7 ms·

Training courses seem to be a place that they've increasingly made terrible in this way. I'm fine with useful training where they teach you some stuff, and let

by jbb555 10y ago

Training courses seem to be a place that they've increasingly made terrible in this way. I'm fine with useful training where they teach you some stuff, and let you have a go at it, and are available for questions. But no... these days they have to make it all "interactive". Instead of teaching stuff they have to stand there picking on people asking "what do you know about X", and then after a few hours of "teaching" you are "rewarded" by being forced to join a group of people for a group activity. No, it's not a reward, it's a few hours of hell. ugh, this is why I tend to avoid so called training these days. Why can't we just be given actual teaching and notes and not be forced to do awful group activities.

puranjay 10y ago
Most of these training courses aren't designed by educators. One of the first things my girlfriend learned when she started her teaching career was how different people learn differently. Some people, it appears, learn better if you just hand them a book and let them read it in their own corner. Businesses seem to forget these basic lessons in favor of feel-good "team work" nonsense
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- onion2k 10y ago
  One of the first things my girlfriend learned when she started her teaching career was how different people learn differently. Some people, it appears, learn better if you just hand them a book and let them read it in their own corner. Most studies have found that the idea people have different learning styles isn't actually true. People have a preference but it doesn't affect how much they learn. http://qz.com/585143/the-concept-of-different-learning-styles-is-one-of-the-greatest-neuroscience-myths/ http://qz.com/585143/the-concept-of-different-learning-style...
  - thr0waway1239 10y ago
    To the extent that the author of that book is correct - they talk about visual, auditory or kinesthetic, I don't really think it is the same learning style we are talking about. The GP says some people learn better if you just hand them a book and let them read it in their own corner (i.e. don't expect extroversion as a precondition for the learning environment you create).
  - cmdrfred 10y ago
    I can certainly learn faster from a book. Unless the teacher is Eminem, I can read much faster than they can speak. I've found that an hour of classroom instruction is about 15 minutes of reading for me.
    - koonsolo 10y ago
      True for me too. Also when there is a part you already know or partly know, you can go even faster.
    - Noseshine 10y ago
      Usually yes - but it depends. Anything programming related I rarely like as a lecture and completely agree with you, unlike it's general concepts and then it depends, see below. I'm an avid reader, so historically I always favored reading and only the last few years did I get a more nuanced opinion with exposure to new subjects and lecturers. On the other hand, when I took "Medical Neuroscience" [0], a pretty heavy course with 16 hrs/week ~25 hours (or was it 35?) lectures total (the 1st edition of that course - I have not checked if they made any changes to the edition online now, Coursera switched to a different course format), at least for the duration of the course I ignored the textbook [1] even though I had it. The lecturer was mesmerizing, I just started the videos and listened for hours - and actually learned. The fact that most of the time you do want to take that textbook (even for this exact same subject) is that it's exceedingly rare to find such a specimen of a teacher. Similarly with basic physiology lectures, even though they were done cheaply and he has stopped making new ones Aaron Mullally's lectures are of the same kind, I could just listen and listen and learn stuff. I tried many different ones, all of them prepared more "professionally" (I don't like that word because the dirtiest and cheapest solution can still be more professional than the one with the best packaging, but you know what I mean, I hope). Math, physics, chemistry, biology: It depends (so the same), I found lectures - I guess that actually means I found lecturers - that at least for me are better than learning the same from a book. Another example where given the choice between book and lecture I would take the lecture any time: [3] (and that is 100% because of the person giving the lecture). [0] https://www.coursera.org/learn/medical-neuroscience https://www.coursera.org/learn/medical-neuroscience [1] http://www.sinauer.com/neuroscience-621.html http://www.sinauer.com/neuroscience-621.html [2] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0JRvRB-VkJ3yeSEdXpe9ew https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0JRvRB-VkJ3yeSEdXpe9ew [3] https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-biology-secret-life-mitx-7-00x-3 https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-biology-secret-life-...
