Tag Archives: learning

How is learning an emergent phenomenon?

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At the end of yet another jaw-dropping TED talk education scientist Sugata Mitra makes a this “guess”:

“Education is self-organizing system, where learning is an emergent phenomenon.”

He says that this should take a few years to prove, experimentally.

Yet it is worth the try.

In the meanwhile, his “Hole in the Wall” experiments show how in the absence of supervision or formal teaching, children can teach themselves and each other, if they’re motivated by curiosity and peer interest.

It seems all we might need for quality learning might be to keep our natural interest in the world — the one  we are all  born with — alive.

Pretty simple stuff.

And then you need your grandmother. No, really, just follow this method that has already proven to be one of the best for learning – the method of the grandmother. What is that?

“Well, what you’ve got to do is stand behind them and admire them all the time. Just say to them, ‘That’s cool. That’s fantastic. What is that? Can you do that again? Can you show me some more?’”

This is what is being built now. They’re called SOLEs: Self Organized Learning Environments. Children are sitting in front of big, powerful screens, big broadband connections, but in groups. They can talk to each other as much as they want. Actually talking to each other is imperant that they do that. And if they want, they can call the “granny cloud”.

Here is the news. We are just one billion children, 100 million mediators, 10 millions SOLEs, 180 billion dollars and 10 years away from. Do you believe we could change everything?

Counting The Cost Of Recruitment Learning and Development In The Recession

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By Nick Jervis

What action can you take to ensure that you hold onto your staff and keep your recruitment costs as low as possible? Estimates vary, but to replace a solicitor the total expense in terms of recruitment, lost man hours of the outgoing staff and the training of the incoming member, can exceed £100,000.

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development has completed their 2009 Annual Survey of Recruitment, Retention and Turnover and it has identified some interesting trends.


Although there has been a significant reduction in the number of vacancies available, organisations are still reporting recruitment difficulties and the key reason for these difficulties are the lack of necessary specialist skills.

Learning and Development becomes even more important, as three quarters of organisations questioned said they were identifying internal staff and providing training to allow these staff to fill those posts.

This becomes even more important when you identify that the average cost per employee to fill a vacancy is £4,000, which rises to £6,125 when also calculating the associated labour turnover costs.

So why should you invest in training and development during the recession?

Whilst movement in the labour market during a recession invariably falls, employee retention is still a huge problem, with nearly 70% of organisations having issues retaining their staff. The most common method of increasing staff loyalty and therefore increasing retention is by offering Learning and Development opportunities.

37% of leavers state a lack of development opportunities as the reason for leaving the organisation, with only promotion outside of the organisation and change of career being above as a reason for leaving.

So in order to retain your staff both in and out of recession you should ensure you develop them and ensure they are maximising their potential in your business.

The Government is offering small and medium sized businesses a grant of up to £1,500 to fund learning and development. You can take advantage of this scheme and it does not take a lot of time to access the grant (less than an hour can be enough). There are obviously criteria you need to meet to obtain the grant, but these are easily explained by the advisor who comes to visit you. You can arrange a visit with an advisor at http://www.traintogain.gov.uk to see if you are eligible.

In short, it is vital to continue on with learning and development through the recession as it can mean that your business is successful and rides the storm. After all, your staff are your most important resource and without them you wouldn’t have a business.


For more information and a training newsletter with course details, visit MASS Training for all of your Legal Training needs . MASS Training provide cost effective, practical and interactive Personal Injury Courses. Nick Jervis is a Solicitor (non-practising) and a Legal Marketing Consultant for Solicitors and Legal Businesses in The UK and a Director of Samson Consulting.

“Success” Learning from my Parents Mistakes…

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By Anthony K Wilson Sr

As I look back I now understand how many hardships I did not have to face if I had taken my parents advice; now I will help my children break this cycle and capitalize on all this valuable insight.

Perhaps your parents had limitations which you do not have. Perhaps they made mistakes in their lives. Whatever your parents’ younger years consisted of, it is likely that they want better for you.

