I am so thankful to Sharon Bowman in helping me become a better coach and trainer. I attended 2 days Training from Back of the Room (TBR) and also was fortunate enough to attend the trainer certification too.
In preparing to attend the training, we were given a work scenario and we had to answer easy questions. I share here the work scenario as well as my responses to the question.
WORK SCENARIO
You work with a training colleague who insists that lecture-based instruction is the best way to teach, for many reasons: the trainees expect it, the company wants it (he assumes), the content is too complicated to teach any other way, and activities waste people’s time (and his). Your company has enlisted your help to change his mind. How will you do this? What steps will you take to help him understand and embrace Accelerated Learning and brain-based instruction?
“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn”, Benjamin Franklin
As mentioned in the scenario, the organization has enlisted my help to change his mind. My very first step would be to understand why my company wants to change the lecture techniques and what specific outcomes they want out of the training.
With those points in my mind, my second step would be to lead the discussion with my colleague and understand why he thinks lecture based instructions are the best way to teach? I would also try to touch on the specific outcomes my company was looking out of the training.
Taking the ques from the discussion, I would start molding the thoughts slowly towards the benefits of accelerated learning techniques, brain-based instructions, the difference between teaching and training. This would allow me to connect with my colleague at a personal level and resonate with his frequency.
Fourth, I would start attending his training and get familiar with training content, learning objectives and key takeaways. Next, I would review my observations with my colleague and take that opportunity to discuss on brain-based learning techniques, how adults learn and retain information, effect of pictures on the human brain, the idea of neuroscience. During my discussion, I would try to use examples like parenting, writing etc, which can not be learned just by teaching/studying and needs hands-on experience. I would love to share my personal experience of attending a workshop “Bootcamp for new dads”. During the workshop, we had talked about all the scenarios and cases from the experienced dad and I felt so happy going out of the training thinking now I know everything. However, when it came to implementing those, I felt like I didn’t know anything. Example, changing diapers :). At that time I wished if my trainer would have made us do tasks like changing the diaper in the workshop.
Fifth, I would take an abstract out of his training and redesign it using colorful pictures and activities, for him to try it out in his next training. We both would gather feedback on the newly added section from the trainees and actively work towards modifying it based on the feedback and interest. With multiple rounds of feedback, I am sure we would come up with an abstract which will have positive feedback.
Assuming positive feedback and also my colleague’s interest, we would redesign the next topic out of his lecture-based instruction and convert it into short image-based instruction with hands-on activity.