#PKMChat 2016-03-02 Keeping a Learning Journal

What is and how to keep a Learning Journal or a Progress Log

For me a Learning Journal is not findings but really what was learned, what took effort, concentration, focus and application to achieve it. I don’t dwell on it, it’s often just a mention in my general log. An important learning could justify by itself a half day spent. When I look back at my day when I stop for the night I often balance doing with learning. If I took an important lesson toward my goals it’s a good day. This is my view. There are plenty of different interpretations, usages and practice around the learning journal and this is our topic. It’s likely the chat will be like a brainstorming session, a collection of ideas shared with no consensus. After a few days something may emerge and be shared.

Austin Kleon

I was reminded of this fact while reading this tweet

Found myself relating so much to this journal entry (attached pic) from @austinkleon https://t.co/XrMYilf5XS pic.twitter.com/Y7SBMThJ5V

— Winnie Lim (@wynlim) March 1, 2016

https://medium.com/@austinkleon/what-happened-when-i-used-my-own-journal-for-a-month-3a7bbe65a63d Austin Kleon using his own journal. It’s a challenge a he took of eating his own food for a month and share it on Instagram. You wil find it here https://www.instagram.com/austinkleon/ A creative way of using Instagram by the way. The last picture is “What I learned from using my won journal”

It’s the last day in February, so here’s the last page of my #stealjournal. (For now.) Thanks for following along. I hope, if you’ve been wanting to start a notebook habit, that you’ll go out and get one and give it a shot!

A photo posted by Austin Kleon (@austinkleon) on Feb 29, 2016 at 9:26am PST

Notice that the left page of the tweet is about personal versus professional growth. An inspiring topic as well.

Learning Journal in #PKMChat

This topic appeared sporadically in #PKMChat – One question Q5 in March 4th, 2015, exactly a year ago. Do you keep track of your learning? Do you have a learning plan – One question in last chat on tools. I placed a collection of tweets in the right column. I love to use lists of tweets from past chats as a learning journal. WordPress and search makes it especially easy.

@brunowinck I started listening to a great podcast called MegaMaker and wrote out a list of my 2016 things to make, so that's been my focus

— K. Anthony (@anthkris) March 1, 2016

@brunowinck also using trello to track myself weekly

— K. Anthony (@anthkris) March 1, 2016

@brunowinck I always take time to at least reflect. I also use my blog to write about what I learned through a particular making experience

— K. Anthony (@anthkris) March 1, 2016

The podcast: http://megamaker.co/

@brunowinck @pkmchat a lifetime ago 😄

— Nick Leffler (@nick_leffler) March 1, 2016

Yet the topic has not been explored in depth in the #PKMChat way. A journal is great tool for keeping a log of progress.

In Real Learning

The benefits of a progress log ( a plog) was explained by JayCross in his Real Learning book and he turned it into practice on https://jaycrossplog.wordpress.com/2015/10/29/plog-and-blog/ Here is the detailed page http://reallearning.biz/monitor-your-progress/ , the connection with WOL https://jaycrossplog.wordpress.com/2015/08/04/hey-im-working-out-loud-here/ and the instructions https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1922865/Plog%20instructions..pdf It’s really how to setup a blog for it but the interesting bit is the proposed category list: Enter tags you’ll use to classify posts, for example: • Daily Reflection • Weekly Review • Self Assessment • Goals & Aspirations • Plans for Change PKMChat being about Personal Knowledge Management encompass Knowledge lifecycle in general. Our first chat was about learning, acquiring Knowledge. Our second is about sharing it. Week after weeks we will switch from one end of the lifecycle to another while exploring all the channels that could be used: social, formal, writing, videos. Feel free to suggest topics by tweeting to @pkmchat.