Interview with Learning Expert: Dr. Spencer Kagan
Total Engagement Made Easy Through Simple Proven Brain-Based Strategies
T/D: You say that participants enjoy our presentations more, and we find presenting easier and more joyful when we align how we present with how brains best learn. Are there a couple of simple, interactive instructional structures you can share with us?
Kagan: A traditional presenter might give some information and call on one person to say: What do you think? Or, how would you answer that? All the other brains in the room are semi to fully comatose.
Another presenter might say: talk it over with a partner. Of course the high achiever in each pair says well goal one was…goal two was…goal three was… . The other person goes, “Ah Hah”, while their mind is really somewhere else.
A better technique would be a Rally Robin: you name one, I name one - so we're both accountable. It gets all brains engaged. Rally Robin is one of the 200 structures that we train. We have structures that engage left hemisphere/right hemisphere, very specific parts of different hemispheres and so on. We've been doing this since 1968 and in the process we've developed lots of instructional strategies that create full engagement.
T/D: What's the difference between a structure and an activity?
Kagan: Rally Robin is a structure. So if I have you Rally Robin, the safety procedures that we've just gone through - you name the first one, I name the next. That's an activity - it's structure plus the content.
A different day I have you Rally Robin for team building or fun - name fun things to do after work. That's a different activity. So we work with a basic formula - structure plus content equals an activity. That's why the structures are so powerful. Any one structure can produce an infinite number of activities.
T/D: Activities keep people engaged, but you say achievement goes up as well?
Kagan: We have lots of research showing that academic achievement goes up among students; it doesn't matter whether it's college or kindergarten. In addition, self-esteem, empathy, social skills, liking the class and content, liking for instructor - we've got hard data on all of those things plus many more. The key is getting everyone involved and everyone cooperating in the e-Learning process.
There have been over a thousand research studies on cooperative learning and overall it's been the most investigated set of instructional strategies ever. The results, according to analysis, are extraordinarily powerful. For example, students who were about 50 in traditional classrooms are scoring about 78 in a cooperative learning classroom even though the classroom time is identical.
Frank Lyman, a good friend of mine, who invented Think-Pair-Share once summarized it very well. He said, "A river takes banks to flow." When you don't have structure there's chaos.
T/D: That's a great analogy. Where can people learn more about your structures?
Kagan: Our webpage is one place to go and it's www.kaganonline.com .
T/D: You have books and tools and what other resources available?
Kagan: We have 100 publications of how to use instructional structures in all kinds of settings including how to become The Dynamic Trainer which is the most relevant for business trainers.
T/D: With a hundred resources to choose from, what's the one you think our readers should look for?
Kagan: The Dynamic Trainer.
T/D: Alright, thanks so much Dr Kagan, it's been a pleasure.
Dr. Spencer Kagan is an internationally acclaimed researcher, presenter and author of over a hundred books, chapters and scientific journal articles. He's a former clinical psychologist and full professor of psychology and education at the University of California. Dr Kagan is the principal author of the single most comprehensive book for educators in each of four fields - Cooperative Learning, Multiple Intelligences, Classroom Discipline and Classroom Energizers. We’re discussing total engagement made easy through simple proven brain-based strategies.
5 General Rules for Workplace Tests Part-5
Rule #5
Ordering Questions
You may wish to group evaluation questions by topic or you may mix them up. Back on the job, the work people encounter won't show up in any kind of logical sequence – so mixing questions up has its merits.
On the other hand, keeping questions grouped allows you to easily spot if a learner just "didn't get" a particular topic. If all the questions on a similar topic are grouped together and the learner answers all or almost all of them wrong, either he needs retraining or the topic itself was poorly presented. If your same-topic-area questions are interspersed throughout the exam, it might be harder for you to spot a problem.
5 General Rules for Workplace Tests Part-4
Rule #4
Use Key Words
Key words assist the test-taker in figuring out the answer.
Who triggers the respondent to look for a person or position
What triggers the test taker to look for a thing or a process
Where triggers them to look for a place or location
When triggers them to look for a date or a period of time
Why will signal them to look for reasoning.
5 General Rules for Workplace Tests Part-3
Rule #3
Stick to the Facts
Do not include trivial information - the only intention of which is to confuse the test taker. For instance: Bob and Ed left their office on K Street in Washington DC at 4:45 pm to travel to BWI airport for a 9:00 pm flight - how far is the airport from their office? The times given have nothing to do with the correct answer; in fact, Bob and Ed are irrelevant, too. 4
A better phrased question would be:
Using (a calculator, a map, an internet site) calculate the distance between K Street in downtown DC and the BWI airport.
5 General Rules for Workplace Tests Part-2
Rule #2
Give Adequate and Specific Instructions
Instructions are critical. Do everything you can to make sure test takers know WHAT to do, and WHEN and HOW to do it.
Examples:
If there is a time requirement, state it. e.g. you must finish this section in 30 minutes
If a tool or resource is allowed, state it. e.g. you may use a calculator for questions 11 – 20. The opposite is true as well - you may NOT use a calculator to complete this section. For each item in column A there is ONLY ONE correct answer in column B.
