Joyful Jubilant Learning

Teaching with the heart of aloha in a digital age

Throughout this school year, I have been diligently researching 21st Century students and how to effectively teach them. Route 21 has been a rewarding resource for me. 21st Century Themes focus on Global Awareness, Financial, Economic, Business and Entrepreneurial Literacy and Civic Literacy. Surrounding these focuses, there is an integration of core subjects with skills such as Critical Thinking and Problem Solving, Creativity and Innovation and Communication and Collaboration.

From this report:

We all know that learning doesn’t stop when school does, but now more than
ever, learning must be a lifelong pursuit. The rapidity of change, the
relentless advance of technology, the diminishing half-life of knowledge, the
far-reaching effects of globalization – all these factors contribute to a growing
conviction that the best thing we can teach our children is how to teach
themselves.

Certainly the challenge before us in education is how 20th Century trained teachers, with 20th Century developed materials and tools are to reach their 21st Century students. Even though the pieces and structures are generationally different, there is at least one facet that hasn't changed - reaching the heart of the student. In a time when students can learn more independently, communicate more frequently and access information more readily, it is even more important that the teacher personally encourage the hearts of students.

People are more digitally connected than ever before. 29 billion text messages are sent each month according to CTIA! This is up from 7 billion in 2005. However, with increasing distant relationships, students find themselves more alone than ever before. One researcher quoted students to say they felt abandoned.

Enter the teacher who desires to reach the hearts of her students. What a profound impact she can make as she adjusts teaching methods to her students' learning and finds a way to reach their loneliness. As our digital age offers a myriad of opportunities, life change still occurs personally. More than ever, this generation needs teachers who are on the cutting edge with their skills; but, even more than cutting edge approaches is the need to teach with the heart of Aloha.

If you would like to know more about 21st Century teaching, I recommend you begin with these resources.

Essential reading: the why, what, and how of effective technology integration:

· Adopt and Adapt: Shaping Tech for the Classroom

Twenty-first-century schools need twenty-first-century technology.

· Synching Up with the iKid: Connecting to the Twenty-First-Century Student

Educators must work to understand and motivate a kind of digital learner.

· Technology Integration Instructional Modules

Free modules are available for use by workshop presenters, college professors, or individuals interested in getting started with integrating technology into the curriculum.

(Photo courtesies: Partnership for 21st Century Learning)

~ Dean Boyer, Teaching with Aloha

Book Review Worksheet - Track Your Favorite Reviews

We are just days away from celebrating a month long excursion through a wide variety of books. The list is varied and extensive. It will be an amazing journey with suggestions and recommendations that you probably never considered.

How will you keep track of it all?

With the encouragement of Rosa, I've designed a one-page worksheet for you to keep track of the relevant and eye-catching information that you'll encounter over the next month. This worksheet is a free downloadable pdf.

When you download this form, you'll have the ability to write down information that sparks your interest from the book reviews. For many of us, our reading list is comprised of books that were recommended to us from friends and others whom we respect. This worksheet will assist you in keeping track of those nuggets of wisdom you find in the reviews. Plus, it will serve as a reminder to add that book to your Amazon Wish List!

Download the Book Review Worksheet

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Tim Milburn loves a good one-page worksheet. He's designed a few productivity worksheets that have assisted thousands of people with meeting and event planning, leadership training guidelines, and personal productivity. You can access these forms at www.studentlinc.net.

In 2008 I'm losing it

Be nice... no, not my sanity, or my sense of all reason. My stuff.

Then again, losing a certain degree of sanity could be pretty interesting too... I think it was Mark Twain who said, “Sanity and happiness are an impossible combination.”

Something I'll be keeping packed in my bags for the trip down Jubilation Way (nickname and wonder-path for our learning in 2008) is my steady migration to a 'trusted system' (in GTD-speak) of completely web-based tools and archiving. To some people it may sound like a contradiction - a trusted system that I place in the web's hands and not my own hard drive or some good old fashioned filing cabinets?

Exactly. More take-the-risk fun than a Barrel of Monkeys.

I have two reasons.