  - notalaser 10y ago
    It's likely true that, all things being equal, learning styles are equally efficient, but this is exactly one of those cases when all things are not equal. The super-interactive (and borderline childish) style of some training sessions is enough to alienate even dedicated learners; they won't learn anything, not because they have a unique learning style, but because they lose motivation, faith in the instructor and the course, and likely brush everything off as a waste of time.
    - __derek__ 10y ago
      I think this touches on personality types, too. People with strong anti-authoritarianism streaks are likely to be turned off by an instructor who attempts to organize those sorts of activities when their authority derives solely from the fact that they are the instructor of the course. Without proof (i.e. having taught me something), you're going to be tuned out when you resort to childish tactics. Reflecting back to these situations brought to mind the Seinfeld episode "The Pitch"[1] in which Jerry and George pitch a TV show to NBC executives. In it, the NBC team's leader expresses skepticism about George's idea, leading to this exchange: RUSSELL: Well, why am I watching it? GEORGE: Because it's on TV. RUSSELL: (Threatening) Not yet. Why are we doing this? Because it's what you say? Not for long. [1]: http://seinfeldscripts.com/ThePitch.htm http://seinfeldscripts.com/ThePitch.htm
    - jbb555 10y ago
      It certainly affects me. If I think a course is going to be super interactive I'll do everything I Can to avoid it
  - balabaster 10y ago
    If there were a subscription service you could pay a nominal monthly fee just to have access to someone you could call up with questions and have them whiteboard you through it, that would be worth its weight in gold. I learn better if you give me a bunch of videos, access to documentation, someone knowledgeable I can ask pointed questions to in order to solidify or correct my understanding and an environment to which I can apply what I'm learning. I don't need someone to hold my hand 90% of the time, nor do I want to waste their time holding my hand for that 90%. I learn faster on my own, but it's way quicker to get unstuck when you can ask questions ... and some things you just can't learn without doing, as my Gran would say: You can't understand the texture of bread dough without getting your hands dirty. For technical stuff PluralSight et. al, Google, Safari and StackOverflow are immensely more useful than sitting in a class of other people learning to program, except for access to the professor when you need things answered.
  - reitanqild 10y ago
    Tongue-in-cheek, but I don't want to take those studies seriously as long knowing about learning styles help people.
  - keithpeter 10y ago
    http://itslifejimbutnotasweknowit.org.uk/files/LSRC_LearningStyles.pdf http://itslifejimbutnotasweknowit.org.uk/files/LSRC_Learning... Similar conclusions - with some evidence of benefit from VARK and similar sensory preference inventories. Coffield and his team also asked if other factors (reinforcement, regular assessment and monitoring &c) had a greater 'effect size'.
  - jogjayr 10y ago
    > People have a preference but it doesn't affect how much they learn. But shouldn't learning in your preferred style affect motivation to learn, thereby affecting how much is learned?
- RamenJunkie_ 10y ago
  I feel like businesses also don't like when people prefer to "work alone" or "work on their own" because they just assume that if you can't see a person working, they are slacking off. Even if working in this case is training.
dopeboy 10y ago
