Human talent is often buried deep

This is a direct quote from this keynote speech by Sir Ken Robinson to the recent iNet Conference.

He draws the comparison with valued natural resources buried deep in the ground, requiring skill and effort in their extraction.

He relates the story that Paul McCartney and George Harrison were in the same music class in high school and were both regarded as being without musical talent - and they hated music lessons. As he puts it - there was this music teacher with half The Beatles in his class... and he missed it!

After what I have recently been through with my son, I felt enormously encouraged. I don't always agree with everything he has to say, but I find myself torn between relief that someone has such clarity of vision... and gets to express it in spaces with wide exposure, and frustration that nothing seems to be changing.

Save the springbok

Today has been declared 'save the springbok' day in South Africa. There are moves afoot to do away with the springbok emblem for the national rugby team.

There are those who see it as symbolic of a racist regime, and want it abolished.

There are those - Nelson Mandela among them - who see it as the symbol of the national rugby team, current holders (for the second time) of the world cup - regardless of the colour of the faces of the players.

Supporters of the emblem are wearing springbok paraphernalia today.

Guess which camp I belong to!

Good grief - I'm rich!

So I don't know why I've been worried about this credit crunch. Just this week I received an email telling me that someone had kindly deposited £6million into my bank account because they didn't have anywhere else to put it. Aww. So glad to be able to help. Apparently, when they come and collect their money, I can keep the interest.

Fabulous.

On a more serious note, I have noticed a massive increase in the number of these mails that are making it past my spam filter, and I worry about those naive souls who seem to be so easily taken in by things that arrive via the ether.

Isn't it amazing that when people are hurting most the vultures come out? Completely devoid of any shred of human decency. Perhaps it's because it's the festive season and this is some people's way of doing their Christmas shopping. Just this week, our local paper ran a story about someone who struck a deal to buy two 'hot' laptops from a pair of guys in a parking lot. After he had forked over £600 and the two had gone on their merry way, he opened the case to find it contained bottles of water.

It doesn't do to be looking for 'deals' in the current downturn. If you weren't able to beat the system when times were good, you're hardly likely to be able to do so now, are you?

Times are tough for everyone and the unscrupulous are becoming increasingly inventive.

Edublogs awards - late nomination

I have just learned of the new category in the Eddies, and couldn't miss the opportunity to make a nomination.

Category 16: lifetime achievement award: Jay Cross for Informal Learning Blog.

On playing the exam game

I have just returned from a rather harrowing parents' evening with my elder son. I met with two biology teachers, two physics teachers, two maths teachers and three PE/sports science teachers. We started with biology. The news was not good... and it went down hill from there!

Every single teacher told me that he talks a good talk. That, in conversation, you think you're dealing with a remarkable child, but then you see his written work and you discover he's actually not all that. His predicted grades are shocking: Cs, Ds and Es. They all complained that his homework is poorly done, if at all (one teacher claims never to have received a single piece of homework back from him - my sons swears he has given him homework into his hands on several occasions).

My son has been speaking with easy confidence and obvious enjoyment about what he's learning at school. The teachers think he runs a good bluff, and is gifted at blagging, but then, when it comes down to 'what matters' he can't deliver the goods.

At one stage, I was quite literally in tears. I wasn't sure how much more of this I could take.

But, blessing of blessings, the PE teachers were the last we saw. First up was the sports science teacher who had just given the class a tough assessment in which my son had scored a solid-but-not-stellar result. He said the magic words: "This is one very bright child who doesn't play the exam game. BUT... if he wants to get the results out of this system that will serve his purposes going forward, he is going to have to play the system."

The last two PE teachers told me that my son is scoring stellar results on their assessments. They had been worried that he would prove unable to walk the talk. Unable to reproduce in a written environment what he can do in a spoken one. It seems that, in respect of PE, he has got this sussed. Why? Because he loves the subject. Because anatomy and muscles and training and all that malarkey pushes all his buttons in the way that learning and learners do mine. So he had inadvertently figured out how to take his verbal reasoning skills and put them down in writing. We talked about how he needed to find a way to transfer that magic to his other subjects.

So on the journey back from the school I confessed to my son how much I loathe the assessment process. How misguided and misdirected I consider it. Then I launched into an analogy... as I am wont to do:

When I go to South Africa, I enter the country with Sterling in my pocket. This helps me not at all in South Africa. Even though the Pound is a far stronger currency than the Rand. Even though the British economy is (even now) in far better shape than the South African economy. If I want to buy something in South Africa, I need Rands. So I go to the forex counter and I exchange some of my Pounds for Rands. I use the Rands for as long as they serve my purpose, and then I return home to the stronger economy where I earn and spend Pounds.

