OneNote and Education : eLearning

New OneNote eLearning case studies available

Mike_Tholfsen — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 17:05:00 GMT

We recently published a few new OneNote case studies that I wanted to share. As I've mentioned, beyond the education world, OneNote is finding success as an eLearning, training and on-boarding tool. Organizations such as the US Coast Guard and Job Start, shown below, are finding success using OneNote in this way and agreed to have a case study done. There are other companies also trying out OneNote in this new way.

Internally at Microsoft we are continuing to use OneNote to replace binders, handbooks and other training mechanisms. We've already realized a great deal of cost savings at Microsoft and we've also reduced paper consumption, substantially in some projects. And the best part is, the overwhelming majority of users are very pleased with having digital, annotatable, sharable copies of their work. Instead of tossing the folder full of training or learning materials, people retain digital copies that are quickly searchable. And they don't take up all that space on the shelf! To see exactly what I'm talking about, I encourage you to download a sample New Employee Handbook in OneNote. You can also watch a video blog of me discussing why I think this concept is so powerful for customers.

Here are a couple of case studies on OneNote as an eLearning tool

Job Start

Nonprofit Employment Agency Uses Interactive Training Tool to Help Teens Succeed

Based in Toronto, Ontario, JobStart is a nonprofit United Way member agency that helps participants gain the skills needed to achieve economic self-sufficiency. In December 2007, the agency received Microsoft® Office OneNote® 2007 through a sponsorship from Microsoft Canada and began testing the software in its youth program. JobStart anticipates that using Office OneNote 2007 will reduce costs while increasing collaboration between students and instructors.

US Coast Guard

United States Coast Guard Explores Potential to Enhance Training with Digital Note-Taking Solution

The United States Coast Guard is known for its impeccable standards and service. To maintain these levels of performance, USCG habitually goes above and beyond the call of duty to seek out new tools and resources that support the ongoing education of its members. In preparation for upgrading its computer system to the Windows Vista® operating system and the 2007 Microsoft® Office system, USCG began examining ways to gain maximum value from these new technologies. Curriculum Developers at the USCG Training Center in Petaluma, California, undertook an initial test of the Microsoft Office OneNote® 2007 digital note-taking program to evaluate how this tool could be used to complement USCG's comprehensive, performance-based training process. USCG was impressed by the dynamic presentation of course materials, the ease of use, and the potential time and cost savings.

If you want to browse all of the different OneNote cases studies, go here. There are both education and business examples of great ways people are using OneNote

OneNote for eLearning, training and on-boarding, plus a new OneNote resource kit!

Mike_Tholfsen — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 19:55:00 GMT

As I mentioned in my first blog entry, in addition to education I planned to blog about how OneNote is being used as a corporate eLearning, training and on-boarding tool.

Over the past two years, we've been experimenting with this new learning model and now it's starting to really catch on, both inside and outside of Microsoft. The main idea is that instead of thinking about OneNote as only a note-taking tool, think about is as an eLearning distribution tool, or a way to distribute a new employee handbook or a new student handbook.

If you have an office or cubicle you work in, I ask you to turn around and look to see if you have any binders from trainings, classes, conferences, or on-boarding. If you're like many of us, you have binder upon binder sitting dusty on your shelf. Or maybe you just tossed all of them the last time you moved :-) With the OneNote model, you can have a digital version of every training or conference you've ever attended. And it's searchable, portable, offline-able, and there are no printing costs! With OneNote's collaborative features, course designers can collaboratively developed classes or trainings on SharePoint or a UNC file share and then package up the notebook for students when finished. Many groups inside and outside of Microsoft have said that the collaborative courseware development through shared notebook truly changes the way that they work. No more mailing around giant documents for weeks. All courseware designers can be on the same page, they can go offline, and OneNote's flexibility allows easy layout options along with rich media types.

The benefits we've seen from this both at Microsoft and externally are:

Digital distribution, retention and reusability of materials
Improved collaboration for both students and course development
Costs savings and efficiency
Reduce the environmental footprint

Within Microsoft, there are groups all across the company using OneNote to replace paper materials. We've already been reaping huge costs benefits. One example is listed below where we saved $360,000 for a single large class being converted to OneNote notebooks. If you did this for every class and training at Microsoft (or another company or school), the savings could be quite large and well into the millions of dollars. Within Microsoft, groups are now using OneNote for management training, IT on-boarding, new employee on-boarding, sales readiness, HR conferences, partner conferences, project management classes, new product training, new intern ramp-up, finance playbooks, legal documentation, etc. And think about all that paper, processing and wasted efficiency that can be saved! If your course needs a last minute update with paper and it's already en-route to China, you have a big problem. With OneNote, it's a quick change and the "book/binder" is already updated.

Case studies

Microsoft Management Excellence case study:
- 30% increased use of learning materials
- $360,000 cost savings for Microsoft
- Environmental footprint reduction
US Coast Guard case study - IT Training

New public OneNote Resource for everyone

Download: Using Office OneNote 2007 for Training Resource Kit

This is a Resource Kit that has been designed for people involved with eLearning, training or on-boarding. This walks you through the steps to create you own rich OneNote notebook. Sections in this notebook include : Basics, Collaboration, Distribution, and Examples.

