NOVA’s Interactives Archive
I absolutely love seeing great examples of e-learning. While watching NOVA, I took a trip over to their website and found their Interactives Archive. It has hundreds of educational interactives. They are organized by interest and range from anthropology to technology. Here is the link, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/hotscience, take a look. It will be added to the Free e-Learning page too.
The Eagle has Landed – Apollo XI
One of my earliest memories as a child was the Apollo 11 Moon landing 40 years ago. With the anniversary upon us (7/20), I am promoting some of the great resources NASA has on the web celebrating this event.
NASA – Apollo 40th Anniversary
Explore the Apollo 11 Landing Site
Restored Videos of the Moon Walk
Real-Time Replay of Mission Audio (July 16-July 24)
you have to fight for the right TO BE ENGAGING
I just read a comment on a blog where a someone was very frustrated by bland, unengaging page turners. It got me thinking. How do you get a an organization out of the rut of making page turners and to start creating more engaging and effective courses? Here are my first thoughts:
- Put on your instructional designer hat and do everything you can to educate all involved (SMEs, clients, managers, and audience too) on what effective e-learning is and how all involved can benefit from it.
- Show all involved what effective e-learning looks like, actual examples. Here is just one place where you can find examples -http://minutebio.com/blog/free-e-learning/ (this my Free e-Learning collection ).
- Find case studies, articles, evaluations, etc. that support your case.
- Create a prototype to demonstrate the level of interactivity and engagement your organization can produce in a course. Get your co-workers involved so they will be vested in the “new approach.” This will earn you supporters and people who can rally against the archaic page turners the organization still wants to produce.
- When you launch your prototype/course and your audience provides positive feedback. Be quick to send that feedback to the powers to be along with any evaluation you have done. They will have a hard time arguing against more interactive courses then.
- Continue to evaluate your courses even after you have been given the go ahead and resources to create more interactive courses. If you can demonstrate positive results for all 4 levels of evaluation, especially “results,” they will have little argument for ever implementing a page turner again.
What else can be done to address the organization stuck in page turner mode? Please feel free to make suggestions. Thanks.
Developing With Flash Lite Video Series
Dale Rankine recently launched the first video of his video training series for Flash mobile developers. If you are interested in developing with Flash Lite, say m-learning, you will want to check this out. The videos are developed for delivery on Adobe TV, but he is also making them available on Vimeo. Here the link, http://vimeo.com/adobeflashlite.
I am looking forward to seeing more of these videos and will be adding this to my Free e-Learning page, of course.
Financial Education – What’s Out There
I saw today that MasterCard launched Learning Centres, which provides financial management tips for consumers. Are they doing the same here in the USA? I found they have a learning center on the U.S. site. And they have a DIY Guide for Young Adults. However, it markets their cards as much as it provides financial advice.
Full disclosure, I am employed by a financial institution, but I am also an advocate of financial education/literacy. As we has seen far too much of, people who are not up to speed with how personal finances, credit cards, and banking products work can get into extreme jams to say the least. And they are also easily taken advantage of . So, here are some resources provided without any marketing from financial industries.
Money Smart – FDIC
Fundamentals of Personal Financial Planning – University of CA – Irvine
Link & Learn Taxes – Internal Revenue Service
And to quote Shakespeare, “Neither a borrower, nor a lender be.”
Free K-12 e-Learning Courses
There are some great e-learning courses out there for kids. I had a few courses on the Free e-Learning page, but hidden under Misc. I am well overdue to add a K-12 category on the Free e-Learning page. For me, some of the most engaging and inspiring online learning is designed for K-12 students. As a corporate trainer, I am often inspired by what is done in K-12 programs. And much of this inspiration has led to much more fun, engaging and instructionally sound course’s for my audience. This includes use of educational games, cartoon characters, immersive simulations, humor, etc. So, thank you to all the K-12 course designers out there.
And thank you Christy, Experiencing E-Learning, who suggested that I add Edheads.org to the list. I have always relied on the kindness of bloggers.
Here is what I have so far, but I know there is MUCH more to add:
Edheads (numerous educational games and activities)
Build a Panda Habitat – National Zoo
National Postal Museum Activity Zone
If you know some courses that I should add, just let me know.
Free e-Learning Page ISD Additions
My Free e-Learning page has received a consistent number of visitors since adding the page. The page receives approximately 10% of my blog’s hits. And from my blog stats, I can see many are launching the free courses.
My intention for the page was to not only provide educational opportunities, but also to showcase examples of e-learning. Many of us, myself included, are inspired by seeing what other e-learning professionals are creating. And I am happy to see the page is being attended.
So, with the intention of increasing the value of the page I have added an “Instructional Design” category.
Thus far, I have added the following:
Access eLearning – Georgia Tech Research on Accessible Distance Education (GRADE)
Aligning Instructional Design and Technical Standards – Eduworks
ADDIE Model – C. Pappas
Gagne’s 9 Events of Instruction – C. Pappas
Objective Builder – RadioJames
Theories of Instructional Design – J. Carswell
If you know of any courses that will add value to this category or to the Free e-Learning page in general, please let me know.
Thanks
Additions to the Free e-Learning Page
Here are a few new finds for the Free e-Learning page.
Enjoy:
International Space Station - NASA
NASA 50 Years - NASA
What is Printing – Museum of Modern Art (MoMa)
Van Gogh and the Colors of the Night - Museum of Modern Art (MoMa)
FAUXTOGRAM – Red Studio (MoMa) If you are a fan of Man Ray you will enjoy this .
If you have of any open access e-learning courses please let me know and I will add them to the Free e-Learning page. Thanks.
Collecting Free e-Learning Courses
Free e-Learning Courses
I have started collecting links to free e-learning courses. Please feel free to access these via the link in the blog’s menu bar. As I come across courses I will add their links to the page. FYI: I will only add courses that are free and have open access. These are asynchronous web-based training courses. Down the road I may add web 2.0 learning applications (e.g. podcasts, m-learning, etc.). If you have a course that allows open access, please let me me know and I will add it to the list.
