mozilla Firefox as my browser a while back, as I was getting concerned about all of the IE security alerts. I like Firefox, especially the tab feature, and will stay with it. It seems that I’m not really an early adopter though, as Cory Doctorow points out in Boing Boing that a Microsoft presenter at the BlogOn conference asked how many people were using Internet Explorer, and no one raised their hand. Things can change fast on the Net.

Eduforge

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Eduforge is “a virtual collaborative learning and exploratory environment designed for the sharing of ideas, research outcomes, open source educational software, and tools within a community of learners and researchers.” In the learning resources section is a case study about a hospital in Ireland that decided to shift to an open source IT infrastructure. This included e-learning, and the selected platform was Claroline. The case study provides figures (costs in Pounds) about the difference in total costs:

Claroline
Initial Cost: 1,000
Total Cost / 5 years : 4,000

Closed Source Solution (Name not disclosed)
Initial Cost: 35,000

Total Cost / 5 years : 175,000

Here is an interesting comment from the Beaumont Hospital IT manager:

If you have a product which costs $1 million, it may be appropriate to spend $500,000 on consulting. However if the product costs nothing then spending $500,000 somehow seems to be a more difficult decision to take.

Consulting services from qualified professionals were just as necessary as they would have been with closed source solutions. It’s not all free, but the Beaumont Hospital staff seem to be happy with their solution.

Articulate

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I just saw a demo of a new product that allows you to conduct PowerPoint presentations online with synchonized audio, and file attachments for reference. It’s called Articulate, and is quite similar to Macomedia’s Breeze. Articulate Presenter sells for $(US)698.00 while you have to send an e-mail request to Macromedia to get a price quote. Both systems seem to be quick and easy ways to get information, such as product details, to a wide audience.

Update: I have found out that Breeze is only server-based, while Articulate works as a standalone as well as a server-based system, and is SCORM and AICC compliant. It seems that Articulate is a more flexible product, especially for SME’s.

701 Free e-Learning Tips

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The MASIE Center has just released this free booklet (PDF) which is a compilation from the MASIE Center’s TRENDS readers and others. It’s a 13 MB download, and here’s an example:

#614 Long Live Gumby (The Eraser)
Expect mistakes and be ready to demonstrate your flexibility as an instructor/facilitator when they arise (Betsy Reynolds, Ingram Micro)

This is a real potpourri of perspectives, but the price is right, and it might be a good source to check once in a while. The text, being in a PDF, is searchable but the document is copy protected.

Blog Rules

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I’m being asked more questions about the value of blogs and how they can help to engage customers, suppliers and employees. Via Dina is this story by Stuart Henshall on what happens when a dedicated blogger is engaged by a corporation:

Blog Rules:

  • For blogs to work there must be trust. Let it be a warning to you when an employer is critical of your blog, or implies that they must approve every post you make first.
  • Blogs are strategic, but the messages must be personal. Planning out a blog strategy and topics in advance fails to account for the immediacy of the daily events and the need for responsiveness.
  • Make sure the company is large enough to have "personalities" blogging — otherwise own the company. The blogger is likely to become an important public face.
  • Think through where the blog should be on what URL. Is it better at blogperson.com or under the corporate banner? What is best to harness the blogger and readers?

Warnings to other Bloggers:

  • Your blog may be perceived as a personal asset and not a corporate one. You personal blog can become a corporate asset but only if the conditions above apply.
  • Corporate positioning is a must. If the company isn’t mature enough or is afraid to enable the blogger to talk about "category" developments then blogging will be difficult.
  • If topics and content are limited then you may lose your friends, lose access to thought leadership and potential partnerships and associates for the company – or even simply good press.
  • If the company fears balanced perspective on other products then you will find life difficult.
  • Blogs require a time commitment, if you are not getting it or there is no time left over for it then it is not valued. My target has always been in the ten hours a week category. That includes the use of my newsreader. Make sure your employer signs off on the time commitment to the blog.
  • If the company asks you when you will transfer your blog URL to the company then they really don’t get it.

As the value of blogging as a medium to connect producers with markets becomes more evident, corporate blogging may move into the mainstream, just as telecommuting (which means less control over workers) is accepted in some areas but not in others.

Into the Blogosphere

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Hosted by the University of Minnesota’s libraries, is this collection of essays, Into the Blogosphere, looking at blogging from multiple perspectives. It is all under a Creative Commons license as well.

This online, edited collection explores discursive, visual, social, and other communicative features of weblogs. Essays analyze and critique situated cases and examples drawn from weblogs and weblog communities. Such a project requires a multidisciplinary approach, and contributions represent perspectives from Rhetoric, Communication, Sociology, Cultural Studies, Linguistics, and Education, among others. We encourage you to post your responses to the essays …

This site should be a valuable resource for anyone studying the blog medium.

Small Towns & Free Agents

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Sackville, New Brunswick, where I live, is a small town of 5,000 people, which increases every Fall by the 2,500 students at Mount Allison University. I think that it is the perfect small town for free agents who run virtual offices. I’ve discussed this with some of the town councillors, but I don’t have any convincing market analyses to show that we could attract some more small businesses to set up shop here. Here are some of the attritubes of this community that I think would be appealing.

We have high speed Internet access, both DSL in the town core, and cable access in the outlying community. My web site is hosted locally. The town is located on the Trans-Canada Highway with Moncton Airport 20 minutes away and Halifax Airport 90 minutes away. There is a hospital in town, and larger hospitals in Moncton (50 km) and Amherst (20 km). We have a number of physicians in town; more than most small towns. Sackville is centrally located in the maritimes, with Fredericton, Charlottetown and Halifax within 2 hours driving distance. We also have a local, live theatre company.

Sackville is a great town to raise a family, as it is safe and hospitable. Many of us were not born and raised here, so the town is open to newcomers. A good house will cost in the vicinity of $(CAD)150,000, but you can even find them cheaper. For families looking to get out of the big city rat race, this may be the place. The school system offers French immersion starting in Grade 1. French schools are available in the neighbouring community of Memramcook, about 20 km away. There a few companies in town, and some free agents as well. We tried to start a loose association, The Sackville SOHO Society, to discuss non-retail business issues, but we never got the necessary critical mass.

So what would it take to interest a free agent to move to Sackville? Do we have what it takes? Are there essential infrastructure requirements, or cultural issues? I’d appreciate your comments.

Update: My neighbour has just put her house on the market, through Property Guys. Search for Listing #2370.