Author: Clive Shepherd

Throughout 2011 we will be publishing extracts from The New Learning Architect. We move on to the sixth part of chapter 7:
Learning can take place in a variety of social contexts ranging from the self-study through to learning in large groups. These contexts have a major impact on the effectiveness of the intervention and so some care must be taken in choosing the right social context, or combination of contexts, for each intervention.
The learner alone: When the learner works alone they enjoy an obvious increase in flexibility – they can determine when they learn and for how long, the pace of the learning, and the location. We know from surveys that learners value the ability to control the pace of their learning above all other factors. We also know that they value being able to learn in small, digestible chunks.
On the other hand, self-study has its drawbacks. Unless specific deadlines are set, the learner has to make all the running in terms of motivation, a difficult task when you consider that learning is rarely that urgent, and must compete with a myriad of short-term priorities. There’s also the problem of isolation: unless the self-study activity is supported, the learner has no-one with whom they can discuss issues or resolve any misunderstandings. And without a group of peers, learners have no access to alternative perspectives and experiences, and don’t receive the additional motivational boost that comes with peer pressure.
Self-study is being used more and more for formal learning, typically through the medium of interactive online materials. This approach can work well for shorter courses, but has limitations when the learning is more complex and multi-faceted, and when engagement with trainers and peers is critical to the outcome. In these cases self-study may still play a role, but only as an element within a blend.
Learning one-to-one: When used for the right purpose and well executed, one-to-one learning can be more effective than any other approach; that’s because the learner has the undivided attention of a full-time instructor/coach/mentor, who can adapt their responses to the particular needs of the individual learner.
There are limitations to the approach however: the low trainer-to-learner ratio is time-consuming and therefore slow and highly expensive; and there are also obvious limitations on the activities that can be carried out, given the absence of a group of learners.
One-to-one learning is unlikely to be used as the principal approach in a formal learning intervention, although it is widely used in more informal situations such as on-job training and coaching. Its primary use in formal learning is as an ingredient in a blended solution.
Learning in groups: Most of the formal learning that we have encountered has been in groups, typically in a classroom. By learning in groups we experience some powerful advantages: we can share experiences and perspectives, we can engage in discussions, we can work together on practical activities, we can share each other’s successes and disappointments.
Where group events fall down is when they are used as a way to deliver large quantities of information. Unless a group is wholly homogeneous, which is practically an impossibility, some learners will be lagging behind and some will be frustrated at the slow pace; some will be interested in the topic and some not; some will want to ask lots of questions, others will not have the confidence. And when these events are face-to-face, the likelihood is that they will go on for far too long and cause cognitive overload for just about every participant.
Undoubtedly group learning will continue to play a dominant role in formal learning, even if more of this switches to online delivery and an element becomes asynchronous (using tools such as email, blogs and forums).
Each of the three social contexts provides us with considerable scope to employ a wide range of educational and training methods, as shown by the table below:

Interestingly, the methods listed above are practically timeless – the list would have been much the same a hundred years ago, perhaps a thousand. Only a few of the methods are dependent on any technology: reading, obviously, which required the invention of printing; and viewing video and listening to audio would not have been possible until some form of recording mechanism was developed. Although the range of methods doesn’t change much, the choices we make amongst them most certainly do, influenced by advances in educational psychology and neuroscience, political viewpoints, fashions and the changing expectations of next generation learners.
But these choices really do matter. As Sitzmann et al confirmed, ultimately it’s the instructional method, not the delivery medium that makes the difference. When web-based instruction and classroom instruction that have similar methods were compared, there was little or no difference in outcomes. Thomas L. Russell undertook an analysis of more than 350 studies conducted over the past 50 years, each attempting to compare the effectiveness of one learning medium with another. The title of Russell’s book is The No Significant Difference Phenomenon, which says it all.

References

The comparative effectiveness of web-based and classroom instruction: a meta-analysis by T Sitzmann, K Kraiger, D Stewart and R Wisher, published in Personnel Psychology (2006).
The No Significant Difference Phenomenon by Thomas L. Russell, online at http://www.nosignificantdifference.org/
Coming next in chapter 7: Media for formal learning
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Throughout 2011 we will be publishing extracts from The New Learning Architect. We move on to the fifth part of chapter 7:
Formal learning comes in many shapes and sizes. The effectiveness and efficiency with which a formal learning intervention is delivered depends to a large extent on whether the shape and the size are appropriate for the job.
Clark and Wittrock devised a useful model for analysing training strategies according to the degree of control imposed over the learning process by the trainer and/or the student. At the most trainer-centred end of the spectrum is simple exposition – the trainer tells the learner things, using methods such as lectures or prescribed reading; no interaction is expected or required, except perhaps some Q&A or an assessment.
The second strategy – structured instruction– is still under the trainer’s overall control, but is much more interactive, allowing the trainer to fine-tune the process to the needs of the particular audience. Structured instruction is widely used in training, and includes most classroom sessions and most computer-based self-study materials. Novices will rely on this degree of structure; independent learners can often do without.
A more learner-centred strategy is guided discovery. In this case, learners engage in tasks that have been specially designed to provide them with opportunities to experiment with alternative approaches. Learners improve their skill or understanding by reflecting, with the help of facilitators, coaches or mentors, upon the outcomes of these tasks and, as a result, drawing general conclusions which they can apply to future tasks. Guided discovery allows learners to have a go and learn from their mistakes. This strategy can be deployed in the classroom, in outdoor settings (as with Outward Bound-style courses) or through computer-based case studies, games and simulations.
The final strategy in Clark and Wittrock’s model is exploration. Here each learner determines their own learning process, taking advantage of resources provided by trainers and others, and takes out of this process their own, unique learning. Exploration may seem a relatively informal strategy, but can be integrated into formalised interventions as a component in a blended solution.
A formal learning intervention may rely on just one of these strategies, but increasingly will use a combination. The choice of strategy will depend on the nature of the learning objectives, the prior knowledge and the expectations of the target audience and, to some extent, the preferences and values of the trainer.

