Final Reflection

Blogging has its ups and downs for me. I am not particularly excited by the idea of using it as a part of a course. I think it's because it forces me to be on a computer for yet more precious time. However, I must admit that I learned a lot from my personal exploration of a topic and the subsequent required writing about it. And, I learned much from visits to fellow colleagues' blogs. I even gained a great cartoon from Bart who sent it to me upon request. And, in terms of the actual journey, I viewed more videos, visited more websites, and gained more personal insight into how people use or don't use technology than any book would have provided.

All that said, the constraint of working within a small group of bloggers also had its ups and downs. On the positive side, I felt that I got to know Ashley, Bruce and Portip as people even though we never met. Bruce is a passionate gamer. He found more websites on games that I could count. Ashley is teacher. She wrote about how she utilized her learning into her classroom. And "Tah Tah" is an educator of another land. I even learned about a different culture through Tah. We, unfortunately, had a couple of folks who dropped out which limited our input. But, I did venture out into the blogs of others outside of my group from time to time.

The course constraint of covering one topic for a long period of time caused me to create a mental outline of what I was going to cover and when. For example, week one I'd cover "what is ___ (topic). Week two "how is it used." Week three "here's an example - an article, video, etc." Week four "here's software on it. Week five "here's how I used the software." So, for me, I needed a plan of attack to cover all of the areas I thought were pertinent to the topic and that would be of interest to others learning with me about that particular topic. Maybe, given the opportunity in the future, I would take a more constructionist approach to blogging used in a course in terms of letting the specific topic develop from week to week...which is probably more in line with what blogging should be about.

Overall, I really like that blogging brings the art of writing back into the forefront of the way we live. For a long time, I was thinking that writing was a lost art...especially in the business world where so much communication is in bullets and matrices. The internet, in general, has given a rebirth to the lost art of writing. Only, I hope that the good/correct grammar and punctuation practices will return in the future as well rather than the invented shortcuts often used for texting, IMing, etc.

So there you have it. The good, bad and the ugly of blogging.

Happy holidays!

Mickey

Mind Mapping Wrap Up

Well, I thought I would share some of my recent experiences with mind mapping since blogging about it.

I've conducted three training sessions in which I included mapping as an activity, and I actually used it for some personal reflection as well. I did not use the software in the activities....just the concept.

The first session was a management development session that used the technique to analyze a case study. Four teams of two or three people worked on the same case. Interestingly, each team came up with a different spin on the solutions. I think most participants had an aha moment.

The second session was with student affairs folks on worklife balance. We conducted an exercise for folks to identify themes of stressors, and then they were asked to join others with similar issues to mind map solutions. Again, folks jumped in quickly and seemed engaged. Each team debriefed their map.

The third session was with library folks whose job is being upgraded. We had them work at their table to brainstorm what was in their span of control in terms of the upgrade process and their feelings about all of the change they've endured. Again, they jumped in and the maps were, overall, pretty positive.

In all cases, we showed the Tony Buzan 4 minute video to demo the technique just before the map exercise. They all "got it" immediately. And, I'm not sure we ever really grow out of colored markers and paper!

Finally, I can speak to using this technique for a personal discovery process too. I mapped out four things: my feelings, concerns, ideal retirement job and things that make me most happy. It was an amazing experience to get all of these thoughts down on four small pieces of paper. I felt like I could see the "big" issues vs. the "small" ones. And, I felt empowered as I realized that I could deal with all of the things that, previously, were swimming around in my head.

Mind mapping is just a great tool. I really encourage you to try it. But, once is not done. You really need to do it a few times to get the swing of it.

And, then, download that free software and really have a good time.

Good luck!