Curated Industry Content for the Week of 08/08/16

Every Monday we curate a number of articles and blog posts that have relevance to members of the eLearning Guild Community, and to the learning and performance field as a whole. Each piece of content that we share includes a brief introduction from the member of the Guild Community sharing why they think the content is important.

Here’s the content for this week:

If You’re Not Outside Your Comfort Zone, You Won’t Learn Anything by Andy Molinsky
True learning is about growth, and the greatest sources for growth often come from operating outside our comfort zones. This article explore the learning value of venturing outside your confort areas, and uses and example that many reading this post may be interested in: speaking at industry events.-David Kelly

Boeing is Using Google Glass to Build Airplanes by Nick Statt
While Google Glass was an interesting attempt at a wearable AR device, the hype never ended up matching the reality from a consumer perspective. That said, it’s still alive and well in an area that it makes the most sense in: performance support. Boeing has been experimenting with using the device to provide assembly instructions to their technicians, trading tedious PDF guides for easy to follow AR directions. It’s projects like these that show the real potential for AR and wearables in L&D. -Bianca Woods

Here Are 17 Places to Get Free Templates for E-Learning by Tom Kuhlmann
Templates are a great tool for jump-starting elearning development. \When looked at with an open mind, they can also be a great resource for inspiring your own design. That’s what I like about this post. It curates a number of websites from developers that share their own templates. It’s a great way to see what others in the industry are doing, thus inspiring your own designs. NOTE: These templates are made for a specific tool, but the design inspiration can be applied to whatever tool you may be using. -David Kelly

Beyond the Virtual Tour: Virtual Reality for Higher Education by Campusbird
Virtual Reality is coming, but what are the use cases for learning, education, and related spaces?  This post examines a few examples of virtual reality being used to help people learn about a critical decision in young people’s lives: Deciding where to go to college. While this post specifically explores that area, the examples shared can be adapted to multiple contexts. -David Kelly

21 Signs That Story You’re About To Share Is Secretly B.S. by AuntieMeme
For many of us, social media feeds have become a major source for news consumption. While the convenience of this has many benefits, there are also risks. When we read something, we are often learning and shaping our viewpoints. Unfortunately, much of the news we encounter online is at best biased, and at worst, completely untrue. This post shares a number of great red flags that can be a sign that the content you’re reading online may not be completely true. (Warning – some strong language) -David Kelly

The Washington Post will use robots to write stories about the Rio Olympics by Peter Kafka
The use of artificial intelligence is rapidly growing. This article examines a milestone in the world of AI, as the Washinton Post will begin to have AI generate public coverage of this year’s Summer Olympics. This use of AI opens up a number of interesting questions about the opportunities and risks of AI, and it makes you wonder: If machines and algorithms are generating much of content we consume, what impact might that have on what and how we learn? -David Kelly

What are you reading?

If you have an article, blog post, or other resource that you think we should consider sharing in a future Curated Industry Content post, please feel free to send a link to the resource to David Kelly along with a few sentences describing why you think the resource is valuable.