14 December 2006

DIY Visual Thinking School


Visual thinking school, originally uploaded by dgray_xplane.

Visual Thinking School (VTS) is a two-hour time slot that XPLANE sets aside each week, specifically for our teams to improve their visual thinking skills.

You can set up and run your own "DIY" version, either at work or at home. Here's how:

The trick is to remember that visual thinking is a holistic skill that involves training the eye, mind and body. The "XPLANE way" is evolving constantly -- most XPLANERs probably learn and try something new at least once a week.

You don't need to be an expert to run visual thinking workshops. Instead of thinking of yourself as a teacher, think of yourself as a learning director. Learning, as opposed to teaching, can be largely self-directed and is usually about a person trying to figure out a way to achieve a goal.

You don't need to be a teacher as much as a goal-setter. Once you have set learning objectives, you can have your team design learning activities themselves.

You could try rotating ownership of VTS to a different person each week.

Give the "VTS owner" a training goal and let them design the session. They can then make calls to subject-matter experts or do some research to fill in any gaps in their knowledge.

You will be amazed at what results you can get with that approach.

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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Very interested in the Visual Thinking School approach.

I was always very interested in Richard Wurman's approach to teaching... he said that when he started teaching, he had 2 choices: teach what he already new, or teach what he didn't know. He chose the second and kept on learning together with everyone.

I have always admired him for that... an adventurous spirit, and it is easier said than done!

Anonymous said...

ery interested in the Visual Thinking School approach.

I was always fascinated with Richard Wurman's approach to teaching... he said that when he started teaching, he had 2 choices: teach what he already new, or teach what he didn't know. He chose the second and kept on learning together with everyone.

I have always admired him for that... an adventurous spirit, and it is easier said than done!

Lucas said...

I really like your thoughts on leadership, communication and innovation. I linked to your blog so I can stay posted. I would love to attend one of your visual thinking classes. Would you ever consider that? I volunteer much of my free-time thinking of innovative ideas to create a more relevant and authentic experience at our church in KC. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

http://innovativechurchideas.blogspot.com