Social learning handbook - a review

I must admit that I'm slightly uncomfortable with the use of the phrase 'social learning' to mean 'learning with social media', because it implies (1) that social learning is anything unusual and (2) that social media is the only way of learning from and with one's peers. There is hardly a person alive who hasn't learned socially, just as there isn't a person who hasn't learned many things on their own or through the efforts of a teacher. L&D are the last people to need convincing of the benefits of social learning because, after all, aren't they the first to complain when anyone suggests that a 'social' classroom experience should be converted to a very non-social self-study piece of e-learning.

Having said all this, the new social media really  do make a big difference. They amplify the opportunities for social learning to an extraordinary degree, extending reach way beyond those who you can connect with face-to-face and empowering all of us to be teachers as well as learners. Bit by bit, the astonishing take-up of social media tools in all parts of the world and amongst practically all sectors of society is not only changing how we all behave, it's changing what we are.

L&D have a tough job introducing social media tools into workplace learning; they are fighting not only the prejudices of senior managers but their own. Just as e-learning has been a game changer for L&D (in most cases resisted fervently), so is social media. But whatever the obstacles, social media tools will become ubiquitous because our use of these tools outside the workplace is becoming so pervasive that it will be unimaginable that we will not try to realise the same benefits at work. All that's necessary is for the key decision-makers in organisations to become avid social media users themselves - and that is only a question of time - and the doors will fly open. When that happens, L&D will have increased opportunities not only to extend the use of social media within formal interventions but to help in architecting the social learning organisation. Even if they don't, it will happen anyway.

All of which brings me eventually to the fact that I've been reading Jane Hart's Social Learning Handbook, just released in paperback (Kindle version soon, please). I'm not surprised that Jane would have written a handbook; after all, she is the official curator of the learning technologies museum (if in doubt, see Jane's Centre for Performance and Learning Technologies). Much will be familiar for those who have read Jane's many articles and postings, and who have seen her speak, but here it all is collected in one place and organised very systematically. The first half of the book presents the argument for social learning and provides a number of ways of making sense of the phenomenon. I particularly liked the reasons not to ban social media and the description of the new role and skills of the workplace learning and development professional.

The second half of the book presents '30 ways to use social media to work and learn smarter.' This is Jane in her element, sharing information on tools and how to use them. Only complete social media fanatics (and, to be fair, there are plenty of them) will find nothing here of value. No doubt this stuff will become out of date in no time at all, but as Jane explains, this is an unbook, perpetually work-in-progress. That's why it makes sense that she's publishing through Lulu, a print-on-demand service, which allows her to update the manuscript at any time.

Anyway, enough of all this. As Jane concludes, rather ironically, at the end of her book: "Social media is not something you talk or read about, it is something you do."