I've been part of a technical training program at a Fortune 100 company. I've done technical training for new hires at a Fortune 500 company. I've also volunteer taught high school kids how to code. I consider myself an introvert with a extrovert mode that gets turned on when needed. Couple thoughts: * As an instructor, I hate standing in front of the class and talking. That asymmetric form of teaching is pointless and I'd argue, outdated. * Interactivity is important in a training setting because you're learning along with others. That initial path you create in your brain is dotted with waypoints that everyone in class travels together. This is powerful when learning because more likely than not, you will be able to pull each other way from common pitfalls and also connect concepts that you know about already. * I see your point on group activity. It depends on the nature of the training. If it's a highly technical topic like a new programming language, it probably makes sense to have individual practice before any group project.
- hannob 10y ago
  "I consider myself an introvert with a extrovert mode that gets turned on when needed." Then please understand that unlike you many others aren't introverts by choice. They can't simply "turn it off".
  - paulcole 10y ago
    Saying, "I'm an introvert" isn't an excuse to avoid interacting with others. Learning how to spend time in a group is a valuable skill, especially for introverts.
    - noobiemcfoob 10y ago
      Unless the course is about training group communication skills, etc, the fact that it is a good and useful skill has no bearing on its use for instructing other topics. The point of a course is to teach you a topic, not teach skills outside of that topic. This was the worst with instructors and professors who felt they needed to teach you some life skill along with calculus. They'd fail to notice a large number of other professors were doing it too. Then you have 5 different people all convinced and trying their hardest to ingrain group communications skills right alongside advanced topics. Meanwhile, I'm crying inside as I struggle with 5 different group projects - not because of the material, I could do each of these projects alone with only moderately more time - but because of the awkwardness of forgetting everyone's name and those details about each of their personal lives they want to talk about for the first 15 minutes of every meeting. Take your life skills and write a self-help book. I just want to learn some integrals.
toddmorey 10y ago
I'm in a course now where the printed course books (the only materials available) all have the important concepts as blanks. The idea is that it's interactive. But in reality I'm spending more time writing than thinking and after missing 20 minutes of training due to a conflict, I now have several pages that are entirely useless.
paulcole 10y ago
>No, it's not a reward, it's a few hours of hell. Holy hyperbole. Couldn't you also be learning how to spend time in a group?
- RandomOpinion 10y ago
  >Couldn't you also be learning how to spend time in a group? I think the definition of the word "introvert" might be something you should review.
  - Jtsummers 10y ago
    No true introvert. The term itself is useless anymore because it conflates shyness, introspection (an aspect of introversion, classically), and symptoms of social anxiety.
    - logfromblammo 10y ago
      One time, my spouse dragged me to Summerfest in Milwaukee, during the day. Even during daylight hours, it's crowded and noisy, and it only gets worse at night. At one point, my spouse turns around, looks at my face, and says, "Oh my God--you look like you're dying." And I felt like I was. To an introvert, groups of strangers are uncomfortable, parties are taxing, and crowds are torture. "Can't you learn to spend time in a group?" is, to an introvert, conceptually equivalent to social mithridatism. All you have to do to feel comfortable in a pit of venomous snakes is to painfully inject yourself with increasing amounts of venom over an extended period of time, giving yourself time to recover after each dose. Or, to overcome a food allergy, you undergo desensitization therapy, gradually increasing your exposure to it. Since the process is painful, there must be some perceptible reward at the end of it in order to make the first step worthwhile. There is no such benefit in most companies. Hey, congratulations! You get to keep your job, doing more of the same thing! Now get back over here and do a trust fall, where you close your eyes and then a dozen people touch you at once, all over your body! It's fun! How about instead of doing that, you give me an office with a lockable door (and also actually give me the key for it) and make sure I only have exactly one boss? Put up a team wiki and give everyone dev blog URLs instead of having a daily face-to-face status meeting? Automate or pre-schedule any co-worker lunch outings, such that everybody knows the restaurant selection in advance?