It's also quite helpful to read the instructions out loud at the start of the test even when they are clearly written on the test itself. This will ensure that everyone hears, sees, and interprets the directions the same way and allows for questions before anyone begins.
5 General Rules for Workplace Tests Part-1
RULE #1
Do Not Trick Them
If you have not taught “it” in the training, it should not be on the test. In addition, your test questions should be stated in the same manner they were stated/taught in the class. For example: if you teach the three characteristics of steel, don't ask: Which one of these is NOT a characteristic of steel. It's hard for most people to have success with "null" answers and more importantly, why reinforce what you don’t want them to remember?
Interview with Learning Expert - Will Thalheimer
Will Thalheimer is a learning professional and researcher whom The Training Doctor recently interviewed
T/D: Let’s focus on learning design and the research that you've done in this area.
Thalheimer: One of the things that I think a lot of us forget is that we're not really trying to create learning as much as we're trying to help our learners remember what they've learned. We’re trying to make sure that not only do they learn it, but they're able to retrieve it from memory at a later time. We not only want to increase learning, making sure they understand, but we also want to minimize forgetting. Minimization of forgetting is something a lot of us don’t think about.
When I looked at the research there are three things that are very powerful in allowing people to minimize forgetting. I'm going to go through the list. The first term is 'retrieval practice'. That means giving learners practice retrieving the information from memory like they would in the real world. Too often we present information that helps them learn, but that doesn't help them practice retrieval.
T/D: We assume that they'll remember it at the right time. That’s a good point.
Thalheimer: If people go down the forgetting curve and they can't remember it, which often happens after learning, the training was a waste of time. One of the things is retrieval practice. The second thing is 'context alignment'. People have to perform in a context - in a real situation. In the environment there's visual cues, noise cues, there's smell, there’s all kinds of things.
T/D: Things that brought you to this point - something that led you to now make a decision, right?
Thalheimer: Absolutely, all these environmental cues trigger memory retrieval, bringing information into working memory. One of the things that researchers have found is by aligning the learning context with the performance context. You have some of the same cues in the learning context that are in the performance context. When people go back to the performance context they are more likely to remember what they learned.
T/D: Can you give us an example?
Thalheimer: Absolutely. It's interesting, the army knows about this and pilots and people in dangerous situations - we need to scaffold them up to the place where they can deal with the stress of their jobs AND still make decisions. They may need to develop an understanding of things in a non-stressful situation, but in order for them to be able to retrieve the information in that real world stressful environment, we can maximize that retrieval if we put them in that kind of stressful environment.
T/D: What does scaffolding mean?
Thalheimer: Well, scaffolding means start slow and progress to more difficult.
T/D: Until it's as realistic as possible.
Thalheimer: Correct, as realistic as possible. That's why the army has people with real bullets flying over their heads because that's a real world situation
We've gone through retrieval practice and context alignment. The third thing is 'spacing' or the spacing effect. It’s one of the most studied phenomenons in all research psychology. It's the notion that if you space repetitions over time they're much more powerful than if you space them over less time. Those three things enable people to remember over a long period of time. They minimize that forgetting curve.
T/D: The fact that we send people to one training class and then send them back to work is fruitless.
Thalheimer: Fruitless may be too strong, but it's certainly not the best design. One of the things that people need to be able to do as a trainer is not only help people understand and learn, but also minimize forgetting. That's what we're all about, helping them remember on the job.
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Will Thalheimer founded Work-Learning Research which is a consulting practice that helps clients build more effective learning interventions. He’s been in the learning and performance field since 1985. His professional focus is on bridging the gap between the research side and the practice side. Visit his excellent blog here: http://www.willatworklearning.com/
The Key to Outstanding Learning Outcomes: Design Learning Processes
Designing training programs can be an arduous process if you take on the responsibility for designing all the content yourself. You can lighten your load and also achieve a much greater learning outcome by designing learning processes rather than learning content.
In this article we will share three ways to design learning processes.
1. Use real work.
Learners prefer to accomplish real work while they are in the learning process. So rather than create a contrived situation or a case study scenario that is “representative” of real life, instead have the learners work on real work tasks. For instance, a financial services firm wanted to teach its sales people to read financial statements in order to find cross-selling opportunities in their current client-base. Rather than teach the sales people how to read “generic” financial statements and then leave them to transfer that knowledge and skill to their own client's financial statements, the learning session required them to bring the annual report from two of their current clients. While they learned to read a financial statement (such as a cash flow statement or a profit and loss statement) the learners were working and reviewing the actual financial statements of their own clients. This not only resulted in a better understanding of the learning but it also resulted in the learners being able to have actionable findings be the end of the training class.
2. Create the learning in real time.
Rather than teach your learners a new concept or skill in a large block of time and then expect them to be able to transfer all of that information to their real work responsibilities, break the training up into smaller, actionable learning objectives and on-the-job tasks. That will allow them to implement their new knowledge and skills in smaller chunks and result in more successful implementation on the job.