#1, I have completely lost patience with reviewing, reorganizing, and restoring my old stuff, only to dust it off in the name of a really clean house, and starting the process all over again - both with material stuff, and as a metaphor for the intellectual stuff. Do that enough in a lifetime and your stuff loses its sentimental value real fast.

#2, I have learned to develop tremendous faith in my own creativity and capacity for more learning (yay JJL!). Before that sounds too vain, please look at it from my very practical point of view: I am positive that I can replace or recreate anything I might happen to lose, or I can learn to. Better yet, I can start from scratch and create stuff that is totally new. (Kinda like cranking out blog posts.)

“Use it or lose it” is sounding fabulous as a new mantra. I'm liking new versus collectible, starring role versus variety show, spare versus abundant, and as contentedly streamlined as possible --- in Hawaiian, ma'alahi.

See, even my language of intention is working for me with losing it --- just one Hawaiian word for a bunch of English ones.

A biggie for me in this leap of faith has been learning that I can lose Microsoft Outlook for a romp in the jungle with Gorilla King Google and their entire tribe of monkeys in a barrel. Monkey GMail, monkey GCalendar, monkey GDocs, monkey GGroups, and the newest monkey I've had loads of fun with, Picasa.

And yes, I do mean for my business apps in Say Leadership Coaching and Ho'ohana Publishing too. I've got a few more barrels as well, not just the Google one (like TypePad and 37Signals) but one and all are web-based.

Jan 12 Update: At LifeDev, Glen posted How to Become a Google Docs Power User today if you are interested in learning more about it. One issue I have with Google Docs however is that it won't allow me to upload pdfs --- anyone have a workaround tip for that?

Living dangerously? Nah. Losing it is liberating.

What will you be losing this year?

---

Postscript: This was a contribution to our January theme at Joyful Jubilant Learning: Packing our Bags for 2008.

Post author Rosa Say is the author of Managing with Aloha, Bringing Hawaii's Universal Values to the Art of Business, and she currently writes for Managing with Aloha Coaching, Value your Month, Value your Life. Visit her there, pick up a feed for your reader, and let her know what you think.

If you like what you read here and there, consider spending some time at her new Tumblr log too, Ho‘ohana Aloha. It's another really cool barrel.

Happy Pumpkin Day!

This is one of my favorite holidays, so many ways to be creative and have some fun! This is one in a series of Li'l Hawks done by hawkstudios on Flickr.

Last year, Opus was Carmen Miranda, remember?

Enjoy your day, and if you have a moment, visit my Kākou in Pictures; it is a new learning of mine done as an October 2007 Flashback.

Happy Halloween!

~ Rosa Say, JJL Contributor, and author of Managing with Aloha Coaching.

Entrepreneurs Make a Difference: Celebrate and Thank Them

I am always amazed at the contribution entrepreneurs make to our society. Stop for a moment and try this exercise.

Take a look out the window, what do you see? Businesses, buildings, homes, or cars? A delivery truck? All right, now think about what type of businesses created and built what you are looking at. What did they have to do? What was their vision? Can you imagine a time when those things never existed? How does that make you feel?

Whenever I do this exercise I am always in awe of the ability of entrepreneurs to manifest and build something from nothing. It makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

Perhaps it's because as a third generation entrepreneur I have seen the multi-generational impact that a business can have on their loved ones, community, and employees. They have a knack for bringing their visions and dreams to life and in the process adding significant value to everything they touch.

Value Added

Creating and adding value is the one constant obsession in my consciousness. It drives everything I do and yet in many ways remains a mystery and what I call my magnificent obsession. When I look out my window and see all the homes, offices, and businesses that have been brought to life - I feel invigorated, renewed, and refocused.

The entrepreneurs that created all these structures and businesses were simply focused on doing what they were good at and doing it profitably. Over the years they gradually grew wealthy because they paid attention to the customer and constantly adjusted, improved and developed innovations within their business. They are the new pioneers and slowly became an economic engine to their community by making small incremental improvements.

