One of the
pioneer thinkers in this area has been Seymour Papert - an MIT mathematician, computer scientist and educator. He is one of the pioneers of artificial intelligence, as well as an
inventor of the Logo programming language. He has worked on
learning theories, and is known for focusing on the impact of new technologies
on learning in general and in schools as learning organizations in particular. Source: Wikipedia
He once famously
said: "You can't teach people everything they need to know. The best you
can do is position them where they can find what they need to know when they
need to know it."
I was invited to
a soft-launch of a new mobile (iOS/Android) technology-based PS system just last
week. This mobile learning startup won the Most Innovative Startup Award at
Ideas.Inc. 2013. Hearing the very young (fresh out of grad school) Founder and
CEO speak, in his jeans, jacket over t-shirt, was reminiscent of hearing a
certain Zuckerberg, less than a decade ago.
The “app”
probably finds itself in the sweet spot of performance support (PS) in the 3rd
& 5th “moments of need”. The "Five Moments of Need" model (Mosher
& Gottfredson, 2011) is a model that
captures both formal and informal learning tracks and needs. Bob Mosher &
Conrad Gottfredson have also made
significant contributions to the thinking on workplace learning.
The Five
Moments are:-
# 1. Learning for the first time (New)# 2. Workplace Learning (More)
# 3. Applying what you've learned (Apply)
# 4. When things go wrong (Solve)
# 5. When things change (Change)
In Jane Harts 2012 Social Learning Continuum (this will be the subject of another post), the first 2 needs are best categorised as Formal and the other 3, Informal. And with an expected 2 billion smart handheld devices by 2030, the stage is ripe for an explosion of informal learning via assisted mobile technologies.
Are you ready for the future of learning?
