Image use courtesy of lrnchat and Kevin Thorn (@LearnNuggets)
Each week that I am able to participate in #lrnchat discussion I post a summary of the discussion to my blog. I do this both for my personal development as well as sharing with the Learning and Development Profession at large. This summary is based on my own interpretations of the chat; others who participated may have differing opinions or interpretations of the discussion. I welcome those that do to add your ideas to the comments.
The topic of this week's #lrnchat session was “What did you lean outside of a classroom this summer?".
I always find looking at the questions that are used to loosely guide the chat as a nice way to see the overall theme of the chat. Here are the discussion questions that were presented to the group:
Q1) This summer, what did you learn that wasn't in a classroom?
Q2) What did you teach someone over the summer that wasn't a classroom?
Q3) What did you do this summer that was new (well, at least new to you)?
Q4) What do you wish you'd done (or learned) this summer?
Q5) What did you do this summer that you'd strongly suggest the rest of us do next summer?
I won't be doing that in this post.
While their was shared value in hearing what peers have been learning and sharing during the summer months, that really wasn't the value of the chat, at least not for me.
What people learned during the summer is extremely personal. What was important to one person may not be relevant to anyone else. It's always nice to share experiences with friends, and we can learn a great deal that way. I just don't think that was the true value of this chat.
The value of the questions isn't really in the answers we shared at all; it's in the quality of the questions we challenge ourselves with in order to arrive at our answers.
So in this 'Reflections on #lrnchat' post, I will not be reflecting on the answers to the questions; I will be exploring the questions themselves. As I do, keep in mind that these are MY interpretations of the questions – yours may have been different.
This summer, what did you learn that wasn't in a classroom?
This question could have simply asked "what did you learn this summer?", but it added a qualifier: "outside of the classroom". Why add the restriction?
The qualifier of 'outside the classroom' provides an important focus on one of the main challenges in education today. Let's look at some basic questions and answers, and then apply some basic logic. Note: the answers here are typical surface level answers, not the root answers you would get if you dug deeper.
Why do people go to school? >> Answer: To Learn
What do you call the weeks off from school during the spring, summer, or holidays? >> Answer: a 'Break'
So if we go to school to learn, and the time off from school is a break, logic would then dictate that Summer is therefore a break from learning, right?
Hell no.
Summer is a time of additional freedoms. Students are free of their class schedules. Workers traditionally take vacation time, freeing them from the routines of their workplace. That's not when learning stops; I'd argue that it's more when learning accelerates.
The freedom provided by vacations and breaks gives us the opportunity to visit new places, explore new interests, or connect with friends and family. All of these experiences provide us with learning and growth opportunities we would likely not have available to us within the structure of a 'classroom'.
Summer is hardly a break from learning, but thankfully, it is often a break from being taught.
What did you teach someone over the summer that wasn't a classroom?
Again the question here isn't really about the teaching you did online, or in a field, or any other non-classroom location. In truth, the real question to consider here has nothing to do with teaching at all.
How did you help people learn outside of your regularly scheduled learning programs? Or... How did you help people learn this summer without formally instructing them?
There's tremendous value in exploring those questions. Too often we are so dependent on the structure we have built into our learning culture that we turn a blind eye to new ways of doing things. And yet, given the freedom of that environment, we subconsciously find ourselves learning through our social connections and through experience and experimentation.
How many times this summer did you just insert a new variable into your everyday workflow and just allow the learning to happen? A visit to the zoo, an unexpected itinerary on a rainy day, getting a new toy – be it a Playdoh set or an Pad – and just diving in and exploring it… these are all great opportunities to learn, and it happens without us consciously stopping and choosing to learn; the learning just happens as part of the experience.
Recognizing this is important, because it provides a frame of reference for the future of organizational learning and performance. The future isn’t in stopping work so you have a chance to learn; the future is in finding ways to fit the learning into the work itself.
What did you do this summer that was new (well, at least new to you)? and…
What do you wish you'd done (or learned) this summer?
I combine these two questions because I think they both speak to a greater question: Did you accomplish your goals for the summer, or – in the absence of goals – did the summer just happen to you?
For me there was a bit of a hesitation when these questions were posed during the chat. I had to think about my answer, and that’s somewhat surprising and concerning. As someone that is passionate about my continuous development, my learning goals should right at the forefront of my thoughts simply because of the priority and focus I place on them.
That wasn’t the case. Yes, I had goals, and after a few moments was able to add them to the discussion. However, it was the hesitation in my answering that was my biggest takeaway; it shows that I need to check my compass more often to ensure I’m still on course.
What did you do this summer that you'd strongly suggest the rest of us do next summer?
This question is pretty straightforward in wording, and many people shared great experiences that they had over the past few months – many of which I’d be lying if I didn’t admit some degree of jealousy about.
This summer I did a number of great day trips, spent wonderful impromptu days exploring with my kids, and learned a tremendous amount trough our move to a new house.
None of which I mentioned during the chat.
It’s not that I was being anti-social. I have no problem sharing stories of those experiences with people. It’s just that because of the lens through which I view the context of #lrnchat, I read the question a little differently…
What did you do this summer – in your role as a learning professional – that you’d strongly suggest the rest of us – who in most cases share that role – do next summer?
That’s why my responses were different. I spent a large amount of time this summer thinking about my journey as a professional, and what I need to be doing to keep it moving forward. The structure of this question made me consider: Am I further along my path than I was on May 1st? If so, what’s been working? If not, what can I be doing differently?
If you didn’t look at the question in that manner, I highly recommend that you do now.
Overall, I think this chat did a great job of reinvigorating the chat after scaling it back so that people could explore the additional freedoms of the summer. Hopefully it also reminded us all that the ‘break’ summer provided was not a break from learning; it was a break from directed-learning.
And that’s, as Martha Stewart might say… “a good thing”.
One last note: This flipping of format for this post – focusing on the questions themselves instead of the answers – reminded me of one of the major ways I learn from #lrnchat discussions. Often the greatest value for me in #lrnchat isn’t in answering and discussing the questions (though doing so does have tremendous value); Sometimes the most powerful takeaway is in considering why the questions were chosen to be asked in the first place.
Until next time #lrnchat-ers!
