The Cool Curve - a strategy for delivering learning in innovative ways?

I picked up on this presentation on Damian Mulley's blog, so thanks for him for that.

This presentation from Professor Toby Moores discusses the idea of the Cool Curve.

The Cool Curve

Moores is the CEO of SleepyDog, makers of multimedia quiz content for the Playstation game console (among other projects). In the video he talks about being creative while matching your output and work to an audience and potential clients; in essence how to inspire your audience with ideas / content / knowledge in a cool / inspiring / interesting way, without "spooking the horses" and being too innovative.

He discusses a 'halo' zone around the perimeter or threshold of the curve (similar in my view to Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development) where audiences are comfortable with the newness of the approach being taken to the delivery of concepts or ideas without experiencing cognitive dissonance.

As an example, Professor Toby Moores talks about Vincent Van Gogh: a highly talented artist who's concept curve did not align with potential audiences of his time, but now is famous for creating some of the world's best known, most popular and most expensive art pieces, as well as being a great influential on successive generations of painters and other creative types.

I must say that I find the Cool Curve concept intriguing and an idea that has potential for the learning and development marketspace, especially as it seems to work as an effective concept development process for games designers, and there are a lot of resonances between the two industries.

Except they have more money than us, obviously.

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What is learning?

I guess it's now time to move on to some of the "big picture" stuff and begin to outline how I characterise terms like "learning" and "e-learning."

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In the field of organisational development, the terms ‘training’ and ‘learning’ are often used interchangeably: both broadly refer to the acquisition of new or enhanced knowledge, skills, attitudes or behaviour through the medium of instruction whether delivered by a source of information such as a text or a computer application, a teacher, or a mentor. In my opinion, the key difference between the two terms is in the reflexive nature of learning, resulting in the integration of the knowledge, skill, attitude or behaviour into the individual’s cognitive constructs - a process Lev Vygotsky called “internalisation,” which he elegantly described as “an internal reconstruction of an external operation (1978, p.56). The Information Sessions non-formal learning initiative (which I'll be discussing in future blog entries). If you've read my recent posts, you'll understand that the theoretical and methodological framework for this initiative was developed within the Constructivist pedagogical model using techniques derived from the Social- and Cognitive schools of thought, with a focus on experiential learning as defined by Kolb, Vygotsky’s social development theory as it is applied in instructional design and Donald Schön’s and Chris Argyris’s views on professional knowledge and social learning systems.

References:

Vygotsky, L. S. (1978) Mind in society. Edited by Cole, M. John-Steiner, V. Scribner, Souberman, E. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press

Learning Theory: Back to school for Christmas

As I've got some holiday time at my disposal over Christmastime , I've decided to refresh my knowledge on Learning Theory in the context of how I use the various learning models and methodologies. So that means that there will be a large amount of information concerning Cognitivism and its offshoots, and much less about the Behaviourist track . So, let's start at the beginning…

What is learning?

In the field of organisational development, the terms ‘training’ and ‘learning’ are often used interchangeably: both broadly refer to the acquisition of new or enhanced knowledge, skills, attitudes or behaviour through the medium of instruction whether delivered by a source of information such as a text or a computer application, a teacher, or a mentor. The key difference between the two terms is in the reflexive nature of learning and the integration of the knowledge, skill, attitude or behaviour into the individual’s cognitive constructs - a process Lev Vygotsky called “internalisation” and elegantly described as “an internal reconstruction of an external operation (1978, p.56).

References

Vygotsky, L. S. (1978) Mind in society. Edited by Cole, M. John-Steiner, V. Scribner, Souberman, E. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press