Continue reading →

Breaking The Bonds Of Limiting Influence

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By John Halderman

If you are wanting to live your life uniquely, your own way, doing what you are here to do, you will need to take a good look at what is influencing you day in and day out. Your family, friends, groups and society all can influence your life usually beyond your awareness. Most people operate within what is considered normal in our society. People tend to go away from discomfort and pain, seeking comfort however they can, which usually means not wanting to feel the wrath of disapproval for doing something out of the ordinary.

The fact that most people are influenced greatly by others keeps them living a life where they are striving to feel good and be happy, but in ways that don’t bring long lasting results of either. If you are influenced to behave like the masses by the masses, what has happened to your unique inner drive? It is sniffled because it does not fit into the norm, and you have allowed yourself to go the more comfortable route, keeping in alignment with those around you.

There is something we are each intended to do, and we get thoughts and feelings about this, but usually cover it up. We think it can’t be done, because it doesn’t look like the life we are now living. The life we have fallen into by listening to and watching the masses rather than our heart and inner guidance is not usually close to our passion and purpose.

Our true deep happiness and satisfaction Continue reading →

How To Optimize Your Brain and Improve Your Memory

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By Leonidas Auerbach

Think about the crucial role your brain plays in the quality of your life. All the signals about the environment captured by your 5 senses are processed in your brain. What you think goes through your brain, what you learn, what you memorize… heck, your brain even controls how fast your heart is beating and your digestive system.

Simply by optimizing your brain, you can change your life. You can break free of addiction (which also originates in your brain), you can quadruple your productivity and you can keep your independence well into your 90s. But for now, in this article, I will concentrate merely on one aspect of your brain.

In this article, I’ll show you how you can improve your memory and never again forget you place the keys! Continue reading →

Creatively Stressed: Anxiety is NOT the Enemy!

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1194315_plasterYou’re obsessed. You’re obsessed with your work, your craft. You think about your art, your character, painting, sculpture, upcoming tour, or screenplay seemingly every waking minute of every day. Heck, you even dream about it!

This fiendish infatuation with your craft, the passion that drives you to get out of bed in the morning is a wonderful gift. Why is it, then, that this fixation on what makes the earth move for you can also stop you dead in your tracks? Cold. Left abandoned by the “What if’s” or “I’m not enough’s” or any version of “I can’t because”.

What starts as a life-affirming energizer bunny within you becomes a taunting dragon that tortures you day in and day out. You feel like there is no escape. If you walk away from what your heart is calling you to become you trade desire for a lifetime of despair. Anxiety.

What is anxiety? Anxiety is worry, anticipation for a future misfortune. Anxiety is irrational fear. Rational fear is real. You fear fire if you’re in a burning house because fire will deliver great harm to you if you just sit there. Irrational fear is worry that your house might burn to the ground as you sleep when there is no sign of fire, no observable hint of a pending fire, as you rest your head on your pillow. Irrational fear is despair over potential bad reviews of your work. You spend your days in desperate anxiety over what you think will be a career, or life-ending, dose of criticism. You believe that your future will be ruined if your performance or creation doesn’t meet with high approval and reward. You think your life will be meaningless; you will have no value or purpose.


And, in your anxiety, you are stuck. You’re frozen on your path like the proverbial deer in the headlights. You Find Excuses And Reasons (F.E.A.R.) to put off moments of judgment. You never finish your painting, screenplay or composition. You blow off your audition because you think your boss won’t let you have the afternoon off. And then you beat yourself up over your procrastination and missed opportunity. And what you fear becomes even more real to you.

Nonsense!

Your anxiety can work for you! Anxiety is just a signal. It is a signal to your Higher Self that you are about to stretch out of your current comfort zone; about to grow. You are about to enter into unknown territory and that ego within you, the Inner Critic, is spooked. Just observe. Notice when your Inner Critic, the voice that delivers your self-doubt and fear, is freaked out. Know that in that moment you have a choice. You can give your personal power over to your Inner Critic, let him lead your choice and stay right where you are where it is ‘safe’. Or, you can recognize that you are about to take one giant step closer to the actualization of your dream.

Remind your egoic Inner Critic that whatever happens, you will be safe. If you are booed off the stage, publicly humiliated by an art critic or your screenplay is tossed in the round file you are still you. You still have meaning and purpose. And you get to learn something from that experience. These lessons are gifts for they are what ultimately deliver what you desire – the masterful expression of your full potential. Look around you. Those you admire got to where they are through a path of stretching, learning, growing, and mastering their craft. So can you.

