DIYEL #11 Ask learners to tell their stories and also to listen to others’ stories.

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Introduction
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We are used to people telling us stories. My grandmother used to scare my sister and me with her stories of vampires and gremlins. As I grew older, I learned there is another side of storytelling, and that is listeners telling their own stories. As the listeners tell their stories, they are embedding the ideas in their minds and in their lives. In turn, the storyteller has learned from the listener. This is the crux of informal learning, which accounts for a lot of the way people learn. And this is an opportunity for the Do-It-Yourselfers.

Do-It-Yourselfers extend the formal learning in eLearning design to open-ended informational learning on line through discussion rooms, wikis, blogs, Twitters and social book marking (otherwise known as Web 2.0 tools). These are tools that allow Do-It-Yourselfers to seek help by asking learners to share stories through ongoing conversations. At the heart of Web 2.0 tools are stories and conversations, not the Web 2.0 technologies. Many technologies will come and go. Instead, learn how to provoke storytelling. The content is what gives the technologies their power.

(This is a series of post from my book “Do-It-Yourself eLearning 2009).

Related Blog Entries:

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Ray Jimenez, PhD
http://www.vignettestraining.com/
http://www.simplifyelearning.com/

“Helping Learners Learn Their Way”