Golf and Blended Learning- Replace Your Divots

People may want to describe blended learning as classroom training with an extra element of online content, or may choose to see a face-to-face element of training as a way to boost the value of online learning. I think focusing on the delivery channel when creating these experiences is an exercise in semantics and can limit the potential for creating the best learning curriculum possible.

Entertaining Yes, But Is It Moving The Needle?

People who discuss ways to make training more engaging often describe ways to entertain a captive audience. Throw a video up on screen, tell a few funny stories, and the time in the classroom or webinar flies. Four things happen:

• At the end of the day, your "smile-sheet learner surveys" will be loaded with great scores and comments.
•  At the end of the month, there will be no measurable improvement in performance, unless you incorporate these entertaining elements with a well focused eye.
• At the end of the quarter, you receive a request to conduct a refresher course on the same topic.
• At the end of the year, your training department faces a battle to retain credibility and defend its effectiveness.

A MOOC Is Freakin' Awesome Only If The Learner Gets Something Out Of It

Massive Open Online Courseware (MOOCS) are online courses that are -in theory- open to large groups of learners and use a blend of different training methods to make the curriculum meaningful, worthwhile and robust. The courses are housed on a platform that provides participants with a seamless learning experience.

Discussions about the MOOC phenomenon spotlight the hype about the technology behind the platform. The methods used to create content that makes a MOOC effective is often left out of the conversation.

Sure the platforms are impressive. You can set up a course that includes videos, eLearning, virtual classroom, podcasts, discussion groups, articles, and other written content. The platforms allow for live sessions and assessments. It's all trackable, verifiable, and measurable.

We tend to think if we build a MOOC, people will flock to it because it's a freakin' awesome, cool way to train and to learn. What we often forget when we get caught up in imagining the possibilities of the MOOC is that it's freakin' awesome only if the learner gets something out of it. It maximizes value if learners complete it, not just sample it and disappear.

Short Form Content

If you agree (in a moment of weakness) to  sit through a "get to know you" meeting with a vendor trying to sell innovative 21st century training solutions, the term "short form content" will come up. It will rear its head in the elevator speech somewhere around the third floor and will be hit upon again in PowerPoint slides 3, 6, 7, and 20.

The definition varies depending on whether there are training professionals in the room or C-Level decision makers, but it boils down to this. Short form content is a broad term covering videos, recordings, graphics, and blog posts that are designed to be brief, informative, entertaining, and relevant. It is meant for people with short attention spans. If you drifted off while reading that definition, short form content is probably the best way to reach you. 

We're Doing it Wrong and We Know it

I’ll admit it, I’m a training geek. I can tell you why the analysis phase makes or breaks training. I can ramble on about adult learning theory, creating meaningful objectives, developing test questions that will tell you who really learned the material covered and so on.  

But I Won’t!

 All that stuff helps us design, develop and deliver the best training possible within our narrow constraints. It’s good enough for now. However, training professionals need to think about things further down the road then our next big deadline.

I’m not saying that we aren’t meeting the needs of our learners. All that I’m saying is that as society evolves (or devolves - for you glass half-empty types), training in general, and instructional design specifically, needs to evolve along