Writing assisted learning

One post every three years is a start right?!

So nearly every day I consider writing something somewhere public (electronically that is) but never do. Deep down I know that doing so will help with the learning process, but I also have this innate fear that putting thoughts out in public imply too much of a commitment to what is written and expose them to judgement and perhaps even ridicule.

So to kill several birds with one stone I am going to make an effort to capture my thoughts and notes on current topics out in the open, rather than in Evernote or simply by retweeting related tweets.

A colleague recently posted, on Yammer, about an interesting article related to how the brain learns. Unfortunately there is a lot in there related to sleep, and the lack of it. That might explain why I tend to feel like a dunce most days. On the plus side there is also some information unrelated to sleep, including learning better with the mindset of having to later teach (which can be facilitated by writing on the topic) and also interleaving your learning.

A key thing to learn is how to become a smarter learner and manage ones own learning.

For general learning I turn to the web like many people. I also like to read, although do not do so even a fraction as much as I did before children. For more specific learning I always assume that there must be an app for that, and there usually is.

Currently I am learning languages using Duolingo and Memrise. Work have launched an internal electronic 'university' based on an open source e-learning platform. I also use Lumosity fairly regularly to give the brain a different kind of work out. In terms of learning by teaching, I guess I do a bit of this through my involvement with the Experts Exchange where I try to do the minimum to retain my free membership and in doing so keep certain technical skills in tune. Less regularly I dabble with coderbyte for some real hands-on challenges.

Upon reflection, each of the tools above incorporate at least one of the concepts talked about in above-mentioned article. All involve (or allow for) a degree of interleaving, and most involve writing. Now if only I could find one to get the sleep situation under control...

Scaling Agile

I have been wanting to get a blog out for a long, long time. Tired of waiting for the right first topic to come along I am simply going to share an interesting presentation regarding a subject that is pretty relevant to me right now: how to scale agile in a large enterprise environment.

If it does not display here try accessing directly through SlideShare at this link.



Enjoy!