Choose to maintain your personal power. Know that what you fear is also what you are here to do. There is only one way to mitigate your anxiety and that is to do the thing that makes you anxious!

Copyright © 2009 Valery Satterwhite

Valery is an Artist Mindset Mentor and Coach who helps creative people get out of their own way so that they can overcome the struggles that come packaged with the life of a visual & performing artist. Clients learn how to express their full potential to create more passionately, profoundly, productively and profitably. Empower the Wizard Within to actualize your full creative potential. http://www.InnerWizard.com Get Free Empowerment tips!

What it Takes to Actualize Your Creative Talents

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1161645_fruitsaladHide not your talents. They for use were made. What’s a sundial in the shade? – Benjamin Franklin

The most exciting place to discover and actualize your talent is in yourself. What does it mean to realize your talents, and how do you do it? When you actualize your talents you understand them clearly and bring them forth out into the world. Understanding and expressing your talent is an active, continuing process of knowing what you can do and who you are, at your deepest level.

People who actualize their talents actively participate in the ongoing process in which one’s abilities are fully, creatively and enthusiastically expressed.

“Self actualization means working to do well the thing that one wants to do.” – Abraham Maslow

The roots of developing your natural talents are in your learning and coping skills. Do you seek opportunities to learn and grow, stretch beyond your current abilities even if part of the process includes mistakes and criticism? Or do you keep safely within limitations that allow you to evade judgment and vulnerability? Authenticity, self-confidence and self-worth development is an important to the expansion of your talents as is the mastery of actual skills and knowledge.

Emotional intelligence, mental health challenges and other aspects of being human can impact how you relate to the world and other people, and express your talents. Living authentically with passion and purpose instead of though the well-meaning ‘should-be and suppose to’ directions of others is essential to your growth as a creative person in all areas of your life. How you react, and your awareness level of your reactions, to the events of your life shape your ability to express your potential.

As with suppressing emotions, suppressing your natural creative talents ultimately results in dissatisfaction and depression. Simply put, holding yourself back is bad for your health, emotionally and physically. Expressing your creative talent is not just about splashing paint on canvas or writing or performing in the latest Broadway hit. Full creative expression involves the application of certain attitudes, such as curiosity, metamorphosis, playfulness and experimentation, to any aspect of life

“Authentic treachery is found when we abandon ourselves, becoming deaf to the whispers of our spirits and blind to the powerful potential therein” – Joaquin Mariel Espinosa

To live creatively, actualizing your talents, is to live your life in the moment and at full-blast. If your ego, that woefully misguided Inner Critic, has held you back from living out loud in your creative expression, disarm it; take away its power to direct your choices, actions and that which you experience. Tell it that it can come along for the ride but for the rest of your life journey, your Inner Critic will sit in the back seat, perhaps with a bankie and a sippy cup.

There’s an easy way to determine whether or not you are expressing or suppressing your natural talents. Pay attention to how you feel. If you’re tired, unmotivated, or unfulfilled you are holding yourself back. You have given your personal and creative powers over to your Inner Critic. If you feel good, productive and full of energy then you have tapped into the vast resource that is your birthright, your personal power, inborn talent and higher self – or what I playfully call the Wizard that is Within you.

The Wizard that is Within you knows you by heart. She knows your truth, purpose and passion in life. She is the voice of your intuition and inspiration. She is your Muse. Reclaim your personal power, acknowledge, honor and nurture your talents that are your birthright to mindfully and intentionally maximize your full potential.

“Speak, look and act in the direction of your dreams.” – Wizard Wizdom

Copyright © 2009 Valery Satterwhite; Valery is a Creative Mentor who helps people get out of their own way so they can move overcome the struggles that come packaged with the life of a visual & performing artist. Clients learn how to express their full potential deliberately & responsibly to create more passionately, profoundly, productively & profitably. Empower the Inner Wizard to actualize your authentic talents. http://www.InnerWizard.com Free “Empower the Inner Wizard tips”