Small Incremental Improvements

The Japanese call this Kaizen, a Japanese word for constant and never ending improvement. The entrepreneurial version of “never ending learning, change, and professional development”. The biggest mistake I have made more times than I care to admit is making massive changes and adjustments.

A Technique For Producing Ideas

Rosa had mentioned how some of us probably do not suffer from writer's block.  For the most part, I do not.  There will be times however, when the writing doesn't flow well.  At that time I will either try to hammer through it or I'll walk away and let the material brew.  One reason that I do not suffer from writer's block is that I have been practicing a version of the following method for over ten years.  I originally wrote this as a book review at my site.  I pulled it off the shelf and dusted off the slang for JJLN.

 A Technique For Producing Ideas  by James Webb Young.

James was an advertising guy who published this less than fifty page book in the 1940's.  His answer to why publish a book that would inevitably help his competitors is classic.  It's why consultants stay in business. It's also the primary reason why people and businesses do not grow. My pureed version is simply: lack of implementation.  Here is James':

"First, the formula is so simple to state that few who hear it really believe in it.

Second, while simple to state, it actually requires the hardest kind of intellectual work to follow, so that not all who accept it use it."

Here is James' five step method for producing ideas:

One -  Gather specific and general material. Specific material is the nuts and bolts information that you will need for an article, book or project.  James suggests capturing this information on 3 X 5 index cards, classifying them by subject. Gathering general material is a lifelong process.  But how fun it could be if you focused on it!  My suggestion is to listen to Dan Pink .  In his book, Dan says to create a design notebook.  As you go through the day, observe your surroundings, take pictures, clip magazines, print stuff off the Internet, remove a page from your child's coloring book and make notes in your notebook.  Live dangerously, create three notebooks. 

Two -  The mental digestive process. This is where you take in the gathered material and observe it, digesting it from all angles.  You'll combine specific with general material.  You are looking for a relationship, a connection.  James suggests to scan your material quickly and not take its meaning too literally.  As ideas from the process pop into your head, write them down.  You'll get to a point where you feel too tired to go on.  Go on anyhow.  Push yourself to capture more ideas.  Soon however, everything runs together.  Your brain turns to spaghetti.  At this point you're ready for step three.

Three - Put your material down, forget about the project and walk away.  Turn to whatever stimulates your imagination and emotions.  Go to a museum; Watch a love story or action movie;  Take a walk or read poetry.  Many writing coaches will tell you to exercise, do something physical.  I like to think of this stage as letting your ideas brew in the subconscious of your mind.

Four - This step is where the idea that you've been in search of suddenly appears. It will come to you after you've done the hard stuff and have had a chance to rest and relax.  It will come to you in a most unsuspecting way.  It might be while in the shower, at the grocery store or while reading a book.  Always be prepared to capture an idea when it comes to you.  Carry a pencil, small notebook, piece of paper or recording device with you at all times.

Five - It is now time to show the world your idea.  Put it out there for all to see, hear, feel and taste.  James believes that this is the stage where many ideas go to the idea graveyard. They're deep-sixed mostly due to the owner's lack of patience in adapting them to the world.  He also says to pay attention to what others have to say about your idea.  Various opinions can present a new vista for you, stimulating additional possibilities.

That's it.  And ninety-eight percent of those who read this will never bother with it, supporting James' position regarding his competitors.

James Webb Young believes that an increased emphasis should be placed on one step in this process.  It's in the accumulation of grist for your mill.  It's in the collection of general material.  Live.  Observe.  Record.

Dave Rothacker

Accelerate Learning: Read and Stimulate Your Reticular Activating System

In this article I cite Thomas Edision, Wikipedia, and Jim Newton (Edison's friend) to answer these questions, "How do we learn? What is learning?"

"That is what learning is. You suddenly understand something you'd understood all your life, but in a new way." - Doris Lessing - Author

We Have Been Given a Wonderful Gift

You may or may not know but we each have been given a Reticular Activating System (RAS). It acts as the brains control center, the  center of consciousness, attention and learning.

