Friday 29 June 2012

COLF, LSG and other acronyms

Again I seem to have been away too long - I blog in 140 characters or less because of it's convenience and speed but often curse at its restrictive nature. Pull your finger out and blog then huh?

The E side of my life has been quite interesting courtesy of the COLF course I am on. No, that's not a typo and I'm not trapsing through the undergrowth in search of yet another shanked 3 iron; COLF is the Certified Online Learning Facilitator course offered by the Learning and Performance Institute.

I'm piloting it on behalf of my employers and have to say I've been mighty impressed. I don't think it's a difficult course and there's no rocket science involved but it does provide a well-focused 'best practice' guide on how to facilitate the virtual classroom. At the end of the 9 one and a half to two hour online sessions comes a 25-30 minute assessment and hopefully an accreditation from LPI of what a good facilitator and all round good egg I am. (I'm not sure about the good egg bit from LPIs point of view.

The course is run by the delightful Mandy Randall-Gavin (who you'll find on Twitter @MandyRG - I recommend a follow). She brings a blend of happiness and professionalism, and the ability to 'say I don't know I'll find out' (important skill that) that has made the 16-18 hours of the course quite literally fly by. The rest of the particpants has helped too: Catherine, Paul, Jonathan, and Steve have all been allowed to show both their serious and humourous sides in equal measure.

Speaking of online, the Learning Skills Group have had an online conference this year instead of staging the event at Olympia (it's being fixed!). It is something of a paradox to bemoan the use of online sessions to replace the physical conference but I do miss the fact I couldn't go to Olympia for a more human experience. Yes, yes, I know Learning technologies are just that - online, remote, synchronous, of course I get that, and I regularly and happily attend the LSG presentations during the year but the not having the chance to get together is a big loss.

Perhaps it clarifies the biggest 'shortfall' of online, or maybe it highlights the need for online merely to act as a catalyst to more learning - to start the learning ball rolling. I missed the chance to network, to ask a person a question face to face, to watch a lecture and listen to and watch for the reaction of others. Without the need to physically remove myself from the workplace, the workplace took presidence and I missed all but one of the lectures. I refused to miss the one by Steve Wheeler - I really rarely hang on the word of someone but I truly respect what Steve has to say. He said at the beginning of the lecture that if it had been at Olympia he would not have been able to attend, I would have been at an event to watch someone who wasn't there... I think I've talked mysef into a corner... long live the online experience!! but I hope face to face never dies.