This is what my son is going to do going forward. He knows that his Verbal Reasoning currency is stronger than that of Test Scores. He also knows that in the land of Education, the currency is Test Scores. So when he enters the exam room, he will exchange some of his VR currency for TS. He will think about how he would make his case if someone were to ask him the exam question in real life, and he will provide a written version of his spoken answer. He will trade in TS for as long as he needs to. He will use TS to buy what he desires and then he will return home to the land of VR where he excels.

Mercenary, yes. But until they change the system to one which ceases to disadvantage my son and others like him, these are the cards we hold. This is the currency we need. I resent it with every fibre of my being, but I will can't stand by and see his career prospects being limited because 'the system' can't see how bright he is!

Assessments

I'm always conflicted on the subject of assessments. I understand that they serve the purpose of identifying where the learner is strong and where work is required. But this is only true if the assessment mechanism is reliable. A series of yes/no or multiple guess choice questions has limited value, here.

• For a work-based learner, surely the point is for them to know where they need to brush up?
  
• For the university student, is the point for the university to establish whether allowing this person credit their institution with the letters behind his/her name going to bring the university honour or dishonour? Is it a worthiness thing?
• In the case of a school child, I'm hoping the point is that the teacher will get an idea of where the child needs help.
  

But I still think that a reliable method of assessment must revolve around application. For example, ask my sons to spell 'conscience' and they will say out loud "Con. Science," and then write it down correctly. But let them decide to introduce that word into a piece of creative writing or, even worse, an email, or worst of all, a text/IM, and you'll get all manner of interesting variations. So, as far as the teacher is concerned: can they spell 'conscience' or can't they?

Yesterday my younger son took a Spanish test. Of all of us, he is the weakest at languages. I have always had an ear for languages, which my older son has inherited. My husband doesn't have a natural flair, but he developed his ability in order to be able to get by when he arrived in a bilingual English/Afrikaans community in South Africa as a child, able to speak only Swedish. He is the most trilingual of us.

My younger son was woeful at French and, as a consequence, was not permitted to continue with it this September because of an insufficiency of French language teachers at the school. Instead he was moved to Spanish, together with all the other poor achievers.

Yesterday he did a vocabulary test, for which he scored 22/20. I kid you not. The test was for 20 marks, and there was a bonus 4 mark question at the end. He lost 2 marks in the main body of the test, but scored all 4 bonus marks. He is delighted. I wonder at the validity of such a test.

He is also delighted (what teenage boy wouldn't be?) that he learned how to say "did you fart?" in Spanish. I can see how this is going to prove very useful next time we visit Spain on holiday! Mind you, it will probably be a lot more useful than being able to say "I don't have my homework."

I have tried very hard to persuade the child to consider Spanish pod, but he is not motivated to do anything over and above what is on offer at school. So it's fair to say that he is not motivated to learn Spanish. He is merely motivated to pass the assessments.

So I ask again: what is the purpose of assessments and how is it that kids come to view them as the point of the learning, rather than the achievement of a certain level of skill?

He finally did it!

I wish I knew who to credit for this shot - please let me know, if you can - it arrived attached to an email from my sister.

On being an independent thinker

I recently attended as much of the CLTI08 conference as I could manage between family commitments (it's a bit tricky when the rather early morning start for the Pacific time zone bods, translates into school run, dinner-preparation-and-eating and getting-kids-to-athletics time in the UK).

I was rather surprised when one of the other delegates commented in her invitation to connect (rather like 'friend' invitations in Facebook) on my "independent thinking". Apparently she felt this was what my contributions to the backchannel chat demonstrated.

I have never thought of myself as an independent thinker. I acknowledge that I (usually) won't just swallow the party line, and that I am not afraid to challenge, to ask the difficult questions. But independent? Hmm. Surely I'm just reacting to what other people say, rather than coming up with ideas of my own?

Some time ago, Harold Jarche sent me this gapingvoid cartoon:I printed it out and stuck it on my desk in my last job, right next to the banner that declared me a workafrolic (check it out, you won't be sorry!) and the reminder to go home every day (follow the link - it's not as daft as it sounds!). I took it with me when I left and it now graces the desk of my home office. At the time, I responded to Harold that, while I certainly didn't want to be a sheep, I didn't think I had what it took to be a wolf, either. I 'asked permission' instead to be a wolf cub, romping along in the wake of the alpha wolves, learning from them, but never quite having to step into that role myself.

