November 10, 1969

This was the first day upon which someone could tune their TV into a National Education Television station and here the now culturally pervasive jingle, “Sunny days keeping the clouds away….”

Yes, forty years ago today Sesame Street was born on the ailing network soon to be replaced by the federally funded Public Broadcasting System.

From the beginning, Sesame Street was developed with a curriculum in mind, and a philosophy that education and entertainment should be integrated - and an understanding that it was okay to pursue broad educational goals because a breadth of topics would be more likely to …

You’ve been there… eyelids growing heavy, mind wandering, sitting through another boring business presentation. And what happens when it’s your turn to speak? Chances are you are committing some of the same presentations sins as everyone else. One of the greatest of these sins is the misuse of presentation software like PowerPoint.

Slides laden with bulleted text are not ingredients for a powerful presentation. But many of us don’t know any better. The templates provided by the software seem to beg for bullets and text and slide titles and logos and clipart. What were meant as tools to make …

The American Association of School Librarians (AASL) recently compiled a list of this year’s top 25 free websites for teaching and learning.

Each site comes with a description of how it can be used by teachers or students, and while some of the sites are specifically academic, many provide online and mixed-technology solutions for anyone interested in collaborative, interactive, or long distance projects and communication.

Here are just a few of their suggestions, and how they could be used in the business world:

Mindmeister

Finally an organizational site for the visual thinker. Mindmeister’s mind map format is easy good for …
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Rich media is the result of combining text, still graphics, voiceover audio, background music, and video. These elements are combined to create dynamic motion that occurs over time or in direct response to user interaction.

Rich media is powerful because it engages the user and keeps him captivated more so than any other media. It draws users in and makes them part of the experience.

At MB/I, we use Flash—the industry-leading software for creating interactive experiences. We deliver presentations to audiences across platforms and devices. With Flash, we can add interactivity by customizing what each user sees and these same …

At MB/I, we have partnered with Scott Stiefvater of Blue Sky Video Production to offer e-learning programs. We take a five-phase approach to producing e-learning programs: analysis, design, development, implementation and evaluation.

Analysis
Through a process of interviews and workshops we draw out and align the objectives of the various e-learning stakeholder groups within your organization. We also explore such things as the audience demographics, the learning environment, delivery options as well as budget and time constraints. From this research, we generate the requirements for the content, design and delivery of the e-learning program.

Design
MB/I takes a “backward” approach to design. Based on our analysis, we first outline the program’s …

At MB/I, we have partnered with Scott Stiefvater of Blue Sky Video Production to offer e-learning programs. Our approach involves three key areas: instructional design, user experience, and technology.

Instructional Design
We see learning for what it is – a complex process. Our e-learning programs are developed with the understanding that they are just one part of that process. Yet, we are intentional about every element of the learning programs we develop so that the learner is motivated to apply the information, concepts, skills and attitudes they learn. To this end, instructional design calls for a vast amount of creativity, but creativity …