How Do Connections Facilitate Learning?

After building a mind map of all my connections to people and groups it was amazing to see how much was there - stop and think about all the people you connect with in your daily life.  Remember the comment someone said about people and connections, “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon”?  It was once said that most of Hollywood could be on the list for six degrees of Kevin Bacon because of the diverse scripting of roles Kevin has done in movies.  He has worked with so many actors that have worked with so many actors and so on.  Now take that and turn it around to yourself.  Think about the six degrees of you and who all those connections are and the different directions and the different elements you have learned from those different interactions – here are some examples of those in my life.

When discussing learning and the people you learn from you have to start with your family – they are the people you learned everything from in your early years.  Back when I was a baby there were not fancy digital toys like today and honestly I feel the best way for young children to learn is without the high tech gadgets.  The most high tech young children should get with their learning is watching Sesame Street on the television – now there is a community full of connections which learn from each other.

After learning the basics and values from your parents and family members it is time to move on to more sophisticated learning which starts in late high school and moves into college and then adulthood.  Yes learning does happen in adulthood – it happens every day. 

In my connections there are many outlets for learning for example when I first started working for the company where I am currently employed.  Day one someone in the office was “showing me the ropes”.  The whole community (the office) would pitch in and help me learn not only what I needed to know on the computer but also what I needed to know for the business in general as well as where to find the bathroom and the kitchen (two very important places to know about).  Eventually I would help others to learn things they did not know – an outsider sometimes brings a fresh perspective.  While this network of people was small in comparison to my network today, it was the only network I knew business wise.  If I had questions on issues there was a hierarchy to getting answers:

1.       Start with the team members

2.       Go to other teams

3.       Go to in-house management

4.       Go to tech training sources either on-line or via the phone

5.       Go to help desks (they were not the best of help for difficult issues)

So you see you may start with small connections but end up developing much larger connections either by design or happenstance.

Working out in the corporate world has changed the way I learn from when I was formally schooled.  School is important to getting the necessary information; however the real learning for me has always been on-the-job.  I graduated from college with a degree in Communication; however my first job (and for many years later my eventual career) was in the computer programming arena covering programming in engineering and business.  I was able to learn the necessary tools to become a successful programming through some courses in college but really from each of the jobs I had doing programming.   Everyone has innate abilities within themselves and so I just needed to look to my network of people to help me learn and eventually I was the person that people looked to for their learning. 

In conclusion, I believe it is impossible to learn without a network or connections in your life.  People do not live in a vacuum so the world and the people in it whether you have direct contact with them or not are the connections you learn from for your whole life.  Isn’t that GREAT!