3 minutes
Even in the age of the smartphone, great education is possible.
Man, are we ever distracted. According to statistics presented in a recent CUES Webinar, Transforming Training: Meeting the Needs of the Modern Learner, we unlock our smartphones up to nine times every hour, are online 27 times per day and get interrupted as frequently as every five minutes. Plus, we’re impatient. In her presentation of the webinar, CUES member Danielle Buscher, learning and development manager at $181 million West Community Credit Union, O Fallon, Mo., and a 2015 Next Top Credit Union Executive contest finalist, said most learners won’t watch videos longer than four minutes.
In addition, online designers now have between five and 10 seconds to grab someone’s attention before they click away. It would seem difficult to teach anything new to people who are that distracted and accustomed to getting whatever they want so quickly. The solution may be an extension of the age-old practice of “meeting learners where they are.” Thinking that way, it’s not surprising that Buscher described education theory suggesting that 70 percent of learning should be integrated into the workplace, 20 percent be learning from others and only 10 percent be presented in a formal learning format. Many of the questions raised during the webinar’s question-and-answer period were about how to encourage adoption of a learning platform offered at the credit union, which would be part of the 70 percent of learning educators recommend integrating into the workplace.
Buscher suggested having learning champions who know how to use the CU’s training system and can enthusiastically encourage and support others. She also said that her credit union has leveraged “gamification,” by using its platform to play Clue. Learners check into the platform throughout the day to get clues and determine “who done it.” Buscher said the 20 percent of learning time that’s recommended to be learning from others could be addressed with social interactions, including involvement in online communities. The 10 percent formal learning component is best accomplished by “flipping the classroom”—that is, spending less time in traditional, one-way lectures and providing more opportunity to tap into experiential learning, she noted.
I’m excited that the new CUES Elite Access™ Virtual Classroom offering that I’ve been helping to research and bring online will help credit unions follow these guidelines. Unlike traditional online learning, the CUES Elite Access courses are live-taught, which means attendees can both see and ask questions of the presenter. This is very different from traditional webinars and online courses. CUES Elite Access also can support interactions and learning from peers in the course through special “break out” sessions set up by the phone system. While modern learners may be tricky to teach, it’s still possible if you meet them where they are.
Dana Murn-Kohal is CUES’ professional development and innovation manager.
