July 2012 – Page 4 – TechCommGeekMom

E-learning’s Missing Ingredient | Business 2 Community

Posted on July 23, 2012July 23, 2012 by TechCommGeekMom

See on Scoop.it – M-learning, E-Learning, and Technical Communications

To quickly scale training globally, e-learning surely is the answer. Today’s global landscape is driving this need.

I will agree with the author that a oft-missed ingredient is social interaction. However, the point is missed that with mobile learning emerging, social interaction becomes much easier to do and facilitate. Even in many online classes I had as a grad student, there was never the lack of social interaction. We had heated discussions and lively debates all online from week to week. Some conversations even carried over beyond the assigned weeks on a given topic. The author is right that without social interaction, e-learning, in many respects, is like having a big library. And for some bookworm types–that’s okay. But with technology changing constantly and new forms of communication through web 2.0 tools constantly coming out…I don’t think this is so much the case.

What do you think? Write your comments below.

See on www.business2community.com

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Harvard Business Review: I Won’t Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar. Here’s Why.

Posted on July 23, 2012 by TechCommGeekMom

Harvard Business Review: I Won’t Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar. Here’s Why.

An English professor friend of mine posted this on Facebook, and it struck a chord with me. While I will never claim to be an expert grammarian (even though I did very well in my Professional and Technical Editing class in grad school), I have to admit I’m a bit of a stickler for good grammar as well. I suppose because some of the basics come so easily to me, I don’t understand why they don’t for others. I’m always surprised to see people who are pursuing Master’s degrees in technical writing have such poor grammar. Okay, not everyone, but a good portion of them. How did they get through high school and college and still not have some of these basics down as described in the article above? I don’t understand that concept. The whole essence of being a technical writer, to me, is being that precise and picky when writing or editing content. If words are not crafted in a particular way, their meanings or messages are lost or misconstrued, and that can be disasterous. I happen to know that the part-time job I have at an academic publishing house was originally gained because I was the only one who actually sent a cover letter that was written in a grammatically correct way.

This article truly speaks to me, and it’s why I try to work very hard at being as detail oriented as I can be, because it’s the difference between getting a job and keeping a job.

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e-Learning – A Growing Field For Technical Writers | Immerse CMS

Posted on July 22, 2012 by TechCommGeekMom

Read this article:
e-Learning – A Growing Field For Technical Writers | Immerse CMS.

This great little article makes a point that I’ve been trying to make on my own quest to find an e-learning positions. In no way am I putting down instructional designers, but as a trained technical communicator, I know that technical writers have the right stuff to be effective in writing for e-learning. Technical writers most often create user documentation and training manuals. With some creativity, imagination, and some quick learning of the basics of instructional design, technical writers can be quite capable of writing up e-learning content.

Now, with the advent of m-learning, the skills to be able to curate content and whittle it down to comprehensible, short yet clear information for smartphones and tablets will be vital. Technical writers are used to working with a mountain of information, and paring it down to the essential information needed to learn how to make something work or take a next step. Isn’t that a valuable skill to have as an instructional designer?

As more e-learning and especially m-learning programs expand, technical communicators are truly going to be needed to help bring things up to speed quickly to keep up with constantly emerging new mobile technologies.

So, if you are looking for a new instructional designer, think about giving a technical writer a chance. I’m sure there are plenty of them (including me especially) who would jump at the chance to write training materials in a new and exciting way, and technical writers already have most of the skills needed. The instructional design will come…most of the essential concepts aren’t that difficult. Give technical writers a chance!

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Seven Top Authoring Tools by Joe Ganci

Posted on July 18, 2012July 18, 2012 by TechCommGeekMom

See on Scoop.it – M-learning, E-Learning, and Technical Communications

“Following the publication of that report, I thought it would make sense to take the seven tools that survey respondents reported using the most and compare their features for you. While it is not always easy to compare the power and ease of use of two tools, it is certainly possible to place the features most people want and expect in an eLearning development tool side-by-side and review them.”

See on www.learningsolutionsmag.com