It is time once again for Jane Hart’s annual top tools for learning survey. And since I’ve been adding my contributions from the beginning (over a decade ago) I’ve got to keep my streak alive. Here are my top learning tools for 2020.
Here are my personal top 10 learning tools for this year.
1. Feedly
Feedly is the foundation of my personal approach to knowledge management and helps me efficiently keep up with all the things I’m interested in.
2. Twitter
Twitter is another important tool for finding, connecting, and learning along with other smart generous professionals. For me, it continues to be one of the best ways to connect with great people for conversations on relevant, professional topics.
3. Zoom
Given the current state of the world, there isn’t any way I could leave Zoom off of this year’s list. I doubt this needs much explanation as we’ve all likely spent a fair amount of time in Zoom sessions this year.
4. PowerPoint
PowerPoint is another tried and tested tool for me. Beyond slide decks and presentations, I use it for graphics, print projects, videos and more. Microsoft has been adding tons of great updates and it just keeps getting better and better.
5. Canva
We live in a visual world and when you need graphic design, Canva is the place to start. There are a lot of options for design tools out there but none that can top Canva for its combination of usability, breadth of content types, and great looking designs.
6. Google Docs Suite
This connected collection of tools makes it super easy to keep in touch and collaborate. By using some really useful add-ins (like Google Docs for WordPress) you can expand what you can do even further.
https://www.google.com/docs/about/
7. Zapier
Zapier is an online automation tool that connects your apps and services. You can connect two or more apps to automate repetitive tasks without coding or relying on developers to build the integration. I use Zapier to do time-saving things like connecting user registration info from an online form to automatically enroll people in a webinar and/or related MailChimp learning campaigns.
8.MailChimp
Email marketing tools are a great way to create automated data-driven campaigns to support learning and performance efforts. (Side Note: There is a great-looking new campaign tool built specifically for L&D called Sparks that I’m excited about.)
9. WordPress
WordPress powers my personal website/blog serves and connects via Zapier with Mailchimp to power my weekly newsletter.
10. Bublup
Bublup is a recent discovery that lets you save a whole host of things in a place that is easy to navigate at a glance with pictures and titles. Keep links in the same folders as PDFs, photos, videos, GIFs, notes, and other files. It all looks good together, it’s easy to share and collaborate with others and more. You can see one of my pages from Bublup here.
Honorable Mention
Sparks
I’m a big fan of learning campaigns and have done a number of them with marketing email tools like MailChimp and MailerLite. Sparks is a tool made specifically for use in learning contexts that has a lot of great things going for it.
Revue
I curate a lot of things and have tried tons of tools looking for an efficient process. If you ever have any interest in curating a newsletter, you should definitely consider Revue. I’ve just launched a new daily-ish “L&D Toolbox” newsletter experiment sharing new apps and tools for L&D pros. There are lots of benefits to writing a newsletter and Revue handles everything beautifully.
OK, now it is your turn! You can submit your own top 10 learning tools list.
Voting for Jane´s Top Tools for Learning global survey will close at noon (BST) on Friday 21 August 2020
Mike Taylor 
Zoom is the tool I used the most in 2020. I like zoom because it’s free and the quality is also excellent. Recently, Zoom has also updated many convenient features for teaching, and the quality is also getting better and better. Maybe zoom will also be my top app in 2021.
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