Since that time, I have found myself increasingly being labelled an 'early adopter', a 'maverick' and 'an independent thinker'. When I look at the people I think of as independent thinkers, thought leaders and so on, I balk at the idea of such labels being attached to me - I feel unworthy (ugh, get a grip!), unequal to the task.

Nevertheless, perhaps from where someone else is sitting, that's how I appear. How about you? Do you think of yourself as being a leader, an independent thinker? How do other people see you? Because your reputation is not really based on your view of yourself. It's based on other people's views of you... whether you like it or not, I guess.

The way people think

Just lately, I have been given practical examples of the different way in which people think and approach a project.

I have been up to my eyeballs in recipes. I am compiling a recipe book to capture a sampling of the wide-ranging cultural diversity of our church congregation: Nigerians, Koreans, Ghanaians, West Indians, Finns, Swedes, South Africans, Zimbabweans, Poles, Welsh... and of course, the occasional English person ;o).

The finished book is to be sold in aid of a scheme which provides food parcels to struggling families in our area. Right now, there are more families in that category than usual, and it looks set to get worse. Of course, I'm busting a gut to get the thing done in time to be used as Christmas gifts.

The people of the church were asked to send/give me their favourite recipes, concentrating on nutritious meals-on-a-budget rather than the endless range of sweet treats that usually result from these sorts of projects.

It has been an interesting exercise:

• Some people's idea of a recipe does not start with a list of ingredients - these are revealed as one reads through the instructions; others start with a detailed list of ingredients, including the quantity of water
  
• Some use rather imprecise terms like 'some butternut', 'a medium oven' or 'about a handful of pearl barley' - others are precise to the last detail: '950ml water', '375°F/180°C' or '165g frozen mixed vegetables'
  
• Some indicate how many people a recipe will serve, others do not
  
• Some use metric quantities, others use imperial, still others use cups and spoons
• Interestingly, one Chinese woman uses colours for reference, rather than time - 'cook until mixture is purple then add stock to turn mixture red'
  

Since the book is intended to celebrate our diverse cultures, I have tried to be true to the way the recipes were given to me, without making it impossible for a less-than-confident cook - who is already out of his/her comfort zone in attempting a recipe from Japan, say - to produce something edible at the end of the experiment.

Since the contributor's name appears with each recipe, I have tried to accommodate that person's character and individuality as far as possible. This put me in a bit of a pickle when it came to spelling and grammar errors. Many of the people in our church don't have English as a first language. This has resulted in the most endearing turns of phrase. I decided pretty quickly that I would have to correct the spelling, but I ummed and ah-ed over the grammar. In the end I did correct it, since I recognise that there may be cause for embarrassment and/or ridicule (not to mention misunderstanding), but it was with a heavy heart.

I did, however, opt to leave in little editorial things like "Cheese soup - yes, really!" and "this is optional!!!!" beside an instruction to add an onion in a recipe from someone who abhors the things. This abhorrence is referenced elsewhere in the book, where one person included the instruction that "L***** may substitute a leek".

I'm not earning a penny from this exercise and it has been hard work, but it has been an absolute romp... and I have learnt so much along the way - about cooking, about people.

Children with imagination

I came across this video today - it was sent to me by a Facebook friend. Those of you who do not share my faith, please do not dismiss the clip because of its source - it really is worth watching. It's a bit of a pity that the subtitles and the branding occupy the same space on the screen, but does this child not have the most wonderful imagination?

How tragic it will be if her formal education does any harm to this wonderful gift.

It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones. Luke 17:2

There is a crack in everything

Tonight I got to see half a Leonard Cohen live gig (when did he start to look so much like Tony Bennet?). Yeah, just half, and I've got the serious mutters with British Rail for robbing me of the other half, but that's for another time.

Leonard Cohen is, to my mind, a consummate lyricist, he can do with a few words what highly skilled visual artists can do with just a few lines or brushstrokes. Sublime. Tonight, as well as being surprised to discover that Leonard Cohen is actually both personable and funny, I heard a song that had somehow managed to escape me before, called Anthem from the Future, which contained some lyrics that struck a chord so deep in me as to be impossible to articulate.

It relates so much to the conversations we have in this space, but I feel as if I would make the whole thing rather trite by trying to explain how, so I will pay you the compliment of assuming you'll be able to make the connection for yourself, and insted just give you the lines:

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.

It reminds me of a badge my kids once gave me that says "Blessed are the cracked, for they let in the light." I am very proud of that badge!

And here's the song in its entirety:

When designers don't consider the user's needs

No, I haven't forgotten the apostrophe rule! Perish the thought. I have deliberately used the singular, because each user is an individual.

As those of you who are my Facebook friends will know, I recently had to get new glasses. One of the (many) curses of middle age.

