MUSTS FOR LEARNING FACILITATORS

Quick Start

with brain-based learning insertions

  1. Do an adequate needs assessment. “Listening to learner’s wants and needs helps shape a program that has immediate usefulness to adults.” A useful question for needs assessment is: Who needs what as defined by whom? Listen to your learners needs by using e-mail, faxes, phone conversations, small focus groups and/or surveys.
  1. Have learning objectives (WIIFYS – What’s In It For you). Learners get enjoyment through anticipation of progress towards a goal,which appears to activate the pleasure centers of the brain. Review objectives periodically so learners can see what they have achieved.
  1. Keep lecture to the absolute minimum. Know the difference between "listening" and "learning". Have participants learn by doing. Try never to talk more than 5-10 minutes without doing something interactive. And saying, "Any questions?" does not count as interaction!
  2. Follow the 30/70 Rule to make sure your session is learner-centered. Facilitators should only be “on” 30% of the time during the session. The other 70% is learner “on” time: group exercises, asking/answering questions, individual work projects, etc.
  3. Utilize the Socratic Method. It's far more importantthat you ask the good questions rather than supply all the answers.
  4. Employ experienced-based, discovery learning approaches. Adults have and are always accumulating a growing reservoir of experience from which they learn. The learning facilitator will use methods that bring these experiences into the picture:case studies, discussion, experiments, simulation, and hands-on participation.
  5. Connect the new to the known, and the usefulness of the content to the life situation of the participants; use stories to communicate your content. No one can understand anything if it isn’t connected to something they already know. Make sure to engage the Basal Ganglia, that part of the brain where neural circuits of long-standing habit are formed and held. Activate learners’ neural networks by using real-life situations that create the questions and challenges that motivate adults to learn and grow. From this context emerge adult “teachable moments”. Although you can tell some of your own stories, focus on participant stories (their life experiences) as a learning medium.
  6. Have a Quick Start and a Big Finish. Get them doing something interesting -- even if it's just a group discussion -- very early. Don't bog them down with YOUR long introduction, the history of the topic, etc. The faster they're engaged, the better. Don't let the class fizzle out at the end. Try to end on a high.
  7. Know the wide variety of learning styles, and how to incorporate as many as possible into your learning experience. This doesn't mean that certain people don't have certain brain-style preferences, but the more styles you load into any learning experience, the better the learning is for everyone--regardless of their individual preferences.

  1. Respect learners’ memory realities.
  2. Heighten learners’ attention. Facilitators need to provide appropriate cues and signals to learners to help them retain the stimuli related to relevant new knowledge. You need to constantly engage participants’ Reticular Activating Systems, the part of the brain that regulates attention. Novelty is thus crucial to the attention process
  3. Don’t spam participants’ attention with information they don’t need or want. Memory has more in common with a sieve than a sponge. The Prefrontal Cortex, where working memory resides, can usually hold only Four Plus or Minus Onebits of information. ANK (Absolutely Need to Know) your learners. NEK (Need to Know) and NIK (Nice to know) should be supplied as resource materials that learners can absorb at their own pace.
  4. Create a great emotional state for learning. Positive emotions facilitate learning. Provide support to learners by showing examples, making suggestions about what to do, and reminding the learner of what she already knows. Allow the learner to have some success, no matter how small. Otherwise, you will be dealing with learners’ amygdala, that part of the brain responsible for the flight or fight response.
  5. Participants need time for elaborative rehearsal, which involves thinking about the meaning of new information and its connections to prior knowledge. The longer certain areas in the cortex are activated, the better the information is remembered. Let participants practice and apply their new knowledge so it can be integrated with prior knowledge in long term memory. Learning requires time for dendrites to grow and brain chemistry to change.
  6. It is almost always far more important that your learners nail fewer subjects than be "exposed" to a wider range of subjects. Knowledge cannot be pushed into someone's head while they sit passively reading or listening. Knowledge is a co-creation. The learner must construct the new knowledge in his own head. The key is to give participants JEL (Just Enough Learning), and the skills to be able to continue learning on their own. Presentation ofinformation does not equal learning!
  1. Strive for deep, not surface learning. Deep learning promotes understanding and application for life. In contrast, surface learning is the tacit acceptance of information and memorization as isolated and unlinked facts. It leads to superficial retention of material for examinations and does not promote understanding or long-term retention of knowledge and information.”
  1. Using PowerPoint slides to deliver a classroom learning experience is often the worst thing you can do. Using slides for some select pieces of a course are important, beneficial, and crucial. But often the best presentation is... no presentation. Ditch the slides completely. Especially if the slides are bullet points. Or worse... paragraphs”. Avoid PowerPoint Poisoning. Too many slides with too much information lead to stimulus habituation: decreased attention and response due to repeated or prolonged experience.

  1. Utilize a simple,learner-centric design. A well-designed session is easier to deliver and allows for session corrections on the fly.
  2. It is also important to design for transfer of learning. There are many reasons for learning, but one of the critical reasons is to impact what people can do in the real world. Transfer of learning means that something learned in one situation can be applied in another.
  3. Motivation is the most overlooked aspect of instructional strategy, and perhaps the most critical element needed for learners. Designers must strive to create a deeper motivation in learners for them to learn new skills and transfer those skills back into the work environment.

.

  1. Keep the Learning Experience Coherent. Coherence literally means sticking together. The elements of coherent learning – course sessions and their content – have to be related to each other so that learners can follow the flow of thought from session to session.
  1. Use Authentic Assessment to evaluate learner understanding. Authentic Assessment asks learners to perform real-world tasks that demonstrate meaningful application of essential knowledge and skills. It aims to evaluate learners’ abilities in 'real-world' contexts. In other words, learners learn how to apply their skills to authentic tasks and projects.
  1. If you're not passionate, don't expect any energy from your learners. That doesn't mean being an annoying cheerleader. Be honest, be authentic, but be passionate. It's your job to find ways to keep yourself and your participants motivated.
  1. Leave your ego at the door. This is not about you. Remember: It's not about what YOU do... it's about how your learners feel about what THEY can do as a result of the learning experience you created and helped to deliver.
  1. Remember that a lot of learning is of the informal variety. “Today, learning is viewed as a continuous cycle that includes both formal experiences (classroom and online courses) and informal experiences, such as collaboration, coaching, feedback and knowledge access. Provide both face to face and electronic networking opportunities for learners.
  1. Realize that learning involvesboth addition and replacement. Learning can be additive (addition of new knowledge, skills, etc.) or supplantive (replacement of old knowledge and skill with new ones). Supplantive learning is a process of personal change that entails unlearning and hence loss. Be aware that you may face resistance to the learning you are trying to facilitate.
  1. Encourage Reflective Learning. Reflective learners can be seen as those who explore their learning experiencesto better understand how they learn, with a view to ultimately improve their further learning. Give learners the opportunity to process their experiences and examine what they have learned from it.