Monthly Archives: March 2012

Mar 31

Project TinCan, the next stage in assessment and evaluation?

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If you need to keep track of who does what, when, within a web-based project or experience TinCan might be just the thing.
—moi

The metaphor that gave name to Project Tin Can is the tin can and string telephone. Project Tin Can is the next phase of SCORM. The project itself has entered its own “Phase 3 — the future of e-learning is now,” which includes prototypes you can use, that in turn can issue data and reports, and web objects to be consumed in ways limited only by the imagination. Continue reading →

Mar 20

Just an idea I’ve been getting

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UPDATED 2012-03-27: What’s with all the icons and rollover pop-ups? They’re based on Compendium, which I’ve written about before. While they may not be appropriate for every everyday blog post, I’m asking you to have a look and leave a comment. Do you see a role for them within other web-based contexts you may be familiar with? If so, which? Leave a comment!

I’m trying to get experience design into my thinking about online learning, using the simple technologies I know and love: computers and various digital mobile devices, web browsers, HTML, CSS, JavaScript. For some time I’ve been headed towards the position  that documents are becoming obsolete. While I was thinking about that a teacher who is part of my Twitter PLN was putting together a wonderful Project-Based Learning experience with her grade 6 class, their parents and many others from the PLN. This led me to have an idea .

Continue reading →

Mar 12

Taming wicked problems, planning projects, designing learning—try Compendium

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UPDATED: Have a look at some more advanced Compendium maps.

Compendium, its stewards at The Compendium Institute say, “is a software tool providing a flexible visual interface for managing the connections between information and ideas.” Wicked problems, as I’ve written recently, contain social complexity, so solving them is a fundamentally social process requiring many people. Compendium software allows a person working alone, or people in a group, to bring together visually the diverse ideas, assertions, arguments, and resources that might contribute to the “taming” of a wicked problem. Continue reading →

Mar 04

Wicked Problems

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Horst Willhelm Jakob Rittel taught design and architecture for over 30 years but never designed a building. Horst Rittel matters because he saw a connection between science and design and was able to articulate it to designers. He recognized that the definition of a problem is subjective and comes with a point of view. When you think this through it reminds us all “stake-holders” hold a stake in any problem’s outcome. The more diverse the stakes, the more fluid definitions become, and ultimately the harder it becomes to define the problem. It’s a problem of moving goal posts and answers that lead to further questions. Rittel named such problems wicked problems, problems that are not so much “solved” as they are “tamed” (Rith & Dubberly, 2006). Continue reading →