Your RAS is the key to “turning your brain 'on',” and seems to be the center of motivation and is essentially:

"your unconscious auto-pilot filter that constantly judges what’s important and what’s not about each and every bit of stimulus occurring physically around you and mentally inside of you. Or, to quote an expert:

“[It] alerts the brain to incoming information from the senses, and from the centers of thought, memory and feeling. More than that, it adjudicates the relative importance of that information. . . In a way the RAS is like a vigilant secretary, sorting out the trivia from the incoming messages.” - Ronald H Bailey, et al. The Role of the Brain, 1975

The amazing thing about the reticular filter is that you, through your own intentions and focus, can influence what it lets in and what it keeps out. If you have ever had the experience of buying a car and then noticed that all you see on the road around you are other cars just like yours, you’ve experienced the power of the reticular filter.

The trick is to consciously set up your reticular to look for input and ideas that will lead you toward SUCCESSFUL outcomes, not unsuccessful ones." Via David Allen Co.

We use our RAS each and everyday whether we realize it or not. The information and stimulus we gain in the process of learning is the seed of awareness that our RAS uses to draw our attention, to notice something we might have otherwise missed.

Example of Your RAC Working

Can you remember when you bought your first new car? What was the make, model, and color? Do you remember suddenly noticing many of the same cars with the color as yours?

Are You The Best In The World?

How are things going? Are you doing well or is something missing? Are your numbers going up or are they stagnating? Is the path you are on going uphill or are you descending into a valley. These are all great questions to ask yourself.

Seth Godin, in his new book The Dip, talks about these inevitable questions that we all ask along life's journey.  The Dip can come in many forms. Seth explains...

It's the fifth job interview where they never even call you back

It's the seventh time you fall on your butt while learning to snowboard

It's the middle of the marathon, when the excitement of the starting gun is a dim memory, and the joy of the finish line is a distant dream.

It's any rough patch you have to get through before achieving your big goal... if in fact you are chasing the right goal.

What else... it's also the key to your career, your company's future, and maybe your ultimate happiness.

Are you in a dip?

Are things getting harder and harder and the rewards smaller and smaller?

I found myself in a dip three years ago.

I had been with an organization called Toastmasters for years and I was about half way through their professional communication program. I enjoyed Toastmasters and went to the club's meetings twice a month. I usually gave a speech a month and participated in most club activities. But I kept having a nagging feeling... Have I learned all I need to learn?... should I just quit... and do something better with my time?

So many other people had done just that. They came for a year, did 6 to 10 speeches and then they were off. It wasn't that Toastmasters was bad, it just felt like I had been doing the same thing over and over, speech after speech. I was in a rut.

That year someone invited me to the Toastmasters district conference. I decided to go and I was pleasantly surprised. The speakers were good and the atmosphere was interesting. Nothing life changing mind you... until one o'clock rolled around.

The speaker walked to the front and I was fighting to stay awake from the large lunch.

I nodded off and then it happened...

In a loud voice, speaker Sarano Kelley boomed out... "What Time Is It?"

I sat up...

Again he boomed... "What Time Is It?"

I was now on the edge of my seat...

For the third time he yelled out... "What Time Is It?"

He looked around the room and said in a soft voice... "The Time Is Now, and Now Is the Only Time You Can Do Anything."

Sarano talked for 90 minutes about time and about being the best person you can be. He talked about setting goals and being the best "you" in the world. This short message resonated with me. I left that conference that day with three goals in mind...

1. To go as far as I could in Toastmasters.
2. To get in the best shape of my life.
3. To move to the next level at work.

Over the next three months I lost 25 pounds, Became an Area Governor with Toastmasters, and I moved ahead on my job. Sarano's words about time and being the best changed my life.

Toastmasters was now a challenge and I wanted to go to the top. Within two years I made it to the level of DTM which is a far as the normal program goes.

Two simple phrases got me out of my dip... The Time Is Now and Be Your Best.

Seth's book is about Being The Best In The World!

You quit the things that aren't important, get off the dead end streets, and focus on your main path.

The dip is where success happens. As Seth explains...

The people who set out to make it through the Dip--the people who invest the time and the energy and the effort to power through the Dip--those are the ones who become the best in the world.

