I once worked with an external trainer whose premise was that the most important thing about a training session is that the trainees should have fun. She and I clashed - I argued that the most important thing in a work training session is that at the end of the session, the trainees can do the thing we are teaching them to do.
Re learning styles - when I was a baby trainer in the 90s, we were taught about learning styles but the gist of it was 'everyone has different learning styles, so put all training modalities in your training session so there is something for everyone'.
This seems to have morphed into 'people have learning styles programmed into their brains from birth and any training for that person must be conducted only in their learning style'. Which doesn't make sense to me.
Thanks Wendy for sharing this. I think this is a learning curve for a lot of trainers and teachers. Starting with all the fluffy and ideal version of teaching/training and then, hopefully, getting more realistic and pragmatic.
Does it mean we can't have any fun? Of course not. But the games or activities must be relevant to the content and the learning outcomes. Even the ice-breakers which are just done for the sake of fun activity are a waste if they are not relevant and relatable.
I had this tab open for a while -- just found time and read it more carefully. Thank you for sharing your journey and your teaching ideas, Umes. This post was super thought provoking.
I once worked with an external trainer whose premise was that the most important thing about a training session is that the trainees should have fun. She and I clashed - I argued that the most important thing in a work training session is that at the end of the session, the trainees can do the thing we are teaching them to do.
Re learning styles - when I was a baby trainer in the 90s, we were taught about learning styles but the gist of it was 'everyone has different learning styles, so put all training modalities in your training session so there is something for everyone'.
This seems to have morphed into 'people have learning styles programmed into their brains from birth and any training for that person must be conducted only in their learning style'. Which doesn't make sense to me.
Thanks Wendy for sharing this. I think this is a learning curve for a lot of trainers and teachers. Starting with all the fluffy and ideal version of teaching/training and then, hopefully, getting more realistic and pragmatic.
Does it mean we can't have any fun? Of course not. But the games or activities must be relevant to the content and the learning outcomes. Even the ice-breakers which are just done for the sake of fun activity are a waste if they are not relevant and relatable.
I had this tab open for a while -- just found time and read it more carefully. Thank you for sharing your journey and your teaching ideas, Umes. This post was super thought provoking.
Thank you for going through this.
Thanks for this! I had to laugh about how similar the trends have been over time.
I’m sharing the link to this and one of your videos on my website collection of free edulinks tomorrow at 9 am local time (Sweden )
https://saraslistofedresources.wordpress.com/ and I’ll share it on Mastodon & BlueSky
You can find me as @sarahjelm on both … or just visit the site and have a look
Sara