2010 Update: The key to becoming ‘Super eLearning Developer’

What I have been ‘up to’?  Conducting a lot of great research for the new eduTech gEEk  redesign AND starting two new eLearning development projects with two new awesome clients!!

Many of the future eduTech gEEk posts will reflect on: (1) Where my career is heading (eLearning development  for virtual learning environments), and (2) Where my career originated (instructional video/instructional design/analysis/formative evaluations).

2010 Focus
In 2010 edutechgeek.wordpress.com will transition into a hardcore eLearning blog geared toward problem solving and issues related to three primary development tools:

• Articulate
• Lectora
• Captivate

In addition, I will continue to support open source and cost-free initiatives within the community, such as:

• Moodle
• eXe
• CourseLab

Becoming Superb
The key to becoming a superb eLearning developer is to dedicate more time to the community and become more involved in the discourse.  Many of my past projects introduce me to some of the best people and best disciplines that intertwine with learning and development.  This includes: technical writing, educational research methodology, graphic design, animation design, user-centered design, etc.

Of course, I will continue to visit the impact of these disciplines on learning and development, but not as much as I did in 2009.  Although I sign the NDA with each new client, I will work with my clients and encourage the disclosure of project-related information that would grow knowledge and practice within the eLearning communities.

My 2010 Communities

Lately, I have been actively involved in several eLearning communities, these include:

• eLearning Guild
• Articulate’s Rapid eLearning Blog
• Adobe’s Captivate Blog
• Lectora’s Online Community

The Occasional Conference
Oh, but of course…Conferences galore!  This year I will decrease the number of conferences I attend.  Meeting new people = awesomeness. I find that post-conference updates, notes, videos work just as well (some of the time).  In 2010, I will pick & choose my eLearning conferences wisely.  However, I will continue to post news and updates on all conferences that come across my desk.

Lectora Certification & Training

What is Lectora?
Lectora is an eLearning development tool, created by Trivantis Corporation (Cincinnati, OH), that:

• Creates online training courses and assessments in a programming free-environment
• Converts MS PowerPoints to eLearning content, and
• Publishes eLearning courses to a variety of formats: HTML, exe, CD-Rom, and LMS.

Lectora User Groups
According to Wikipedia, a user group is a type of club focused on the use of a particular technology, usually (but not always) computer-related.  Within the U.S. and Canada,  Lectora User Groups exist within these areas:

• Austin, TX
• Boston, MA
• Chicago, IL
• Central Kentucky
• Cleveland, OH
• Colorado Springs
• Denver, CO
• Kansas City, MO
• South Florida
• Southwest Missouri
• Ontario (Canada)
• British Columbia (Canada)

Lectora Training
Trivantis has three levels of Lectora Training:

• Fundamental
• Intermediate, and
• Extreme.

Note: Some IDs and eLearning Developers refer to themselves as “extreme users.”  This title comes from the completion of the highest level of Lectora  Training.

Lectora Certification
A good way to set yourself apart from the bunches of eLearning developers is to acquire Lectora Certification.  The two certification options are:

• Lectora Certified Author, or
• Lectora Certified Advanced Author.

**For more information on Lectora, please visit www.trivantis.com.

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Inspiration behind this post...

This past summer I was a member of the beta research team for Lectora Online.  Initially, it was an exciting experience since Lectora is the second authoring tool I was introduced to early in my career (the first being Authorware =-Snooze!)  I am a huge advocate for the learning community.  I also believe strongly that eLearning developers must be able to develop online learning in a hassle-free environment.  Many of us are not coders or IT experts.  We just want to create user-friendly computer-mediated training full of awesomeness!  Lectora is such a wonderful tool for eLearning developers of all skill levels.  If you are new to Lectora, I hope you’ve enjoyed this post!

~De Anna L Fench, M.Ed., M.A.

Inspiration for Re-design

As I re-design my eduTech gEEk blog, I wanted to share my inspiration—> http://dustincurtis.com/index.html

15 Open Source Resources for Educators

Finding open source or free resources is a great way to enhance learning and increase productivity in the classroom. There are many different applications, tools, and other materials available online.

This list provides 15 free open source resources that are perfect for educators:

Bookgoo – Bookgoo is a free web app that provides tools to highlight and annotate documents. The app works well for grading papers and sharing notes online.