References

Psychological Principles of Training by Ruth Clark and Merlin C Wittrock,published in Training and Retraining, Macmillan Reference USA (2001).
Coming next in chapter 7: Social contexts for formal learning
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Throughout 2011 we will be publishing extracts from The New Learning Architect. We move on to the fourth part of chapter 7:
A formal learning intervention is only successful if it results in lasting change in the learner’s behaviour on the job. In their 1992 book Transfer of Training, Mary Broad and John Newstrom estimated that “…merely 10% of the training dollars spent result in actual and lasting behavioural change.”
When assessing what made the biggest impact on transfer of learning, the authors looked at three different parties – the learner’s manager, the trainer/facilitator and the learner themselves – at three stages in the process – before the intervention, during and after. They found that the greatest impact was made by the learner’s manager in setting expectations before the intervention; next most important was the trainer’s role before the intervention in getting to know the needs of the learners they would be training; third most important was the manager’s role after the intervention.

References

Transfer of Training by Mary Broad and John Newstrom, Basic Books, 1992

Coming next in chapter 7: Strategies for formal learning
Return to Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6
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Throughout 2011 we will be publishing extracts from The New Learning Architect. We move on to the third part of chapter 7:
What is the difference between education and training? The answer, according to the old joke, is that, whereas you might be happy for your children to have sex education at school, you’d be a little disconcerted if they had sex training. Training is, almost by definition, interactive. It has to impact on performance and, to accomplish this, it must involve a highly practical element.
In a formal learning situation, teachers, coaches, instructional designers and other ‘learning experts’ take on the responsibility not only for providing interesting new learning material but also for assisting the learner to recognise what’s important, transfer this to long-term memory and then strengthen their pathways to this new learning. They achieve this primarily through interaction – questions, exercises, discussions, essays, assignments, and so on.
But it’s a mistake to believe that learning can only take place when this interaction is externally mediated; individuals can also do this for themselves. Those who have learned how to learn are capable of acting independently: they can recognise when something is important, they reflect, they make notes, initiate conversations and post to their blogs. They’re also quite capable on acting on what they have learned by applying it to their jobs. With independent learners, courses with formalised interactions will often not be necessary.
In 1992, Hubert Dreyfus described the journey that learners take from ‘novice’ to ‘advanced beginner’ to ‘competent’ to ‘proficient’ to ‘expert’. Brian Sutton explains how different approaches are required at different stages along this journey: “The transition from novice to advanced beginner is essentially associated with rule following behaviour and this is best facilitated through formal learning processes. However, the transition from competent through proficient to expert is largely associated with pattern recognition and experience. It can only be attained within the performance context. It is rooted in the acquisition and sharing of tacit knowledge and this is fundamentally a social process – it needs prolonged and deep engagement with other expert practitioners.”
Sutton goes further to argue that “…as learning professionals we need to stop thinking of learning as an event that is organised by one set of people and imposed upon another, regardless of whether that event takes place in a classroom or via the medium of e-learning. Learning is a natural consequence of living and working: work has always involved problem solving, judgement, conflict resolution and choice – these are all learning opportunities. We can experience them and move on regardless or we can reflect upon them within the context of our environment and our core principles and, as a result, produce new insights that move us forward.”
There is a price to pay for the structure inherent in formal learning: interventions take time, money and expertise to design and develop. Organisations can’t always afford to wait for the interventions to be made available, nor can they necessarily spare the resources. When the learning is important to the organisation, when there is a sufficiently large target audience, when there is adequate lead time, then the investment might be made. When these conditions aren’t met, the organisation can either look for an off-the-shelf solution from an external supplier or adopt a more informal approach.
The inflexibility of formal learning can extend to the content, as John Seely Brown and Paul Duquid observe : “Learning is usually treated as a supply-side matter, thought to follow teaching, training or information delivery. But learning is much more demand driven. People learn in response to need. When people cannot see the need for what’s being taught, they ignore it, reject it, or fail to assimilate it in any meaningful way. Conversely, when they have a need, then, if the resources for learning are available, people learn effectively and quickly.”
Sometimes, as Harold Jarche likes to say, you need the ABC solution; that’s Anything But Courses.

