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Clive on Learning
FEBRUARY 22, 2021
Instrumentality · The Last Post In October 2005, I wrote my first post for the Clive on Learning. It was called Bringing e-learning into the twentieth Century. We're now 20 years into that new century and I'd like to think that, thanks a great deal to coronavirus and repeated lockdowns, we now have a pretty good idea of what advantages we can gain by learning online.
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Clive on Learning
NOVEMBER 20, 2019
No Regrets is a tale of love and learning, produced in 2014 to accompany my book More Than Blended Learning. It tells the tale of two young people who meet up in Brighton as they begin training in their new jobs. As the week progresses, they reflect on their contrasting learning experiences, highlighting from a learner's perspective what good and bad looks like in the design of learning solutions.
Clive on Learning
MAY 20, 2019
Imagine if you had to satisfy not one set of customers but two. Both were demanding, and each was looking for quite different things. Well, such is the lot of the learning professional. Not only do you have to provide a great service to your clients, business sponsors and key stakeholders, you also have to deliver satisfying experiences to your end users – the learners.
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Clive on Learning
APRIL 15, 2019
When we think of a great learning experience with digital content, we tend to think of the way that the content itself is designed – how usable, relevant and engaging it is for learners. But the learning experience is much more than the content as we shall see. In this article, I’m going to demonstrate how the learner’s experience can be considerably enhanced by the systems and processes we use to deliver our content.
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Clive on Learning
MARCH 11, 2015
'First of all, before we get started, let me just clarify that I am not talking about e-learning in the broadest sense, encompassing live online sessions and all sorts of online collaboration. I prefer to refer to these as learning technologies, perhaps even ''digital learning''. No, what I’m referring to in this post is the use of interactive self-study materials, particularly in the workplace.
Clive on Learning
FEBRUARY 1, 2014
'At Learning Technologies 2014 , Reed Learning were giving out copies of The Little Book of Inspiration. Here is my contribution: You don’t have to be inspired to learn, but it certainly helps. One of the principal goals of any sort of course is to inspire the learner about the subject - to make them care about leadership, health and safety, anti-money laundering, troubleshooting a piece of equipment, the company for whom they work, or whatever the subject is.
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Clive on Learning
FEBRUARY 1, 2014
'At Learning Technologies 2014 in London this week I provided a first taster of my More Than Blended Learning project, which will comprise a book, case study videos, tools, interactive scenarios and possibly some form of course. A great deal of this work has already been completed but to get the whole project off the ground will take until September or October.
Clive on Learning
OCTOBER 11, 2013
'For far too long we have deluded ourselves into thinking that we can achieve meaningful learning through a single live event or using a single resource, however brilliantly these are facilitated or designed. Learning is a process, a journey, which requires takes time and a wide range of initiatives, some by teachers, trainers and coaches, but many by learners themselves.
Clive on Learning
OCTOBER 10, 2013
'However fast your bandwidth and however high-resolution your webcam, you cannot fully replicate a multi-sensory, face-to-face experience online – at least not for now. There are occasions when learners really do need to get hands-on with tools and equipment (perhaps even with each other), explore a real physical space, be aware of the body language of others in the room or just experience the magic of the occasion.
Clive on Learning
OCTOBER 9, 2013
'Technology will rarely make much of an impact on the effectiveness of your solution. Yes it could make it faster, cheaper, more flexible and more scalable, but it won’t guarantee that you achieve your goals. The first priority in any learning design – once you have a clear understanding of the requirement – is to establish the strategies that will best facilitate the required learning for your particular population.
Clive on Learning
OCTOBER 2, 2013
'Schools and colleges exist primarily to foster learning. Employers are only interested in learning to the extent that it influences performance. Employers invest in learning interventions because they believe these will positively impact on their key performance indicators, but they have lots of other ways to spend their money and need reassurance that they are getting a good return.
Clive on Learning
OCTOBER 1, 2013
'A subject-matter expert should be your friend and partner, but he or she should not be your master. Their role is to ensure the quality of the technical content; yours is to ensure that the learning objectives are achieved. Of course the SME may be able to provide you with valuable insights into the best ways to communicate their expertise, but they are not ideally placed to offer this advice.
Clive on Learning
SEPTEMBER 30, 2013
'This one’s a bit obvious, but it needs saying. It’s oh so tempting when confronted with a new project to jump straight into the creative process of selecting the ingredients for your blend without a clear understanding of what it is that you’re required to achieve. There will be plenty of room for creativity later on in the design process, although you may find that the ‘how’ becomes all too obvious once you have answered the questions ‘what’, ‘why’, ‘who for’, ‘by when’ and ‘for how much’.
