Is it innovation…or imagination?

February 2, 2011

We hear a lot about “innovation” in business…about the need to innovate to hold a competitive edge, for example, or innovate to attract people to our association’s conference year after year. Whatever the reason, we’re always on the lookout for how we can be more innovative in our work.

I’d like to postulate that what we want isn’t innovation…it’s imagination.

Last Friday I wrote about the vision held by the Challenger 7 families and the organization they founded, the Challenger Center for Space Science Education. That got me thinking, in the funny way our brains work, about the role of vision in learning, which led me to recall a blog post I’d read in early January. That post from Jonathan Fields featured JK Rowling’s 2008 Harvard commencement address, in which she makes a pretty strong case for the power of imagination and failure. A little later in January, Fast Company featured in its daily e-newsletter 13 “radical ideas” for spending $100 million dollars to really save education, a response to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s $100 million contribution to the schools and city of Newark, NJ last September.

And then yesterday morning, another article in the Fast Company e-newsletter introduced me to No Right Brain Left Behind, an intriguing 5-day challenge to the creative industries to “concept ideas that can help the creativity crisis happening in U.S. schools today.” One reason for this emphasis, cited in a slide presentation about the project: a lack of creativity in schools and a recent IBM poll of 1,500 CEOs identifying creativity as the “#1 competitive edge for the future.” Continue reading →

{ 1 comment }

From tragedy to a triumph for learning

January 28, 2011

In January 1986, NASA launched the first teacher towards space.

In January 1986, Challenger exploded and the world stood transfixed by the tragedy, the first of its kind in the US space program.

Much has and will be written about the mission and its horrible end. The historical record is available on NASA’s website. A case can be made that NASA didn’t learn much from the incident or at the very least slipped into complacency once again, resulting in the Columbia disaster 17 years later, almost to the day.

So why would a learning blog offer a post about Challenger?

Because I’m inspired by what came from the tragedy. Because I’m awed by a vision of learning so powerful that it has literally affected millions of people. Because just three months after the explosion, the families of those seven astronauts turned an incomprehensible tragedy into an inspiring and enduring learning legacy.

Rather than merely cope with their loss privately, the families of Challenger’s astronauts created a living memorial to their loved ones. Like a phoenix, the mythical bird reborn from fire and ash, part of Challenger’s intended mission – to bring the excitement of space science to a new generation through live “lessons from space” – lives on in the Challenger Center for Space Science Education.

The Challenger Center was incorporated on April 25, 1986 with a mighty vision. Since then, more than 4,000,000 K-12 students have benefited from the center’s activities. Currently, each year, 500,000 students and 6,000 educators participate annually in its programs in 30,000 schools and 48 learning centers in the US, Canada, and the United Kingdom.

Pretty powerful stuff. And it all started with the vision of seven grieving families.

Does your organization have a learning vision? You no doubt offer learning opportunities to stakeholders…what vision drives them? What impact does your work have on those who attend your webinars, conferences, self-paced eLearning and other learning programs? What impact could it have, if your vision went beyond the boundaries of your organization?

Spend a minute in silence today to honor the memory of the Challenger 7. Visit the Challenger Center’s website  to be inspired by what a powerful vision can make happen, and consider getting involved and/or making a donation. I plan to.

Then think, “what if…?” for your own work, and imagine what could be.

{ 0 comments }

Get those webinars interactive!

December 20, 2010

How engaging are your organization’s webinars? Do your speakers actively plan and implement opportunities for their audiences to get engaged, or do they essentially deliver a “virtual lecture?”? What do your adult audiences expect from webinars?

A while back I wrote an article for a learning technology company’s e-newsletter, entitled Get Interactive! Ensure Your Webinar Speakers Engage Their Learners. The company’s client relations manager asked me to write it because some of its clients wanted ideas for making their webinars more interactive.

As you’re planning your annual learning calendar, consider how you might enhance the value of your webinars by ensuring participants are actively engaged. Webinars are learning opportunities; they’re just delivered virtually! All adult learning principles and practices apply, just as they do in face-to-face learning. Your speakers might have to get more creative in how they engage their audiences, and it likely will take a little more effort…however the pay-off can be huge when it comes to learner satisfaction and “repeat business.”

How do you make it happen?

Continue reading →

{ 0 comments }

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →