Category: learning

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Resilience is life-long learning – a lesson from Covid

Uncertainty is a commonly used word today.  Uncertainty creates stress – and the uncertainty in our private and work lives is escalated in a world being transformed by a pandemic that comes in waves. 

In this uncertain world, there is a lot of encouragement for us to develop a resilient mindset. It’s almost as if resilience is a silver bullet – something you can take to get you through the hardships. However, I have observed a few things over the last week that have caused me to stop and think. We need to be realistic about resilience.  Many people are finding it tough. Here are a few thoughts.

It’s okay to acknowledge and say you are not coping.

Continue reading “Resilience is life-long learning – a lesson from Covid”
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Working out loud…..opportunities for an introvert in social media? (Nowhere to hide in the COVID induced online work spaces)

My present enthusiasms include doing (again, it is simply that good) the Harold Jarche course on personal knowledge management, PKM in 40 days , and reconnecting the concept of working out loud.

This is challenging, as the introvert in me screams for this process to be internalised, and screams for a completing of the work before it is shared.  Small talk stresses me out, so the thought of working out load is scary.  It’s easier for me to talk about the complete picture, not the work in progress.  Working with people and in groups drains the energy from me.  I sense a loss of control over my thoughts…I am just not good at thinking out load. And this is really challenging in the digitally-connected, online work environment that COVID-19 has imposed on us – you can’t really take time out and hope to keep up – you either engage in every moment or you lose the sense of things (and you don’t know who is actually looking at you!) The introvert in me didn’t anticipate that.

So, working out loud in the social media might offer some great opportunities…I can put my ideas out in the hope that others can help improve them without…well, without having to be social.  Really? Well, it is really a different way to been social than the (team meeting, or face-to-face, or the social gathering) online meetings.

With social media, I can control the level of interaction and the pace of engagement.  I can create the space I need to recharge the batteries.

I guess I can still be social…work out load…and not raise my anxiety too much. Thus create some time and space for ideas to develop.

This will be (fun) (interesting) (scary) …..sort of like throwing caution to the wind….being vulnerable….learning….

Learning? ……… Acceptable risk

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How we best learn

How do you learn? Reflection is important. And the context or setting you are in is important. Another way to think about this, is to think of yourself in a teaching situation where you are dealing with fellow adults. When would they learn best from you?

If you understand how adults learn then you can create, or seek, the right conditions for yourself to learn. Adults learn best when:

  • They feel the need to learning and to have input into what, why and how they learn. (Voluntary participation is almost always preferred to mandatory – however people do sometime perceive learning as necessary after being forced into it.)
  • Learning’s content and processes bear a perceived and meaningful relationship to past experience and experience is effectively utilised as a resource for learning. (Adult learners need to realise that their experience constitutes both a potential asset and a potential liability for learning.  Education needs to take into account previous experience – create environments in which people are free to analyse experience and try out new ways of learning.)
  • What is to be learned relates optimally to the individual’s development changes and life tasks.
  • The amount of autonomy exercised by the learner is congruent with that required by the mode and method utilised.
  • They learn in a climate that minimises anxiety and encourages freedom to experiment (collaborative learning requires a climate of mutual trust and teamwork in which people feel accepted and free to disagree and take risks.  “When people are truly treated as adults”)
  • Their learning styles are taken into account.

From  Smith R M (1983)  Learning How to Learn: Applied Theory for Adults.  Milton Keynes: The Open University  pp.47-49

See also Reflection in Action: Reflection on Action. What is it that we do when we do what we do?

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Reflection in Action: Reflection on Action. What is it that we do when we do what we do?

What is it that we do when we do what we do?

Donald Schon introduced many of us to the power of reflection in The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. He drew on earlier work by John Dewey to demonstrate how you could draw insights from experience through reflective practice. What is it? Why is it useful?

Schon defines reflective practice as the practice by which professionals become aware of their implicit knowledge base and learn from their experience. He uses three terms:

  • knowing in action
  • reflection in action
  • reflection on action
Continue reading “Reflection in Action: Reflection on Action. What is it that we do when we do what we do?”