As I write this today I face another Dip?

My blog is two years old and my once expanding numbers are now somewhat flat.

Should I power through... or should I quit?

Are you facing a similar situation? Download Seth's Manifesto and pick up his short but profound little book... and then do something truly remarkable... Power Through!

E Learning is Shallow Yet Has Potential

I have great hope for the future of E Learning but in it's current state, E Learning is shallow and ripe for innovation. I was discussing this with Rosa and she asked me to share my thoughts with the JJL community.

Why is E Learning Shallow?

The challenge with E Learning is it tends to be impersonal, lacking one-on-one interaction, and reciprocal action.

Learning is an experience.

Learning cannot be bottled, controlled, or packaged - learning is the experience of acquiring knowledge or skills through practice, experience, or study. A teacher, mentor, or speaker can impact a students experience, direct their attention - despite that, learning is very much a personal journey.

Solitary E Learning offers flexibility, self-paced, and self-study opportunities that traditional approaches cannot match.

It is the exchange of ideas, debate, and exploring on an idea or concept between two or more people that creates a plethora of learning opportunities. Unless we can create a synchronous  electronic environment that provides for interaction, collaboration, and synchronous (at the same time) conversations.

We Need to VAKOG E Learning

We learn through our five senses and its a unique combination of visual, auditory , kinesthetic, olfactory, and gustatory (VAKOG) stimulus that creates the 'learning experience' and until E Learning can simulate more of a interactive, live learning environment it will not reach wide acceptance, by learners.

I am not suggesting that people cannot learn via E Learning, just that its potential will be limited until we can create a rich, live, and interactive user experience.

• Are you aware of any E Learning platforms that provide a synchronous and rich experience?
• What has been your experience with E Learning? What did you like or dislike?
• Why do you think E Learning has become popular?

Greg Balanko-Dickson is a Business Performance and Lifestyle Coach that helps entrepreneurs to have their business and a life too.

Steelcase: A Culture of Learning

In my never ending quest for knowledge about design, I came across the Steelcase Web site last year.  It was there I learned of Mark Greiner's blog workit.  workit also was a stop on a Starship Cruiser mission, one of my all time favorite voyages.  That day we were in search of a sense of place.

A few minutes at Steelcase's site pegs the red line on my this-is-a-company-that-values-knowledge meter.  Heck, it breaks the glass.  The entire site radiates this thought and for me it was not anything specific.  From the main site I find Mark's blog and his post on people and culture.  Mark's observations reinforce my perceptions of Steelcase as a knowledge-based company.

James P. Hackett's article, Preparing for the Perfect Product Launch, in the April edition of Harvard Business Review, caused me once again to dwell on the learning culture of Steelcase.  (Unfortunately HBR requires a paid subscription to view this article online).  Jim, who is the company's CEO, describes a critical thinking process that his associates go through before launching a product.  This process which Jim teaches at their corporate university, combines deep thinking with execution. 

Why don't I hire a training company to teach managers critical thinking?  The answer is simple: The lesson sticks better when the CEO teaches it.

The critical thinking course not only is of value to new product development, it helps managers working within groups, reach decisions and come to informed agreements. 

The course is based on four phases:

• Think
• Set the Point of View
• Plan Implementation
• Implement

Think

• Ponder
• Query
• Read and research
• Network
• Document

Set the Point of View

• Conduct a collegial, open-minded discussion
• Determine the direction
• Assign an owner for the point of view
• Stay the course

Plan Implementation

• Clarify, refine
• Consider all stakeholders
• Practice, practice, practice

Implement

• Select a spokesperson
• Play to win
• Celebrate the victory

Each of these phase subsets is rigorous and involved.  But from this snapshot one can easily discern the seriousness that Steelcase places upon the learning process.  Combine intent with content, add discipline and surround it with interested associates and you have a culture of learning.

Review: This is Your Brain on Music

This love affair with books brings to mind another love affair that my wife and I share; music. Music has appeared at significant moments in my life such that hearing a particular song again takes me on a instant trip back in time.

