From Stephanie Crowley of Chrysalis Studios:
Several cool tools have emerged on the Web 2.0 tech horizon that enable swift data visualization of numbers and text. Below are examples of Obama's speech as parsed by two such on-line utilities: Worldes and ManyEyes.
I wanted to share my image with you all. This morning I drew Barack Obama's inauguration speech: There's a page for it here, including a PDF to print. I'm usually drawing conversations, not a single, succinct speaker. I normally map in real time, but the density of Obama's point made me take very quick notes on what stood out to me. I quickly found a transcript of the speech online to reference. One way I help groups is by summarizing and synthesizing their words into brief points. In this case, getting our new president's words verbatim was important. I compared my notes to the transcript, giving me a chance to really decide what to pull out for the drawing. Next, I took to drawing those points around the main banner of Obama. In my drawing, I really focused on the ideas of work and...
Sometimes the objective of a given session doesn't go as planned. Things can be going just fine when suddenly, the unexpected happens and threatens your entire process. In my humble experience as a facilitator, I've learned to look forward to things "going wrong!" Why? Because, if they are handled well, they can present some of the richest learning or barrier-removing opportunities available. In fact, I've come to see these occurrences as gifts, offering my groups the chance to explore in ways I could never have planned.
Crayon Physics Deluxe from Petri Purho on Vimeo. How many Saturday afternoons did I spend with a huge sheet of paper, a box of crayons, and visions of spaceships careening, cowboys shooting, cannonballs arching across the page? "It's a game where your crayon drawings come to life," 25-year-old independent games designer from Finland named Petri Purho. "You draw stuff and your drawings behave physically correctly. LOOK: The game trailer LISTEN: Interview with NPR's Melissa Block GET: Buy the game ($19.95) from http://www.crayonphysics.com/
At CES 2009, Toshiba showed off a conceptual computer interface that uses hand gestures for control. With simple motion sensing technology and a software interface, Toshiba hopes to open up applications for video games and other interactive media.
Many years ago, then unemployed art director Marty Coleman started to draw simple pictures on the napkins that he included in his daughters' school lunch bags.
Steve Davis of Facilitator U. shares some wisdom from a short article written by David Ellis, author of Becoming a Master Student, entitled "How to Fool Yourself--Six Common Mistakes in Logic. These points seem relevant to our interest in clear, critical thinking as facilitators, in his article, Getting to the Truth.
Jerry Michalski describes himself as "a pattern finder, lateral thinker, Gladwellian connector and explorer of the interactions between technology, society and business." In this podcast from VizThink, Jerry discusses how he thinks visually and helps others to navigete the massive universe of ideas and information. Visual Knowledge Management from VizThink: 100s of messages in your inbox, overflowing blog readers, browser tabs filled with websites to explore…that and so much more can lead to information overload. For over a decade, Jerry Michalski has been using his Brain to not just process that information, but to organize, recall, and find hidden relationships between the disparate pieces of information. In this 15 minute, 34 second podcast, we discuss using visualization for knowledge management, dealing with massive quantities of information over long periods, and a view of where future technology needs to go in order to manage the...
When working with your team or clients as you kick off the new year, Steve Davis of FacilitatorU.com reminds us in the post below to celebrate successes, challenges, wins and losses, friends, colleagues, children and bosses.