Knot Tried

PROLOGUE
I’d like to teach the world to sing “I’d to teach the world to sing” — The New Seekers, 1972.
KNOT
Day 10’s AprilBlogaDay is suddenly upon me. Who knew it’d wrap me up in its all encompassing thrall? What have I not tried this school year that I want to? (Disclosure: I’m an instructional designer producing learning experiences for health care providers).

Sure, a Tangram is supposed to come with seven shapes. But if seven is good eight or more must be great!
Anyway, most of my better ideas for learning activities have their roots in K-12; the bulk of my PD (Professional Development) activities come from participation in EdCamps, CUE, and TCEA events. There’s some amazing things going on in K-12. The rub for me is my learners are quite a bit older than first graders, so there’s that. Other differences are a little more knotty.
For example, teachers sometimes assign stuff to be completed after school hours. With adult learners being trained this way can be a big no-no; unions have contracts and there are strict rules for overtime and so on.
I usually have to reflect tons and bounce ideas off my PLN (Personal Learning Network) before an idea morphs into something that I can test.
TRIED
Tried is tired spelled sideways.
When, as part of my design thinking instructional design process, I interview learners I hear a lot of moans and groans about stuff that doesn’t work or work well. Don’t get me wrong. Most of the learning I see is great. But there’s room for improvement.

The thing I’d like to try next is a series of case studies told over a campfire. There’d be a campfire hook (thank you @burgessdave and his Teach Like a Pirate book for that) to draw learners in. What would have been a series of PowerPoint slides on a wall and a lecture would instead be transformed into hearing about a problem and then working through to an actual solution.
My thinking here is that at by the end of the training transfer would have occurred and learners will have made something (job-aids, decision-trees, something I haven’t even thought of (!!)) to make their learning visual and discussable. To the English teachers in my PLN: apologies for that run-on.
EPILOGUE
A lot of technology goes into education and training. I’d like to try a more primitive and earthy approach next time out. I’ll let you know how it goes.