EveryMan Learning

Oh how I remember when offices didn’t have computers – let alone lap tops, palm pdas etc. etc. and the first mobile phone in the building was such a massive great thing – it was pretty hilarious to look at.  When our managers did at last decide that enough was enough, we’d fallen behind quite quickly and thus it was high time we took the bull by the horns and got online – big time!  So the very long winded business of building online operational systems with accounts, orders in, stock movements, delivery notes and invoices out etc. etc. All that took a couple of years to develop, with the help from the international community within the administrative group.  There were no such things as e-learning, online education or VLE software.  We were lucky to be given a mouse and mat with instructions to play Solitaire to get us used to pointing at the screen!

I have been watching many old documentaries on catch up tv on my ipad.  This is a constant pleasure and all the more because I never know what’s going to pop up on screen at any one time.  There is one series based around London, made between 1965 and 1991.  Just odd sequences of black and white film showing all kinds of London areas.  Covent Garden fruit market costa mongers, then it might jump to Borough Market or Petticoat Lane market.  These social history documentaries are a truly inspiration lesson to all generations – take pictures, videos and keep records of how we live now.   Learning how to read the history behind the lens is vital for all kinds of subjects.  When you take up a software training package, knowing how to read properly what you see in front of you is not something we always appreciate at the time.  Learning to learn is the key.

We are hearing all the time about the changes in secondary age education in the uk.  There have been many changes  with local education authorities being swept away with their school responsibilities replaced by government funded academies and free schools.   Teaching schemes and new style methods of learning were intended to free up the beaurocracies that stifled so much of the education system – apparently preventing the free thinking and learning that is needed.  What is more of a problem is the very limited curiculum that only teaches children to complete exams to a very high level, but completely misses out everything that isn’t on this very rigid proscriptive method.  For a youngster to get a fully rounded education in all subjects and to enter university fully equipped for a career focused degree course, they can help themselves with online courses and more robust teaching of the missing elements.