Clive on Learning
FEBRUARY 21, 2013
When formal learning solutions are necessary (and, if you read this blog regularly, you'll know that I believe there is an important role for formal learning, alongside more non-formal approaches, performance support and experiential learning) then I'd prefer not to rely on a single element, whether that be self-study e-learning, or a classroom session (virtual or face-to-face).
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APRIL 29, 2012
When I was 11, my older brother returned from a long trip abroad with a Hofner electric guitar, which he had tried unsuccessfully to learn. He gave it to me, along with a copy of Bert Weedon's Play In A Day , the now legendary book which enabled tens of thousands of British people to learn the guitar. Just like scores of guitar superstars from the 1960s, I started with Bobbie Shaftoe Went to Sea.
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Clive on Learning
APRIL 25, 2012
Over the past couple of years I've been making quite a play on the need to design formal learning interventions so that they focus on inspiring and confidence building and not on dumping knowledge. In my experience of talking to 100s of trainers, the typical workplace intervention consists of 75% theory and 25% practice. This has two effects: Learners are overwhelmed with new knowledge that they cannot hope to retain.
Clive on Learning
APRIL 23, 2012
Stephen Downes pointed out an article in The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning by Neus Capdeferro and Margarida Romero entitled Are online learners frustrated with collaborative learning experiences? This caught my attention because I'm a great believer in and keen user of this approach. My experience has been extremely positive and I'm sure I'm not the only one.
Clive on Learning
APRIL 13, 2012
Clearly, you do not need to be a naturally gifted artist to perform effectively as a designer of learning experiences. Graphic design and instructional design are quite separate, but they are related. The way content is designed visually is going to make a big impact on how easy that content is to use, how clearly it communicates, how easily it engages, and how credible it comes across to the learner.
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Clive on Learning
APRIL 11, 2012
Time and again, trainers tell me that they have trouble getting trainees to complete their 'pre-work'. For some this failure has become such an obstacle that it threatens the whole basis of blended learning, which will typically mix asynchronous activities (which these trainers would categorise as 'pre-work' and 'post-work') alongside the synchronous (whether bricks-and-mortar classroom or its virtual equivalent).
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Clive on Learning
OCTOBER 11, 2011
For some background to these cases, see my initial post. Case 4 You are the project manager for an e-learning programme that has recently been completed. The purpose of the e-learning programme was to brief managers and senior professionals about a major policy change. You have just conducted a project review with your client and the following points were made: The policy change was being made in response to an urgent need, yet the quickest that you were able to deliver was three months.
Clive on Learning
OCTOBER 7, 2011
For some background to these cases, see my initial post. Case 2 You have been the manager of a project to develop a new e-learning component to your organisation's induction programme. The e-learning will be used by all new employees. You have just conducted a project review with your team and the following issues were raised: The development phase was significantly delayed because you discovered that the output produced by your chosen authoring tool was incompatible with many of your organisati
Clive on Learning
OCTOBER 6, 2011
I have been developing a set of cases to use at a workshop I am running next Thursday in Munich. They are designed to bring out a wide range of issues related to the development of custom e-learning content. I want participants to be aware of the sorts of problems that all too frequently occur, but also the difficulties with coming up with a process that suits all stakeholders and all requirements.
Clive on Learning
OCTOBER 6, 2011
With iCloud appearing on the horizon, I was reminded yesterday of just how vulnerable you become when you trust all your data to a third party to store for you online. I made a simple change to my Blogger template and pressed Save. Some bug in Google's software then rendered my blog as a complete dog's dinner of code. My instinct was to revert to the previous version and put this down to experience.
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Clive on Learning
SEPTEMBER 28, 2011
Throughout my book The New Learning Architect I take time out to look at real-life examples of great learning architects in action. Next up is Charles Jennings, who believes firmly in the power of social and experiential learning at work, and has successfully applied these beliefs within the complex and fast-moving environment of an international news agency.
Clive on Learning
SEPTEMBER 22, 2011
Last week I chaired the Charity Learning Consortium 's conference in London. There were some excellent sessions from Sudhir Giri of Google, Iain Napier of British Telecom, Nigel Paine, and Simon Mercer and Kate Graham from Redtray. Each one of the speakers challenged the audience of L&D staff from leading UK-based charities to think differently about the way they manage learning and development in their workplaces, in particular to better harness the potential of social learning and to reduc
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MARCH 8, 2011
The Big Question on the ASTD Learning Circuits Blog is long enough to fill a post all by itself: How do you assess whether your informal learning, social learning, continuous learning, performance support initiatives have the desired impact or achieve the desired results? I think we can group this stuff together as all those forms of learning which are not formal, i.e. courses.