Because of the dramatic change to my eyes over the past two years, my needs have become more complex. Instead of just the reading specs you see me sporting in my profile photo, I now need three different prescriptions: one for close work like reading, knitting and so on, one for detail-in-the-middle-distance like working on my desktop computer screen and watching telly, and a third for distance vision, like driving - that last one came as a total surprise to me!

Initially I got two pairs of varifocals: one clear and one tinted for outdoor use. But varifocals didn't suit me. Everything kept moving. The abundance of striped shirts being sported by men these days had me almost reaching for the barf bucket as the stripes heaved and ho-ed and flatly refused to stand still. Any printed matter I tried to read changed shape continually. Driving was a nightmare, as nothing would come into focus quickly enough to allow for competent navigation of traffic. Working on my deskop was just as bad - I had a keyhole sized area of perfect vision, with a blur of motion around it. And, as some of you will know, the stairs refused to behave - resulting in a painful injury to my neck and both shoulders.

So back we went to try to find an alternative arrangement. This time I asked for a single vision pair of glasses with photoreactive lenses for distance. And a pair of 'office glasses' - graded to cover my near vision and middle distance requirements - also with photosensitive lenses.

Er no.

There is no problem with the first of those, but it seems that 'office glasses' don't come in photosenstive lenses. Whyever not? Well, because they are meant for indoor use, you see. Hence the name 'office glasses'.

Ri-ight.

So they presume to tell me I may not take my crossword puzzle out into the garden. I may not read a map in the car the next time my husband and I go on a roadtrip. Never again may I demonstrate my geekishness be reading Judith Bell on the beach in Spain. And I may certainly not decamp my office to my patio! These are not the behaviours of a bespectacled office worker, it seems.

Says who?

Who designed these lenses, anyway? And who was their target market? Thanks to their bright spark ideas, I will now have to wear two pairs of glasses when carrying out close work outdoors - one to correct my vision and one to deal with the glare.

Honestly!

Pretty poor market research, I'd say.

There is this book...

... that has taken hold of me. And it doesn't even exist!

A few times in my life, I have felt inclined - compelled, even - to write a book. It's not a feeling I enjoy. Most times, I have been able to fob it off with a few chapters before succumbing gladly to writer's apathy.

I have written a few (passingly decent) short stories in my time, and a few dreadful poems, but a book is a different matter. A different matter entirely. And I don't have time to spend writing a whole book when I have to earn a living! And I certainly have neither the time nor the energy to try to find a publisher. I mean, kick a bush and two would-be authors fall out. I've seen the hassle some of my writer friends have had, and I want none of it. Hence the welcoming attitude towards aforesaid apathy.

This time it appears to be different. The book was birthed in my head, totally unexpectedly as I drove my son to school today. With astonishing speed, it took root in my chest, where it is threatening to explode if I don't let it out. And I now have unspeakable heartburn.

This time, it's not just the germ of an idea. This time the book has a title... and I know how it ends!

Just to explain... I have no pretensions to the next cluetrain manifesto, Naked Conversations, Knowing Knowledge or Informal Learning. Those books look for more skillful, more knowledgeable authors. The books that try to get me to write them are usually works of fiction. Flights of fancy. That kind of thing. Quite often they're appropriate for the age my children happen to be at the time, and are extensions of some or other tale I have been weaving for them. It's a dirty trick, trying to use emotional blackmail on a person, but it seems books have no shame.

This particular book is based on fact. On the life of a real person. Someone who died when I was a teenager and who was only peripherally known to me. Someone who was a no-one. Someone whose name leapt unbidden into my head, accompanied by a crystal clear mental snapshot and a motion picture of his very characteristic walk.

How do you persuade a book that you're not the right author and send it on its way to find another?

Instinct v presence of mind

A thinking-out-loud post.

This morning, thanks to my new glasses, I nearly fell down the stairs. Instinctively, I grabbed the banister and rescued myself... at the cost of my right shoulder, which is now killing me! The instinctive reaction probably saved me from a different injury, but if I were a professional violinist, I would probably have preferred the other injury.

I know a man who is possibly the finest osteopath/physio/sports injury therapist on the planet (okay, that's a huge overstatement, but I would recommend him unreservedly to anyone). He was hiking in the Swiss Alps with a bunch of teenagers who were working towards their Duke of Edinburgh awards. One of the kids above him dislodged a rock, which hit him on the head and sent him over the edge (literally, not metaphorically). As he fell, he had the presence of mind to protect the tools his trade: his hands. Where someone else would have wrapped their arms around their head, or used them to try to break their fall, John crossed his across his chest and tucked his hands into his armpits.