For example, a sales organization was training their sales people to listen for cues from prospects to better gauge if they could ask for an appointment or not. After a period of time in the classroom, in which the sales people/learners learned the 5 types of responses which would either open a door for them or not, they were then given an hour to return to their desks and make up to 10 phone calls from their personal prospect list; making notes about types of conversations they had and whether they were able to secure an appointment or not. This approach not only allowed the salespeople to accomplish some real work during the training process, but also created a rich discussion upon returning to the training room because they each had real-world experience implementing their new skills and were able to compare and contrast their outcomes and ask additional questions of the instructor.
If they had simply completed the training and then returned to the job to (attempt to) implement what they had learned, when would they have ever had those rich discussions that serve to cement the learning for adults?
3. Have the learners contribute the content.
A third sales organization wanted to teach overcoming objections in relation to a very complex product that their sales people sold. Rather than try to anticipate all the objections and give the sales people pat answers in reply, the training was designed to first solicit the “5 toughest objection you've encountered when attempting to sell xyz” and then a game was created, dividing the larger group into 3 teams and giving each team the opportunity to craft an appropriate rebuttal to the objection.
The learning process went like this
Team A stated an objection to Team B~Team B had a period of time to craft an appropriate response~Team C had the opportunity to challenge Team B's response~Team A chose what they thought to be the best response and awarded a point to either Team B or Team C accordingly.
This learning process continued in a round-robin style, with Team B next sharing an objection, Team C getting the first opportunity to reply, and Team A being given the opportunity to “challenge” team C’s response, until all of the 15 toughest objections in regard to that topic had been addressed.
This process allowed the learners to share their real-world problems and to get the best and the brightest to assist them with being better prepared the next time they heard that objection.
The next time you are attempting to design learning content take a step back and see if instead you are able to design a learning process that better assists the learners in working with and assimilating that content.
Learning processes can often lead to greater learning outcomes because the learners are more engaged with the content, identify with it more clearly, and have less trouble transferring what they learned in the classroom to what they do on the job. An added bonus, from a logistical standpoint, is that designing a learning process requires much less updating in the future should the content itself change.
Adobe Connect and Your Virtual Learning Offerings
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Use your Network to Create + Supply Employee Training
Too often we isolate ourselves and think that we are the only organization that has a particular problem; for instance, quality control issues or the need for sales training on a particular piece of equipment that your company resells. We put a lot of time and effort in to creating a “customized” training program when, in all likelihood, that training program has already been created by somebody else.
Suppliers
Many suppliers already have training programs in place to train their own workforce. Simply ask if you can borrow their programs or perhaps pay a fee to use them with your employees. Often, it is possible to have your supplier-company salesperson or another representative provide the training for you. Case in point: a retail organization wanted to train its store clerks in athletic footwear construction and the best use of each brand or style of footwear so that they could be more responsive to customer needs. The first thing the operations manager of the retailer did was call all eight salespeople at the athletic footwear, manufacturers, and ask what resources were available that the retailer could have or borrow. All eight footwear manufacturers were eager to provide information and assistance with the training project. In fact, all eight salespeople came in on the same day, in one-hour blocks, to present what they felt the clerks should know about their particular brand of footwear and how it was different from the other manufacturers.
Another example comes from a restaurant trying to increase its dining checks by increasing the level of liquor sales per party. The focus was on wines and how they complemented the various menu items. One liquor salesman, in particular, had a passion for wine and was thrilled to be asked to provide a 90-minute workshop for the restaurant's employees on the different types of wines and the different menu items that they complemented. The salesperson did the training on his own time, certainly with the expectation that his sales would increase if the restaurant’s retailing of wine increased, but also because he was thrilled to talk about something he really loved.
So first: think about how your suppliers can provide you with training or training resources.
Client Companies
Another approach is to look to your client-companies – perhaps your clients have already solved the challenge of lean manufacturing in their organization and would be happy to include your employees in the training that they already offer, or to loan their trainers to your organization to conduct the same type of training. Don’t think of yourself as isolated and trying to solve a problem that is unique to your organization because 80% of the time it is not unique – pick up the phone and call a few of your clients to see if they have faced (and surmounted) the same challenges.
Cooperative Relationships
The last suggestion is to actively seek out similar companies in your industry. As an example, a southeastern state found itself with under-qualified bridge and road inspectors due to an early retirement package offered by the state. The employees that were left did not have as many years experience on the job and no longer had mentors from whom to learn. The state realized it had to create a new training process, but was wise enough to realize it could not be the only state in the nation with that need. So the state’s transportation commissioner called 30 of his colleagues across the US and asked them if they had encountered the same challenge. Of the 30 colleagues contacted, two offered their training program (materials) in their entirety to use as a model or to use carte blanche.
Before attempting to solve a “training problem” in your organization think creatively and cooperatively about who else might also have the need and has perhaps already solved it for you. Very often you will find that you have resources and support at your disposal, quite in abundance, simply for the asking.