Eduslide – Eduslide provides free open source tools to create online classrooms courses, chat rooms, and forums.

FlashcardExchange – FlashcardExchange is a free flashcard maker used by teachers around the world. Flashcards created on this site can be printed out or shared online.

Mikogo – Mikogo is a desktop sharing tool that is free for both private and commercial use. This innovative site works well for webinars, online conferences, and remote support.

Artopia – Artopia is a comprehensive art site designed for middle school children. This creative site gives students the opportunity to examine art and learn art techniques from others.

GroupTweet – This Twitter app allows teachers to communicate with their students privately. Teachers simply sign up for an account and then register their students as members to converse with them privately.

Empressr – Empressr is a free multimedia tool for creating presentations. This visual storytelling tool allows you to add images, videos, audio, and text.

NoteMesh – This open source app allows students in the same class to share and collaborate on notes.

Thinkfinity – The Verizon Foundation’s Thinkfinity offers lesson plans, interactive games, and activities that are perfect for the classroom.

FREE – FREE (Federal Resources for Educational Excellence) provides many free resources for teachers including lesson plans, animations, primary docs, video, and photos.

Smithsonian Education – Smithsonian Education offers several open source materials for teachers including lesson plans, games, and more. The materials cover a wide variety of subjects and grades.

Remember the Milk – Remember the Milk is an online task manager that provides tools to manage tasks quickly, send notifications, and make lists from anywhere.

Microsoft Education – This educational website from Microsoft offers lesson plans, training, and an educator’s community.

4Teachers.org – 4Teachers.org is an open source site that offers several tools and resources to integrate technology into the classroom. Just a few features of this site include web lessons, quizzes, rubrics, and calendars.

Web-Chops – This free site provides tools to collect and share web content. The content you collect can then be organized and displayed on one page.

Guest post from education writer Karen Schweitzer. Karen is the About.com Guide to Business School. She also writes about online classes for OnlineClasses.org.

The Chicago Convergence—CANCELLED

A follow up to my May 20th 2009 post about the TCC 09…the Chicago Convergence is cancelled.

The scheduled 2009 Chicago Convergence has been cancelled. Last year’s event was great. My intention was to volunteer this year. There seemed to be an awesome line up of new media nerds and techie geeks from all professions. Here is a snippet of the email I received:

The Chicago Convergence conference, slated for Sept 21-23 at the Spertus Institute is officially canceled and will be honored with an anniversary party [details in next few days]. We are planning to host additional events and activities over the next 90 days.

TCC is undergoing a massive restructuring in order “to grow a more robust digital community and expand jobs and opportunities,” said Montgomery, who succeeded founder John Patterson of Pixel Brothers when he relocated to Los Angeles earlier this year.

In late July Montgomery convened a meeting of TCC’s Leadership Committee to “edit and repackage ideas” for the second annual Convergence Summit, and to find appropriate future programs to satisfy the membership’s needs, he said at the time. The final nail in the coffin was an unproductive effort to replace sponsors that bowed out when the recession hit earlier this year.

How unfortunate.

In regards to technical writers…

How funny?!

Technical Writing Graduate Programs & Certification

In regards to technical writing graduate programs…

…Yes, they exist.

I seen a Wikianswers question regarding the availability of PhD programs in technical writing.   Someone replied ”no.”  This is incorrect. 

As instructional designers and eLearning developers we are interdisciplinary professionals.  Technical writing is one of our most common crossover careers…in addition to web designer, video editor, script writer (audio/video), magician, black jack dealer…they think we can do it all. (We can!)

For this reason I wanted to put together a list of technical writing resources.  That list could run all day.  Instead, I have some links below that you should find helpful depending on your level of technical writing/communication interest.

Reputable graduate programs

• Texas Tech (available onsite or online)
• University of Arkansas, Little Rock
• Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
• Boise State

Technical writing within other academic departments
Another option is to search within traditional academic departments that include technical writing as a track option.

• Writing, Rhetoric, and Discourse(WRD) Departments
• Communications Departments
• Traditional English Departments
• Perform a google search for “technical writing graduate programs”… Results!

Certification programs
Another solution is a certification program within a reputable university and/or training center.