References

Mind Over Machine by Herbert Dreyfus, 1992.
Learning’s Environmental Crisis by Brian Sutton, published as part of the Advance series by Saffron Interactive, 2007.
The Social Life of Information by John Seely Brown and Paul Duquid, Harvard Business School Press, 2002.
Learning & Working on the Web, December 30, 2008: http://www.jarche.com/2008/12/innovation-and-learning/.
Coming next in chapter 7: The transfer of learning
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Throughout 2011 we will be publishing extracts from The New Learning Architect. We move on to the second part of chapter 7:
The structure inherent in formal education, training and development provides advantages for employers and employees alike

• Because the curriculum is formally laid out in advance, employers can have greater confidence that important content has been covered consistently.
• Because a formalised intervention has a clear beginning and end, employers can more easily track who has had what training and when.
• Because of the assessment process, employers can have greater confidence that learning objectives have actually been achieved.
• Because professional facilitators are leading the intervention, employees can have greater confidence in the quality of the tuition they are likely to receive.
• Because content is sourced from subject experts and assembled by professionals, employees are more likely to have access to high quality materials.
• Because the intervention has a recognised outcome, even if that is just a formal completion, employees have the opportunity to gain a certification/qualification that may be valuable in their careers.

Of course, few of these advantages can be guaranteed; a great deal depends on the skill with which the intervention is targeted, designed and delivered. However, it is easy to see why employers and employees are likely to have more confidence in a formalised intervention than any less formal alternative, particularly when the stakes are high:

• When an employer needs to be able to demonstrate compliance to an external regulator.
• When a high degree of proficiency is absolutely vital to avoid the chance of an expensive error, damage to an employer’s reputation, or risk to health and safety. Quite clearly we cannot rely on informal learning processes to provide the skills needed by airline pilots, surgeons or structural engineers. These may be exceptional cases, but there are elements in most jobs where proficiency cannot be left to chance.
• When an employee is a complete novice and depends on a structured approach to their initial training.
• When the attainment of a qualification can make a big difference to an employee’s career progression.

However strong the lobby for more informal approaches to workplace learning, it is hard to see how we could do without formal learning altogether. The problem is not with the concept of formal learning; it is with the assumption, often held by l&d professionals, their internal ‘clients’ and learners themselves, that every learning and development requirement is best addressed by a course. As they say, when you’ve got a hammer in your hand, every problem looks like a nail.
Coming next in chapter 7: When formal learning is less appropriate
Return to Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6
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Throughout 2011 we will be publishing extracts from The New Learning Architect. We move on to chapter 7:
Having explored the contextual model from top to bottom, it is time to begin a closer examination of the four main contexts in which learning takes place in the workplace, starting with formal learning. Why start with the fourth of the contexts, rather than working from left to right? Well, simply because formal learning is what most people focus on when they think about learning at work. For many, learning means courses, and typically it means those courses where teachers and trainers provide instruction to a group of learners in a classroom.
Both formal and non-formal learning are proactive approaches, with the same overall goal of equipping employees with the knowledge and skills that they require to meet present and future job responsibilities. The difference with formal learning is in the way that this task is tackled.
Formal learning experiences are typically packaged as ‘courses’ or ‘programmes’. These tend to have a number of features in common:

• Objectives that describe, in terms of knowledge, skills and attitudinal change, what learning is intended to result from successful completion of the course or programme. Some courses may adopt a more learner-centred approach, focusing on the goals of the learners themselves, but it would still be highly unlikely for a formal learning intervention to have no objectives at all, whether or not these are made explicit.
• An established curriculum or learning plan, which sets out how the learning objectives are to be achieved in terms of the topics to be covered and/or the activities to be undertaken.
• Content assembled by or with reference to acknowledged subject experts. At the very least this content is likely to consist of a simple trainer guide or lecture notes. More commonly, it will extend to slides, videos and other visual aids, handouts, job aids and reference books. And where self-study forms an important part of the intervention, the content could include workbooks, online reference materials, interactive tutorials and simulations.
• A designated teacher, trainer or tutor to facilitate the learning process. The role of this person or persons will vary widely depending on the type of intervention and pedagogical approach, from a formal instructor to a subject expert, a coach, an assessor, a moderator or a curator. In cases where the intervention consists entirely of unsupported self-study, there will, of course, be no role at all.
• Some form of assessment, to determine whether the learning objectives have been achieved. Where a qualification is being awarded, this assessment could be elaborate, requiring an exam, a practical assessment, or the formal submission of a paper or portfolio. In other cases, the process of assessment could be much less formal, perhaps a practical exercise or a quiz.

Coming next in chapter 7: When formal learning does the job
Return to Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6
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