What are sweet nothings? Little endearments, usually whispered between lovers. Little non mots? Little secrets? Special little somethings that mean nothing at all but at the same time everything?
As much as I love sweet nothings, and I love giving em . . . I don’t think I’m very good at them.
The other day I was discussing training with Ryann, a colleague, and the idea of engagement came up. We also discussed how there has to be sufficient rigor, or difficulty in the training, or the learner will not be engaged.
I like that Ryann brought this up, and also discussed modeling the feedback on the learners capabilities and expectations. In our organization we discuss the need for "rigor" in our training courses. Without challenging the learner, applying "rigor" then the learner will be bored, unengaged, and not care about the objectives or the outcome. I like that you've identified that having feedback that is worthwhile, maybe rigorous, and challenging will help ensure that the learner is responsive and growing as the facilitator might expect.
My buddy Andrew, hit on something that is a cultural problem for our learners. Testing and quizzes, especially the negative views that come with them.
One thing my organization has done in the past few years is start to increase the amount of testing and quizzing that we do, but we've called it something else to get away from the terminology with a bad connotation; ie. Testing or Quizzing. We now have non-graded pre-tests before our training and knowledge checks scattered throughout the course. These tools are all non-graded but they provide the same testing effect memory development as an actual quiz or test. We are also working with iterative learning, or flashcard style quizzes. An entire module that is nothing but quiz questions designed to stimulate the testing effect for the learner.
For a tool that is so powerful in creating long term memories, I think that testing and quizzing gets a bad rap.
Reference
Pulichino, J. (2017, Sep. 5). Brain-based elearning design. [Video]. LinkedIn Learning https://www.linkedin.com/learning/brain-based-elearning-design/the-testing-effect (Links to an external site.)
I recently took a survey and read a book on online teaching. The survey provided a good, albeit straightforward, assessments of a trainer's readiness to teach an online class based on several principles such as their ability to use technology and tools and their understanding of the online learning principles and confidence. It also provided an overall score at the end to help the assessment taker determine if they were ready as an online teacher for facilitating an online class.
The chapters in the book were a bit "tip heavy." Do this, do that, . . . that's a tip heavy manner. It provided information on how to sustain course discussion, ensure comprehension among the learners, and wrap up the online class. Like last week, by providing "tips" the text helps learners by giving them concrete activities that can be immediately applied to an online course and spell out why each activity is worthwhile and effective.
All in all Online Teaching, which I've been doing for years, is continuing to progress and evolve. It's good to stay abreast of the changes. And I scored very well in my assessment. I'm ready to teach online.
Since we are talking so much about apps for online learning, I'm going to focus on the Screencastify. I love that so many of my peers are planning on utilizing something that is so present already in classes.
My organization has provided multiple online conferences in the past year and one of the things we quickly figured out was that not having the camera on and creating a sense of presence and connection with the audience was a huge mistake. Who wants to attend a conference where you are confronted with a disembodied voice from the start and that stays with you the entire time. We want to see who we are learning from, right? I think your wife's idea with video is remarkably inline with establishing presence, engagement and connection.
Andrew and Lauren both brought up the importance of humor in training. I'm glad they did. I know that when I was a trainer, especially when I was an online trainer, I used humor liberally to create engagement, social presences, and inspire a sense of community.
I found that using humor was a good way to bring the trainee's into the training community and embrace the medium. I also found out quickly about some of the pitfalls and challenges of using humor. Anything beyond surface level quickly cut to the quick and had the adverse effect. The trainer I interviewed for this week's assignment actually brought up humor as a tool and technique that he uses often as well. He found the same hazards existed for him.
Our training organization deliberately and expressly shies away from using humor in our courses. the classes we teach are quick, lasting usually no more than a few hours. Developing a rapport and using humor is tough to do in that time frame. Still, I see it as a technique that has it's uses. Already I've downloaded Andrew's two reference articles and can't wait to read them.
References
Anderson, C. (2020). His sense of humor carried the day: Using humor with nontraditional adult learners. Adult Learning, 31(1), 3-5.
Summerfelt, H., Lippman, L., & Hyman, I. E., Jr. (2010). The effects of humor on memory: Constrained by the pun. The Journal of General Psychology, 137(4), 376-392.
I had a long discussion with Tommy at work - find the link to the podcast here, and he recorded it. He podded me, then he cast me. So, I've now been captured as a part of a podcast.
In the podcast (see here) I go over how memories are made, what we are doing at work to support the industry, and alot alot on VR. It was tons of fun, but man-oh-man is it hard to hear my own voice.
Give a listen and let me know if you like it!
These are more that I read recently that called to me (like these HERE). I will tell those of you who like these that yes I write my own . . . yes you've read them . . . yes I have a pseudonym I post under. Can you tell which are mine?
Kelsey, brought up the use of blogs, wikis, and discussion forums. Lately, for the past couple of years that is, I've been trying to develop communities of learners via these types of tools.
The idea came to me during Hurricane Harvey when my neighborhood had to evacuate due to potential floods. Instead of going to the newspaper, the television, the phone or any other conventional source, the entire neighborhood got their news from a Facebook Community page. It stunned me that we all, en masse, eschewed the more conventional for the passive stream of information coming from our neighbors writing and sharing together. I wondered if we might find a way to share learning in much the same way.
At my old organization, a contracting company, we created a page to help develop leaders in the organization. We invited all supervisors, managers, and directors to be a part of it. We found that supervisors enjoyed the opportunity to share their experience across the organization and having a line of communication to the upper leadership. Now, I am trying to do the same thing with our leadership training. We find that we get wonderful engagement from the learners when they are in the building, but once they go back to their jobs, that connection is lost. I want to find a way to keep that connection going. Allow the learners to tap into the resource as needed. Look through posts to find answers to what they need.
I like having that chance to hunt through posts and find the one that I want, I'm sure they would too. Blogs and wikis and discussion boards help facilitate that style of learning and I'd love to see it become a bigger part of our learning community.
