We all remember watching Sesame Street, Oscar, Big Bird and Bert & Ernie when we were young. Personally I was hooked from an early age and, I don’t mind saying the Street taught me how to count and say the alphabet. The only real downside was that Count Dracula, or any other muppets, weren’t there when I counted at school, which made me less attentive as a young student. According to Malcolm Gladwell’s book Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, when children observing Sesame Street were examined, it was established that they became distracted when they got confused, not when they were bored, this is why the show’s producers created Big Bird and Oscar, they were used to ensure children didn’t get confused during street scenes and therefore distracted. A similar situation can happen when training in a classroom environment, let’s take a look at our guide to why online new hire training works.
The Learners Actually Learn
The example of Sesame Street is a great one, as it shows precisely how you can hook in your learners. There is a concern that in a classroom environment your learners could get confused, and quickly begin to get distracted. Maybe the content isn’t engaging enough, maybe the teacher’s methods don’t work for everyone, or maybe a classroom just isn’t for them. This is why online training is a better option, as unlike classroom based training, the learner will have the option to go over information, and properly understand what they are being taught at their own pace. If I can talk about what I know best here, GoContractor’s safety training software ensures that your training material is being read and absorbed. Learners can’t move forward until they fully understand the training material and they have proven that understanding by taking a quiz at the end. This ensures that your learners remember your material and are, ultimately, less susceptible to a serious accident. What’s our first tip? Use our online platform and see for yourself.
It Presents Information in a Digestible Format
Online new hire training provides information in what the eLearning company Shift call a bite-sized format. It’s easy to read, can work on pretty much any device and, ensures your workers understand everything. The guys at Swift point to a number of reasons why this bite-sized format works better than the classroom, they include the following three points:
New Hire Training Improves Psychological Engagement
Everyone would love to have engaging content to train with but assuming not all the materials will be novel or interesting in their own right trainers have to find ways in which to engage the trainees psychologically. Short format material can help with this by revealing its points one by one thereby creating anticipation about what is coming next and using teaser information to keep learners hooked. Using regular testing during the course also helps to involve the trainee beyond just being a passive spectator.
Takes Advantage of Our Natural Ebb and Flow
Our natural condition is to have our attention span ebb and flow so using online training can allow trainees to stop and recommence in line with this. Short, precise information also helps to combat falling attention levels by always introducing new material. This is in contrast to the classroom type training where sessions tend to be much longer and can see large fall offs in attention towards the end.
Speaks to the Twitter Generation about New Hire Training
As Swift rightly point out, today’s learners are “swimming in a sea of information”. Information is so accessible, and with the heightened awareness of social media, people want things that are easy to understand and memorable. It’s not an easy thing to do, providing information that your learners totally understand, but with new hire training you can allow continual checking of information through testing. Online training allows companies to speak directly to their employees, in language they can understand. The method of delivery of these materials, direct to laptop or mobile also works well for people nowadays who are used to using their phones and tablets to get information while on the move.
We’re all visual learners now
People remember information when it is attached to an image, let’s go back to Sesame Street for a moment. According to a 2013 report by University of Wisconsin-Madison four-year-olds who watched Sesame Street had literacy scores that were 67% higher than those didn’t watch.
Over 90% of US parents noticed a change in their children’s counting, sorting and math after watching the show and the high-school grade average is higher with children who have watched the show. Let’s take that 90% number. If you’re not aware of the show’s characters, Count Dracula, who I mentioned before, uses a variety of images and numbers to teach children how to count. With Sesame Street, the numbers are usually disguised within a character to ensure the child’s attention is kept, what that shows is that the right image will likely stick with your learner longer than text. This is why we use a lot of images across our platform, it ensures your learners absorb and store information quickly.
Sesame Street is an amazing example of a different approach to learning. All that is left really is for you to look at online learning, not as a replacement for the classroom, but as a better option for ensuring your learners are properly absorbing information.
Image courtesy of See-Ming Lee, entitled ‘Let me tell you a secret’ under Creative Commons
