The year before COVID-19 arrived, I was briefed by a client on how they saw their training mix changing. They showed me two pie charts; the first was the current mix of training delivery and the second was the mix they predicted for the next few years. You won’t be surprised to hear that this company expected classroom-based training to decrease, while work-based training would increase. There would also be increases in more social forms of learning through coaching/mentoring and peer-based learning. Of course, much of this would be delivered through internet and mobile technologies, replacing classroom activities, so we would see the introduction of ‘remote learning’; a move to ‘anytime, anywhere’. Finally, there would be a move to ‘micro’ learning. Learners would take a more agile, modular approach to acquiring skill and knowledge, learning what needed to be learned at the right time, gradually building up a portfolio of experience, at times evidenced by micro-credentials.
In truth, the move to online learning has been happening for years; COVID just accelerated the pace of change. As trainers, coaches and facilitators, if we weren’t already ‘on the bus’, we certainly have to be now, so I thought I’d put up this short post that explains some of the terms we will come across in this new age of learning.
I’m aiming to keep things simple and pragmatic and not to get too bogged down in problems of definition. It turns out, that as with many things in the field of learning and development, definitions are not always clear and are sometimes contested.
So let’s try to keep it simple:
Blended learning – essentially, now has come to mean a mixture of approaches to providing learning, over a workshop or a programme. It more often than not implies a mix of online and offline activities, some may be ‘classroom’ based, others may be accessed from a variety of locations. (There is a debate about whether we are actually talking about blended teaching rather than blended learning, but I’m not going there!). Not to be confused with….
Hybrid Learning – again, there are a few definitions of this term, but for me, I like to use it to differentiate from Blended Learning by using it to describe multiple channels for learning the same subject matter. So, whereas a blended learning course might have a sequence of different approaches to cover a subject, hybrid learning offers a selection of approaches to cover the same material. So, hybrid learning allows the learner to select the most appropriate learning method for him/her at any time (or place). While you can see the benefits to the learner of this approach, you can also appreciate that this may increase the workload for the trainer or learning designer, as they have to produce the same content across a variety of channels.
Asynchronous v Synchronous learning – simply put, can the learner choose when to access the materials or do they have to attend a ‘live’ event? A blended approach may include aspects of both, for example, completing an online questionnaire, before attending a webinar with a keynote speaker.
You will also hear the term, ‘flipped learning’. It comes from the education sector. Traditional classroom teaching was based around the idea of, ‘teach the concept in the classroom, practise with homework’. Flipped learning turns this on its head, so the student may learn about the concept by doing some pre-work, for example, an internet search task relevant to the subject, then practise and consolidate their learning in the classroom. In work-based training, we’ve probably been doing this for some time, partly because over recent years there has been a drive to reduce the amount of time employees spend in the training room. Typically, this can lead to a ‘pre-work then practise’ model of learning design.
Take a course on influencing skills, for example. Participants may be asked to complete a questionnaire and do some background reading before attending a workshop where they can practise the skill element and receive feedback. So, although we may be used to using a flipped approach, it’s worth remembering that we can also have the option of using the ‘traditional’ approach too in our learning design.
On to learning design
Once we have defined our purpose for the course, objective setting and success measures we move on to the ‘how’ of learning design. The above definitions lead us to a series of choices we can make as we create our course or programme.
Which elements are best delivered online and which are best done offline?
Where/when does the trainer need to be present, and what is their role at those times?
Which elements can be delivered asynchronously and which should be synchronous? Asynchronous activities give more control and choice to the learner, but synchronous events can allow the trainer to follow the ‘mood’ more easily, to give a consistent message to everyone, and also monitor learning in the moment. It’s easier to ask questions too.
It’s also worth considering what elements of your course are best learned by the learner working alone and which parts might be better learned through a more social, collaborative approach.
Here’s an example:
Imagine you are designing coaching skills course for managers and you have been asked to create a blended design. To keep things simple, let’s say the key elements of this course are:
· Be able to demonstrate the use of a coaching framework eg the GROW model.
· Develop the key skills of asking open questions and listening.
· Receive feedback on coaching style, and demonstrate reflective practice.
Here’s one way you could do it. It’s definitely not the only way! If you find yourself saying, ‘I wouldn’t do it like that’, then good! Ask yourself, what would you change and why, especially around the dimensions we discussed earlier. Why, for example, would it be better to deliver an element face-to-face rather than online? What is the best way to practise a skill and receive feedback on it? And also, although we haven’t discussed it in this post, how would you monitor learning in each stage of the course?
We could go on, but the above shows some of the ways we could use a blended approach around a course that involves both knowledge acquisition and skill development. There are many, many other options for designing a course like this, using a blended approach, but hopefully this shows some of the factors you might consider as you choose each method of learning for your activities. It's also worth saying that there are other factors that will affect your learning design e.g. budget, class size, resources, IT protocols to name a few, but this post is about thinking about how we can create blended approaches.
If you are thinking that you would use a different design, please do give this exercise a go. Once you have produced your outline then you can challenge yourself. Why did you make the choices you did? (I have a preference for doing skill development as a face-to-face activity, but it doesn’t have to be that way. How could you do it online?). If you really want to stretch yourself, pick what you think would be the worst possible learning method for an activity then come up with options of how you could make that work for your learners. These sorts of stretches can break you out of your own preferences for training.
Photos:
'Back to School' Photo by Deleece Cook on Unsplash (deleece-cook-zzjLGF_6dx4-unsplash)
'Difficult Roads...' Photo by Nik on Unsplash (hello-i-m-nik-z1d-LP8sjuI-unsplash)