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Clive on Learning
MARCH 1, 2011
In my last post, a review of The New Social Learning , I proposed that, with the rapid rush to using e-learning in the workplace, we are at greater risk of a surplus of isolated self-study than we are an explosion in the use of social media. This got me thinking about the differences between what I regard as the four primary social contexts for learning: Self-study - you learn alone One-to-one - you learn with an expert, coach or teacher Synchronous group - you learn in a live event with peers (
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FEBRUARY 23, 2011
In my third review of books on social learning in a month (see my posts on Jane Hart's Social Learning Handbook and Jane Bozarth's Social Media for Trainers ), I turn to Tony Bingham and Marcia Conner's The New Social Learning , a book recommended by both the Janes. Before I get on to the book, I want to share what was the most striking insight that I obtained while I was reading.
Clive on Learning
FEBRUARY 22, 2011
Throughout my new book The New Learning Architect I take time out to look at real-life examples of great learning architects in action. Some of these have very well-defined responsibilities for specific populations or projects, others a broader remit across whole corporations. This extract shines the spotlight on a real innovator who has successfully broken free from the confines of the traditional training course and, in doing so, challenged out-dated models of learning and development.
Clive on Learning
FEBRUARY 15, 2011
I must admit I've always thought of the four-step process that sees a learner move from unconscious incompetence through conscious incompetence to conscious competence and finally unconscious competence (see the Wikipedia entry ) as an amusing play on words and not much more. But I've been finding it quite useful recently as a way of explaining the learner's journey as they develop new skills and I'm finding a very snug fit with Nick Shackleton-Jones ' concept of courses and resources (see my po
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SEPTEMBER 16, 2010
I'm beginning to warm to Nick Shackleton-Jones's Affective Context Theory , not the title particularly - it's accurate but rather off-putting - but the idea. Essentially what Nick is saying (assuming of course I've got it right) is that we remember much more when we are emotionally engaged in some way - we are under pressure to solve a problem, we are shocked or surprised, we are excited by a new idea, we perceive a threat or an opportunity, we really care about something.
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Clive on Learning
SEPTEMBER 8, 2010
This year’s Institute of IT Training conference was another buzzy and stimulating event. Any thoughts of cutbacks and budget deficits could be cast aside temporarily as we gathered at a luxury hotel in one of the world’s most glitzy locations – London’s Mayfair (top property on Monopoly). A recurring theme, at least for me, was on–demand learning, so I interested to come across this original offering from Trainer1.
Clive on Learning
SEPTEMBER 1, 2010
I need your help. I’m working on a book about architecture, but not in the conventional sense. I’m looking at learning architects, those who design environments for learning in the workplace. I want to interview a cross-section of pioneering learning architects from across the world to try and ascertain their vision for learning and development at work and how successful they have been in implementing this within their organisations.
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Clive on Learning
AUGUST 26, 2010
The BBC news website describes a new Ofcom report which surveyed 1138 adults in the UK to determine how they spend their time, in particular the media they consume. The findings are startling. The statistics suggest people in the UK spend seven hours a day – almost half their waking lives - "engaging in media and communications activities" The article goes on: “However, the average person actually squeezes in the equivalent of nearly nine hours of media and communications by multi-task
Clive on Learning
AUGUST 23, 2010
In an interview with MediaBistro , Seth Godin declares that he has given up on writing books. With 12 in the bag, he no longer thinks that the traditional publishing process is “worth the effort”. “I like the people, but I can’t abide the long wait, the filters, the big push at launch, the nudging to get people to go to a store they don’t usually visit to buy something they don’t usually buy, to get them to pay for an idea in a form that’s hard to spread,” he says.
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Clive on Learning
AUGUST 19, 2010
I've had a number of discussions today about what really matters when it comes to the design of effective learning content. What has emerged, at least from my point of view, is a greater clarity about the considerations that drive decision making in both design and development.It seems there are three key factors all competing for attention, and that it's very difficult to concentrate on them all: The first major consideration is the subject matter itself.
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NOVEMBER 19, 2009
This morning I presented on ‘the e-learning skills gap’ for a webinar run by the Learning and Skills Group (LSG). The LSG webinars are always well attended (this one attracted 120) and ably hosted by Don Taylor. A recording of the webinar will be available here in due course, although there’s also a SlideShare version if you just want to flip through the slides.
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NOVEMBER 17, 2009
Working life provides a great many valuable learning experiences, but it will never provide the diversity of opportunity that an individual can obtain by maintaining a healthy work-life balance. Those who overwork are severely damaging their potential to learn, as John Medina points out in Brain Rules : Exercise boosts brain power (and, unless you're a professional athlete or a manual worker, chances are your work provides few opportunities for exercise).
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Clive on Learning
NOVEMBER 12, 2009
This month’s Big Question in the ASTD Learning Circuits Blog is ‘How do I communicate the value of social media as a learning tool to my organisation?’ How indeed? Well one way to approach this issue is to step back from the technology and ask yourself whether bottom-up learning in general (which has always happened, but which social media facilitates) is appropriate for the target population?
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