The kit includes:

Toolkit - Using OneNote 2007 for Training (make sure to look at this)
Sample New Employee Notebook
Sample Training notebook
OneNote training Video

Here's a sampling of what the toolkit also discusses:

Instructor Led Training	See how OneNote 2007 can help you to enhance instructor led training sessions.
New Employee On-boarding	New employees can easily get up to speed by searching in one place (their OneNote 2007 notebook) for the information and resources they need.
Manager Development (self paced)	OneNote 2007 enables managers to have job aids at their fingertips.
Sales Readiness	OneNote 2007 enable sales people to easily take their training content on the road and search it quickly for relevant information.
Helpdesk (IT)	Provide all helpdesk materials in a comprehensive, searchable, updatable package with OneNote 2007.
Facilitator Guides	Easily move existing facilitator guides to OneNote and enable facilitators to add their own information and notes.
Participant Guides	OneNote 2007 can enhance participant guides through providing all materials in one comprehensive, organized package.
Other Learning Activities	Additional examples of OneNote in learning activities.

Screen shot from the Microsoft Management Excellence notebook

Contoso New Employee On-Boarding:

How are you using OneNote in education?

Mike_Tholfsen — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 20:31:00 GMT

One thing I want to do on this blog is understand how other teachers, students and schools are using OneNote. We are often surprised by the creativity in which people use our software. I have some examples below of OneNote in education, and we also have many case studies with OneNote in education, but I know there are more. BTW, eLearning, training and on-boarding OneNote stories are welcome too. It's also great for the product team to understand how our customers are using OneNote, as this feedback can help influence decisions in the next version of OneNote, which we are working on now.

How are you using OneNote in education? Share with the community…

Examples of educators and schools using OneNote

Innovative Teachers visiting Microsoft in Redmond this week

This week Microsoft is hosting some of the winners of last years "World Innovative Teachers Forum" from Helsinki, Finland. For those of you who may not be familiar with this forum is, here's the definition:

“Innovative Teachers Forums are part of the Innovative Teachers program, a global community of educators sponsored by Microsoft Partners in Learning. The forums are annual events that recognize and reward innovative teachers who practice the elements of 21st century learning in their own classrooms, and then incorporate these skills into the student learning environment.”

I had the chance to go to the forum last year and co-present "OneNote in the Classroom" with Palie Cantu, an amazing teacher from Forest Ridge. I also had the chance to meet many of the innovative teachers from countries around the world and the great work they are doing. Imagine a United Nations for teachers and you'll get a sense of what the event is like. It was truly impressed by the diversity of innovation that is happening in schools around the world.

In particular, I had the chance to get to know quite a few of the teachers, including Kumaras Pillay from South Africa and Erik Westrum from Norway. Both Kumaras and Erik will be traveling to Redmond this week. I've also learned that OneNote is now being used in schools all the way up in Svalbard archipelago in the town of Longyearbyen,Norway, one of the farthest points on earth where towns exist. The teachers say they are using "OneNote at the top of the world. My wife and I actually are having Erik over to our house for dinner tonight. I'm part Norwegian myself so we'll have some Lefse prepared for him ;-)

The World Innovative Teachers Forum is part of the broader Microsoft Innovative Teachers program. If you've never heard of this program, I strongly encourage you to check it out. You can join the Innovative Teachers Network and collaborate with great teachers from around the world in a community. You can also submit your own work and you too might be able to go to a future World Innovative Teachers Forum. This year it's in Thailand. And of course you can also get the latest and greatest OneNote education materials from the network. We'll be adding a bunch more soon so keep your eyes peeled!

New beta version of PowerPoint 2007 "Producer" available

BTW, separate from OneNote, be sure to check out the beta version of Microsoft Producer for Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007. Great for classrooms - both students and teachers.

Welcome to the new OneNote and Education blog!

Mike_Tholfsen — Mon, 19 May 2008 20:57:00 GMT

This is the inaugural entry of the new OneNote and education blog! My name is Mike Tholfsen and I am the test manager of the OneNote team and will be the primary author of this blog. Since Dan, John, David, Olya, Michael, Jeff, and Chris (ex-OneNote) all have their own OneNote blogs, I thought I'd blog about one of the areas I'm very passionate about, which is OneNote and education. I am interested in how OneNote can help enhance the learning environment and I believe OneNote will be a primary tool for 21st century education. We also plan to have other guest bloggers from the OneNote team and from other Microsoft teams post education-related entries here. John Guin is still writing the OneNote Testing blog so even though I'm the test manager, this blog will be about OneNote and education.

Because there are so many things happening right now with OneNote and education, we wanted to start this blog to have a dialog with the education community, as well as share ideas, resources, and gather feedback from teachers, students and faculty. We also hope to point to examples of great things that educators and students are doing today with OneNote and education. In addition to K-12 and Higher Education, you can also expect to see topics on eLearning, Training and on-boarding with OneNote. Many companies, including Microsoft, are delivering eLearning solutions using OneNote.

Some of the types of OneNote-related entries I hope to cover in this blog include:

Teachers
Students
Faculty
Schools
Collaborative learning
Collaborative curriculum development
OneNote education samples
OneNote tips for education
Future directions for OneNote and education
Corporate eLearning, training and on-boarding
Corporate educators
A bunch of other fun stuff

Over the last few years, I've had the opportunity to meet with teachers, students and faculty from around the world, and I've seen some amazing things that people have done with OneNote. I look forward to starting a dialog with everyone and you should expect many future blog entries about OneNote and education.

-mike