The challenge of online education is converting teaching into learning. There are two ways you can turn online training into an effective learning experience for your learners: humanize learning and individualize learning.
Humanize Learning
Developing and delivering training does not mean people are learning. Training will be more effective by humanizing learning through learner-to-learner and instructor-to-instructor interactions.
Lack of face-to-face interaction can cause learners to feel isolated, decreasing motivation. Learners are more likely to achieve course objectives when they feel part of a larger community.
At the core of humanized learning is interactivity: interaction with the content, classmates and the instructor.
Tools such as Facebook, wikis and Skype facilitate user-generated content and personal learning spaces. Social media allows learners to express themselves, collaborate and interact with the content on a deeper level.
These tools are great for personalizing the learning environment. After providing background on a topic, present interesting discussion questions and let learners explore further via chatrooms or social media. They get a sense that they have a role in shaping the learning experience.
Methods to humanize learning include:
- Chatrooms: Peer-to-peer group chatrooms allow learners to post their key takeaways and noteworthy point of views on a subject matter.
- Social Media: Harness learners’ social media habits to create a community learning environment where learners interact in various topic groups and share questions, content and points of view in real time.
- Online Instructor Support: Learners get the online instructor support necessary to humanize learning.
Individualize Learning
Feedback from classmates and instructors via chatrooms and social media can also promote individualized learning. People have different learning styles, so individualized learning allows people to create their own plans and mix and match modules based on their competencies.
Easy access to information and interactive online applications makes online learning more collaborative. Online instructors guide learners and provide tools to design a learning experience that works for each individual. Individualized learning and self-directed learning often go hand-in-hand, placing the responsibility for the learning experience on the learner. Proactive learners are more successful than passive learners and retain more information.
Learners become vested in the entire learning experience when they are given the option to select their modules and build their own course. Individualized learning provides value in learning by focusing on the competencies learners want to master.
Try creating a library of core and non-core topics that allows learners to select modules to personalize and individualize their learning experience based on their competencies.
The focus is on learning, not delivering content through a learning management system. Online tools can help humanize and individualize learning.
