TEACHERS & TRAINERS

When talking about the challenges facing both education and training today, one size no longer fits all. Stand-up instruction, videotapes, distance learning, books, desktop delivery of networked computer-based instruction, and multi-sensory e-Learning may all have a place.

Equally important is the support we all must give education and training professionals in dealing with these increasingly complicated challenges that effect learning. And, we must remember that the challenges facing trainers and educators outstrip the time-demands necessary for them to stay abreast of the “latest and greatest.”

While many tools exist to help educators stay current, it is not so easy to do so for the corporate trainer.

Unfortunately in business and industry, an organization too often chooses to focus certain time and money on training only when either some process/function within the organization has gone awry or an edict-to-train has come down from high up in the organizational structure.

Do to pressing time restraints, the effected trainers rely on a reactive decision process, ignoring the two bottom line questions: “who-to-be-trained?” and “what-to-use?”

And yet, the answers to those two questions is what the successful trainer has to find — for isn’t having well-trained personnel going to ultimately be more valuable to those individuals – and, at the same time, give more of an ROI to their organization?

Most importantly, we cannot assume that learning takes place just because instruction and learning materials are made available. In addition to content accuracy and completeness, today’s video-based learning culture and individual learning styles must be addressed.

Teachers and trainers need to re-examine the learning needs of their students and their trainees. Educators need to, once again, exalt the diversity of our children — their passions for living and their inherent desire to learn! Critical thinking skills must become “Job One” in education (both in public schools and in our universities).

Trainers, on the other hand, need to remember that Skills Acquisition becomes the ultimate goal for improving the lives of one’s trainees — and for the organizations they serve.

Teachers and trainers need our understanding and our support. Their task is monumental!