When he came to a halt, most of his scalp had been ripped away and his knee had been very seriously damaged. He applied first aid to himself and, when the first of the kids arrived on the scene, got them to call the air ambulance.

He was taken to a Swiss hospital, where the doctor who saw him was tickled at John's professional interest in his own injuries and their proposed treatment. After stitching his scalp back in place, he operated on John's knee, using an epidural instead of general anaesthetic, so that John could watch the surgery, and keeping up a running commentary - which he enjoyed enormously!

Instinct is focused on survival. Presence of mind, it seems, is focused on preservation of the things that are important to us on other levels. I excercised instinct. John exercised presence of mind.

Military training appears to impart to people the ability to override the instinct for personal preservation and to carry out actions that serve the purposes of the bigger picture.

I find myself musing on this today. Military drills are based on behaviourist principles... with good reason. Is there any other way to learn to override instinct? For example, how did John learn to do what he did?

Learning styles again... again

Just in case my arguments against the concept of learning styles don't carry enough weight - here's someone with a lot more credibility than me.

Good teacher, bad learners?

Today my elder son had to teach a lesson at school. It's part of their course on PE/sports science. His specialisation for the course is javelin and he was expected to teach his class how to throw a javelin within a single lesson. A tall order at the best of times.

When he got home from school today, I asked him how it had gone. "Not so good," he told me Apparently, the class hadn't paid attention or co-operated at all. His confidence, however, was unbowed.

"I still taught well, " he assured me, "Regardless of whether they learned anything or not."

Hmm. What it is to be seventeen!

I must remember that one if ever I run a workshop that doesn't go over well.

Academicinfo - a new string to my bow

I have recently started blogging for Academicinfo, "an online education resource center with extensive subject guides and distance learning information." Their mission is "to provide free, independent and accurate information and resources for prospective and current students (and other researchers)."

The posts I write there are not a duplication of those that appear on this site. Currently, I am busy with a series of book reviews, which may expand to include must-read blogposts and ezine articles.

On the same site, you will also find a series of posts by Harold Jarche who is exploring social media and new understandings of literacy.

Please swing by and let us have your input.

Give them the truth!

I've just returned from the local service station. My car needed a new bulb in one of the headlights and Peugeots being what they are, it wasn't something I could easily do myself. I asked the man behind the counter how long it would take, since I have a lot to do today. "Oh, twenty minutes, if that," he assured me airily. Perfect.

Half an hour later, I asked for a progress check on the rather elastic 20 minutes. "Just a few more minutes," a different man told me.

A good 15 minutes or more later, the first man re-appeared to tell me that my car also needed a new wiper blade. I pointed out that I had already been there more than double the original estimate of 20 minutes. He explained that they have to do a health check on every car. "This is fine... and commendable, " I said, "but when a person asks you how long something is going to take, you should factor that in, so that they can plan accordingly." He sighed. "Look, do you want your wiper blade replacing (sic) or not?"

Not. Thanks. That much I can do for myself.

And next time my car needs work, I'll be going somewhere else.

We need to beware of this, too when we're trying desperately to sell someone on an idea/solution/whatever. If we boost their expectations and under-deliver, we will only alienate them even further. Our job is tough enough as it is.

CLTI08 starts today - will you be there?

The Corporate Learning Trends and Innovations conference starts today at 8am Canadian Pacific time, which is 4pm GMT.

George Siemens has become synonymous with collecting together movers and shakers in the world of learning and offering these free online conferences, using the very impressive Elluminate as his platform. I haven't missed one yet. I'm delighted to see that the word is spreading and we are seeing increasing enrolment from developing countries, including several of my compatriots (woohoo!).

Of course, the poor Aussies and Kiwis are going to have a rough old time of it with the time zone issue, but many of them have attended before, and seem to consider the loss of sleep a small price to pay ;o). I've got the mutters a bit myself, because I can't do Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday evenings and will therefore miss several great sessions, including the one I most wanted to attend.

Eddies 2008 nominations

It's a bit scary having to put my nominations out in the open like this, but that's how the 2008 Edublog Award nomination process works. I also just know that, the minute I publish, my faulty memory is going to remind me of a post I should have nominated in at least one category, but what can you do? So here goes (numbered as per nomination categories on edublog site):

1. Best individual blog OLDaily

2. Best group blog Workplace learning today

4. Best resource sharing blog Jane's elearning pick of the day

5. Most influential blog post Cathy Moore's Be an elearning action hero

6. Best teacher blog Cool cat teacher blog

9. Best elearning / corporate education blog Making change

Deep breath. Hope not to upset anyone. Prepare to hit Publish... NOW!