by jbb555 10y ago

puranjay 10y ago

Most of these training courses aren't designed by educators. One of the first things my girlfriend learned when she started her teaching career was how different people learn differently. Some people, it appears, learn better if you just hand them a book and let them read it in their own corner. Businesses seem to forget these basic lessons in favor of feel-good "team work" nonsense

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
onion2k 10y ago
One of the first things my girlfriend learned when she started her teaching career was how different people learn differently. Some people, it appears, learn better if you just hand them a book and let them read it in their own corner. Most studies have found that the idea people have different learning styles isn't actually true. People have a preference but it doesn't affect how much they learn. http://qz.com/585143/the-concept-of-different-learning-styles-is-one-of-the-greatest-neuroscience-myths/ http://qz.com/585143/the-concept-of-different-learning-style...
- thr0waway1239 10y ago
  To the extent that the author of that book is correct - they talk about visual, auditory or kinesthetic, I don't really think it is the same learning style we are talking about. The GP says some people learn better if you just hand them a book and let them read it in their own corner (i.e. don't expect extroversion as a precondition for the learning environment you create).
- cmdrfred 10y ago
  I can certainly learn faster from a book. Unless the teacher is Eminem, I can read much faster than they can speak. I've found that an hour of classroom instruction is about 15 minutes of reading for me.
  - koonsolo 10y ago
    True for me too. Also when there is a part you already know or partly know, you can go even faster.
  - Noseshine 10y ago
    Usually yes - but it depends. Anything programming related I rarely like as a lecture and completely agree with you, unlike it's general concepts and then it depends, see below. I'm an avid reader, so historically I always favored reading and only the last few years did I get a more nuanced opinion with exposure to new subjects and lecturers. On the other hand, when I took "Medical Neuroscience" [0], a pretty heavy course with 16 hrs/week ~25 hours (or was it 35?) lectures total (the 1st edition of that course - I have not checked if they made any changes to the edition online now, Coursera switched to a different course format), at least for the duration of the course I ignored the textbook [1] even though I had it. The lecturer was mesmerizing, I just started the videos and listened for hours - and actually learned. The fact that most of the time you do want to take that textbook (even for this exact same subject) is that it's exceedingly rare to find such a specimen of a teacher. Similarly with basic physiology lectures, even though they were done cheaply and he has stopped making new ones Aaron Mullally's lectures are of the same kind, I could just listen and listen and learn stuff. I tried many different ones, all of them prepared more "professionally" (I don't like that word because the dirtiest and cheapest solution can still be more professional than the one with the best packaging, but you know what I mean, I hope). Math, physics, chemistry, biology: It depends (so the same), I found lectures - I guess that actually means I found lecturers - that at least for me are better than learning the same from a book. Another example where given the choice between book and lecture I would take the lecture any time: [3] (and that is 100% because of the person giving the lecture). [0] https://www.coursera.org/learn/medical-neuroscience https://www.coursera.org/learn/medical-neuroscience [1] http://www.sinauer.com/neuroscience-621.html http://www.sinauer.com/neuroscience-621.html [2] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0JRvRB-VkJ3yeSEdXpe9ew https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0JRvRB-VkJ3yeSEdXpe9ew [3] https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-biology-secret-life-mitx-7-00x-3 https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-biology-secret-life-...
- notalaser 10y ago
  It's likely true that, all things being equal, learning styles are equally efficient, but this is exactly one of those cases when all things are not equal. The super-interactive (and borderline childish) style of some training sessions is enough to alienate even dedicated learners; they won't learn anything, not because they have a unique learning style, but because they lose motivation, faith in the instructor and the course, and likely brush everything off as a waste of time.
  - __derek__ 10y ago
    I think this touches on personality types, too. People with strong anti-authoritarianism streaks are likely to be turned off by an instructor who attempts to organize those sorts of activities when their authority derives solely from the fact that they are the instructor of the course. Without proof (i.e. having taught me something), you're going to be tuned out when you resort to childish tactics. Reflecting back to these situations brought to mind the Seinfeld episode "The Pitch"[1] in which Jerry and George pitch a TV show to NBC executives. In it, the NBC team's leader expresses skepticism about George's idea, leading to this exchange: RUSSELL: Well, why am I watching it? GEORGE: Because it's on TV. RUSSELL: (Threatening) Not yet. Why are we doing this? Because it's what you say? Not for long. [1]: http://seinfeldscripts.com/ThePitch.htm http://seinfeldscripts.com/ThePitch.htm
  - jbb555 10y ago
    It certainly affects me. If I think a course is going to be super interactive I'll do everything I Can to avoid it
- balabaster 10y ago
  If there were a subscription service you could pay a nominal monthly fee just to have access to someone you could call up with questions and have them whiteboard you through it, that would be worth its weight in gold. I learn better if you give me a bunch of videos, access to documentation, someone knowledgeable I can ask pointed questions to in order to solidify or correct my understanding and an environment to which I can apply what I'm learning. I don't need someone to hold my hand 90% of the time, nor do I want to waste their time holding my hand for that 90%. I learn faster on my own, but it's way quicker to get unstuck when you can ask questions ... and some things you just can't learn without doing, as my Gran would say: You can't understand the texture of bread dough without getting your hands dirty. For technical stuff PluralSight et. al, Google, Safari and StackOverflow are immensely more useful than sitting in a class of other people learning to program, except for access to the professor when you need things answered.
- reitanqild 10y ago
  Tongue-in-cheek, but I don't want to take those studies seriously as long knowing about learning styles help people.
- keithpeter 10y ago
  http://itslifejimbutnotasweknowit.org.uk/files/LSRC_LearningStyles.pdf http://itslifejimbutnotasweknowit.org.uk/files/LSRC_Learning... Similar conclusions - with some evidence of benefit from VARK and similar sensory preference inventories. Coffield and his team also asked if other factors (reinforcement, regular assessment and monitoring &c) had a greater 'effect size'.
- jogjayr 10y ago
  > People have a preference but it doesn't affect how much they learn. But shouldn't learning in your preferred style affect motivation to learn, thereby affecting how much is learned?
RamenJunkie_ 10y ago
I feel like businesses also don't like when people prefer to "work alone" or "work on their own" because they just assume that if you can't see a person working, they are slacking off. Even if working in this case is training.