I recall driving to the Junior Naval Cadet drill team practice, struggling with the decision leave the team to devote my time to making the high school basketball team when the Rolling Stones came on the radio singing “You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you get what you need…” I did leave the drill team to play basketball.

I recall a time in college, the cross country team traveling on a bus ride to a meet in Plymouth, NH. It had been pouring rain since we left Worcester, MA. We were dreading running the course which was not known to be good in wet conditions. As we came over a crest on the highway, the rain slowed, the clouds gave way, the sun appeared and of course, on the radio, “I can see clearly now the sun has gone … it’s going to be a bright, bright sunshiny day.” The team did have a good race that day.

When I heard there was a new book: This is Your Brain on Music, The Science of Human Obsession by Daniel Levitin, I found the Amazon link and put it on my reading list. I read it over the course of several commutes via the train to Boston. Oddly, it held my attention such that I could not listen to music while reading it. Some books do that for me. They may not require my full attention but they attract it. This was one of those. This was also one book that I ended up marking more than any other I have read in the past several years. I marked books in school and then got away from this habit post college. Reading Tim Sanders’ Love is the Killer App brought this technique back into my life.

Daniel writes in the introduction:

“By better understanding what music is and where it comes from, we may be able to better understand our motives, fears, desires, memories and even communication in the broadest sense. Is music listening more along the lines of eating when you’re hungry, and thus satisfying an urge? Or is it more like seeing a beautiful sunset or getting a backrub, which triggers sensory pleasure systems in the brain? Why do people seem to get stuck in their musical tastes as they grow older and cease experimenting with new music? This is the story of how brains and music evolved --- what music can teach us about the brain, what the brain can teach us about music, and what both can teach us about ourselves”  (p12)

Behind the Scenes: Collaboration on 12 Days

Objective: do something with the twelve days of Christmas for JJLN

Inspirations: Rosa's first challenge, Toni chimed in, Blaine goes with the flow, Steve adds his two cents, Terry makes a good suggestion, Rosa comes back, Steve finishes it

Rosa's challenge

Another idea/ day marker:

How about a joint posting from all of us on a Christmas Day message for
the blog on 12/25? Something short and sweet? Thoughts?

Since there are 12 of us, we could do something on the 12 Days of
Christmas spin?
Rosa

Toni chimes in

I am not much of a singer, but would it go something like this?

<insert 12 days of x-mas music> On the 1st day of learning, my teacher
said to me "Go and log into JJLN"

On the 2nd day of learning, my teacher said to me

Hehehehe,  wow still pre-coffee, but I like the idea of the 12 days of
Christmas.  Can it be a list of "If I could give a gift of learning to
my special someone, I would give...." Mine would probably be fearless
curiousity, or a great mentor.

Again, just thoughts off the top of my head.
:)
Toni

Would this be “Del.icio.us Digging?”

With all this blogging how-to and tool-talk, I couldn't resist sharing this from bLaugh:

And this goes with my comment for Phil...

 

Shaka (Hawaiian hat-tip) to Techno Queen Leah Maclean for the pointer to bLaugh - LOVE the one she snagged for her site! Trackbacks rule.
(We’ll wait for you Leah.)

Gotta say, open source technology rocks... And I LOVE ready-to-copy html code!

Brad Fitzpatrick is bLaugh’s artist, and Chris Pirillo is its creative writer.

---

Post Author:
Rosa Say’s life changed when she started blogging, and she has absolutely no regrets. She would love to be an artist and figure out how to create cool graphics, but for now she has to be content with snagging (I mean sharing and happily crediting) everyone else’s talent. You wouldn’t believe how long it took her to figure out how to post this Opus cartoon. That’s why we’re all here, to learn this (and other stuff), right?

Learn to Be, or to Become?

I had written two columns for Lifehack.org (one, and two) and then my husband showed me this:  The point that I was trying to make with Berkeley Breathed was able to portray in a single, insightful cartoon strip.

photo credit to the Washington Post
Click on the link above or the image for a bigger view to read.

I must add art to my list of what I must learn.

Those articles I'd written were:
Why Work? and
Break the Mold and Create Your Own Work