Holistic Report Framework 08/06/2016

Unit 101

Sharing holistic report framework, talking about the learning cycle.

There are five steps of the learning cycle including the following:

+ Identify learner's need,

+ Plan and design the suitable training

+ Deliver the training to the learners/audiences

+ Assess the training results

+ Evaluate the training and improvement

+ Identify learner’s need.

Why do we identify learner’s need first before commencing other things. In organization training or vocational training, the need of learners is very important. By understanding clearly about the capability of learners, strength points and week points, we know the level of competency that learners need to improve or fill the gap.

How to know the needs. There are several ways to got that including formal and informal methods. You can ask questions directly to learners or face to face interview. You can send them the questions forms via email or post. Or you can check the evidences of competence by verifying the certifications or observing they doing some tasks or as some eye witness… So the way you choose to identify needs depends on your resources. How much time you have? How much cost you can spend for? The schedule and availability of involved persons? And the purpose of checking that suit levels of training.

In my faculty, we are the HSE training provider for oil and gas industry in Viet Nam. Currently, we are the OPITO Approved center. Beside of this, we also supply the HSE training courses following Viet Nam standard and internationally guidelines such as HSE UK and OSHA.

The practice of identify learner’s need, we now conduct for external learners (delegates from oil and gas companies) and internal learners (trainer/instructor of the faculty). For external we use the booking procedure to get the demands of customers. Then upload booking and confirm on our database so that we arrange the suitable training schedule.

For internal, based on the training matrix or competency matrix, every year we have the plan to improve our trainers/instructors so they can handle the course by themselves. Then we send the people to attend training not only in-house training, on-the-job training but also oversea training. After each milestone, we have competence assessor to do assessment before report to manager for approval of new specific training course trainer/instructor.

+ Plan and design the training contents

Once complete identifying the learner’s needs, the trainer/instructor should proceed to the next step of “plan and design for the training”. So, how to plan and design the training suitable for learners. The answers you already got from the results of the first step. You have known the competency of learners, what training units/modules/qualifications they have to attend, what are the gaps need to be filled in and some other needs such as translation, disability support, request for services…

Planning for the training, trainers should check and verify some basic information to include training location or venue, suitability of facility and equipment, weather conditions, availability of time and schedule for both trainers and learners, support of transportation… Trainers and learners also sign onto the plan to confirm their understanding and agreement between both sides.

Before commencing training, trainers/instructor should design course programme/contents suitable to training levels of different learners. And how to design well. One of the good practices is that we design courses following international standards or industrial guidelines. We can also use the internal requirements of organization or out sourcing for that job. However, when designing, we need to focus on the aim and learning outcomes of training by answering some of these questions: the purpose of training, what are knowledge and skills that learners achieve after leaving the class.

In my faculty, we use guidelines for all instructors when teaching called Lesson Plan which is theory lesson plan, practical lesson plan or mixed. We put in that clear instructions for trainers so that experienced or non experienced can conduct training following our standards. Some key notes in lesson plan to include course/module title, date and time, trainer’s name, aim, learning outcomes, activities in class, resources to be used (slide, equipment, flipchart, multimedia…), assessment methods and reference.

+ Deliver training

After design and plan, now trainer is ready for deliver training. If you prepare well, your training can be run well. We just do what we think and write down on the plan. However, training activity is not just static. It is a dynamic motions. Trainers should not copy one style that you are success for one class to the others. Just because of different classes, always different learners.

There are three parts of training which are open, body/content and close parts. However, there are many different techniques to show the parts of training. We can use explanation, group discussion, round robin activity, asking questions, brainstorming, demonstration, tell story, showing video…

+ Assessment

Can we just do training without assessment? The answer is absolutely no. We must do assessment to confirm that learners have achieved learning outcomes or they have not. Assessment is one important part of training.

So, when and how to assess. We can do formal and informal assessment. We also have initial, formative and summative assessment. That means we can assess before, during or after training. Ther are several ways of assessment to include examination, questions, observations, assignment, project, approved prior learning, witness, simulation…

In my faculty, we often use multi-choice questions and observation of practical exercise for assessment.