• University of California Riverside
• Tech-writer Certification
• Perform a Google search for “technical writer certification” … Results!
• Society for Technical Communciation (STC) has a great list of online certification courses

Hope this helps…

Adobe Learning Summit 2009

Adobe + eLearning…

What: A conference that discusses the latest eLearning tools, practices, and skill using applications from the Adobe eLearning Suite

When: November 9, 2009 // 8:00 am to 7:30 pm

Where: Fairmont Hotel // San Jose, CA

Keywords: eLearning, learning technologies, virtual classrooms, Connect Pro, Captivate, Presenter, Adobe eLearning Suite, education, inspiration

Benefits: Connected with DevLearn 2009 // Reception at Adobe headquarters (also known as “heaven” to us techie designers–”woohoo”)

20 Free eduTech Resources

  From web apps and course management tools to social learning sites and online classes, there are many edutech resources available online. These resources are a great way for students and lifelong learners to discover, create, and share educational information.

10 eduTech Resources

Shmoop – Shmoop offers fun and refreshing study guides for literature, U.S. history, and poetry. The site is specifically designed to make students better lovers of literature, better writers, and more critical thinkers.

 VerbaLearn – VerbaLearn helps students study vocabulary more effectively with MP3 files, video flashcards, puzzles, and review resources.

 iTalki – iTalki is an online language learning site that uses social networking, and crowdsourcing to increase understanding of foreign languages and cultures. This site offers many innovative features, including socially-driven questions, knowledge wikis, multimedia chat capability, and file sharing.

 OCW – The OCW features a master list of colleges and universities with open courseware programs. The site lists schools in the U.S. and abroad.

 SecondLife – This virtual world houses hundreds of universities and schools around the globe. SecondLife can be used to connect with other people or study online.

 Scitable – Scitable is a free collaborative learning and teaching portal with scientific insights, study resources, and teaching aids. This site concentrates on the fields of genetics, evolution, and variation.

 Grammar Girl – This friendly grammar site/podcast from Mignon Fogarty provides easy to remember grammar tips and rules. Listening to this podcast is a great way for anyone to improve their grammar and writing.

 Wolfram Demonstration Project – The Wolfram Demonstration Project features demonstrations to illustrate concepts in art, science, math, technology, finance, and other fields. This site can be used to illustrate difficult concepts, explain new mathematical ideas, and help with thesis research.

 Livemocha – With over 2 million members, Livemocha provides an excellent platform for language learning. The site offers free lessons and helps connect people with language partners all over the world.

 Arkive – Arkive is a large collection of images, videos, and fact files of the world’s species. This is the perfect site for exploring and learning about geography and the species of the world.

10 eduTech Tools

 WizIQ – WizIQ is a free web app for anyone who wants to learn or teach online. It can be used to create virtual classes, online tests, educational content, and web seminars.

 JingProject – JingProject makes it easy to share your computer screen with others online. It works well for collaborating on a project, editing a document, and commenting on homework.

ProProfs – ProProfs offers free tools for creating and sharing knowledge. This site features tools for creating quizzes, polls, flashcards, brain games, wiki’s, and forums.

 VoiceThread – This interactive site provides a tool for sharing information through images, documents, and videos. VoiceThread gives you the opportunity to showcase information that others can comment on in five different ways.

 Yugma – Yugma is a free tool that can be used for web conferences, online meetings, desktop sharing, and collaboration.

 Class Wiki – This free web app provides a platform for teaching and classroom activities. This Wiki service allows you to drag content, such as video, graphics, and text, into a space for educational instruction.

 Edmodo – Edmodo is a microblogging site created for teachers and students. This free edutech tool makes it easy for teachers to safely and securely send events, alerts, assignments, and more.

 Moodle – Moodle provides a free platform for creating online learning sites. This global project is open to everyone and can be modified for your needs.

 Connexions – With over 14,000 modules of scholarly information, Connexions provides invaluable resources that can be organized into books, courses, and reports. This site provides information on many different subjects, including art, business, humanities, math, science, and social sciences.

 Cramberry – This online flashcard site offers free pre-made flashcards for thousands of topics. It can also be used to create and study your own flashcards. Cramberry is a more intelligent way to study because it records progress, shows trouble cards more often, and makes studying more effective.

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Guest post from education writer Karen Schweitzer. Karen is the About.com Guide to Business School. She also writes about online colleges for OnlineCollege.org.

Creative Video: Contents of the IDD

Very creative video tutorial on how to create an instructional design document…

Instructional Design Document