dopeboy 10y ago

I've been part of a technical training program at a Fortune 100 company. I've done technical training for new hires at a Fortune 500 company. I've also volunteer taught high school kids how to code. I consider myself an introvert with a extrovert mode that gets turned on when needed. Couple thoughts: * As an instructor, I hate standing in front of the class and talking. That asymmetric form of teaching is pointless and I'd argue, outdated. * Interactivity is important in a training setting because you're learning along with others. That initial path you create in your brain is dotted with waypoints that everyone in class travels together. This is powerful when learning because more likely than not, you will be able to pull each other way from common pitfalls and also connect concepts that you know about already. * I see your point on group activity. It depends on the nature of the training. If it's a highly technical topic like a new programming language, it probably makes sense to have individual practice before any group project.

hannob 10y ago
"I consider myself an introvert with a extrovert mode that gets turned on when needed." Then please understand that unlike you many others aren't introverts by choice. They can't simply "turn it off".
- paulcole 10y ago
  Saying, "I'm an introvert" isn't an excuse to avoid interacting with others. Learning how to spend time in a group is a valuable skill, especially for introverts.
  - noobiemcfoob 10y ago
    Unless the course is about training group communication skills, etc, the fact that it is a good and useful skill has no bearing on its use for instructing other topics. The point of a course is to teach you a topic, not teach skills outside of that topic. This was the worst with instructors and professors who felt they needed to teach you some life skill along with calculus. They'd fail to notice a large number of other professors were doing it too. Then you have 5 different people all convinced and trying their hardest to ingrain group communications skills right alongside advanced topics. Meanwhile, I'm crying inside as I struggle with 5 different group projects - not because of the material, I could do each of these projects alone with only moderately more time - but because of the awkwardness of forgetting everyone's name and those details about each of their personal lives they want to talk about for the first 15 minutes of every meeting. Take your life skills and write a self-help book. I just want to learn some integrals.

toddmorey 10y ago

I'm in a course now where the printed course books (the only materials available) all have the important concepts as blanks. The idea is that it's interactive. But in reality I'm spending more time writing than thinking and after missing 20 minutes of training due to a conflict, I now have several pages that are entirely useless.

paulcole 10y ago

>No, it's not a reward, it's a few hours of hell. Holy hyperbole. Couldn't you also be learning how to spend time in a group?

RandomOpinion 10y ago
>Couldn't you also be learning how to spend time in a group? I think the definition of the word "introvert" might be something you should review.
- Jtsummers 10y ago
  No true introvert. The term itself is useless anymore because it conflates shyness, introspection (an aspect of introversion, classically), and symptoms of social anxiety.
  - logfromblammo 10y ago
    One time, my spouse dragged me to Summerfest in Milwaukee, during the day. Even during daylight hours, it's crowded and noisy, and it only gets worse at night. At one point, my spouse turns around, looks at my face, and says, "Oh my God--you look like you're dying." And I felt like I was. To an introvert, groups of strangers are uncomfortable, parties are taxing, and crowds are torture. "Can't you learn to spend time in a group?" is, to an introvert, conceptually equivalent to social mithridatism. All you have to do to feel comfortable in a pit of venomous snakes is to painfully inject yourself with increasing amounts of venom over an extended period of time, giving yourself time to recover after each dose. Or, to overcome a food allergy, you undergo desensitization therapy, gradually increasing your exposure to it. Since the process is painful, there must be some perceptible reward at the end of it in order to make the first step worthwhile. There is no such benefit in most companies. Hey, congratulations! You get to keep your job, doing more of the same thing! Now get back over here and do a trust fall, where you close your eyes and then a dozen people touch you at once, all over your body! It's fun! How about instead of doing that, you give me an office with a lockable door (and also actually give me the key for it) and make sure I only have exactly one boss? Put up a team wiki and give everyone dev blog URLs instead of having a daily face-to-face status meeting? Automate or pre-schedule any co-worker lunch outings, such that everybody knows the restaurant selection in advance?