Training Industry Magazine - Spring 2016 - (Page 11)

WILL THE APP BECOME the NEW CLASSROOM? Classroom education emerged in a world of information paucity. A minority of people could read. Knowledge was held by the few and education was deeply entwined in the oral tradition. Many of the early education models in the West were driven by religious texts that were read aloud. Memorization was a critical skill. Rote learning was the way to get ahead. The classroom was a critical tool. GOOGLE NEEDS NO CLASSROOMS. However, each one of these attributes has been turned on its head over the past 150 years. We now live in a world of information abundance. The vast majority of people can read. Knowledge is openly and freely available and education is a complex process of reading, listening, finding, sense-making, sharing and doing. Education is now driven by government policy and the needs of employers. Memorization is only required for critical, conceptual elements of our work as multi-channel access via the Internet and to networks of experts now means that "find"' is a more critical skill than "know." Yet much of today's education and training in the world of work remains fixed to an era long gone. Classroom learning, by definition, is separate from the pointof-use of learned knowledge and skills. We know that the closer learning is to the point of need, the more effective and impactful it is likely to be. Peter Senge, author of "The Fifth Discipline" and creator of the notion of the learning organization, clearly explained the situation: "A simple question to ask is, 'How has the world of a child changed in the last 150 years?' And the answer is, 'It's hard to imagine any way in which it hasn't changed,' and yet, if you look at school today versus 100 years ago, they are more similar than dissimilar." Exactly the same could be said of adult training and development as of child education. We may have added some technology, better lighting and more comfortable chairs, but our organizations' classrooms today have changed very little. IS THE CLASSROOM STILL RELEVANT? A fundamental question is whether the classroom is still relevant in 21st century organizational learning. There is no doubt that sometimes learning with others in the same room is the best option. Face-to-face onboarding programs that focus on rapidly building conceptual understanding (rather than developing knowledge of detailed tasks) will continue to be an important use of classroom learning until technology delivers much better virtual reality environments than are currently available. Classrooms also remain relevant for learning through group discussion and group problem-solving when people are co-located or in close reach with each other. The flipped classroom is a good example of this, where people come T R A I N I N G I N DUSTR Y MA GAZ INE - SPRING20 1 6 I WWW.TRAININGINDU S T RY . C OM/ MAGAZ I NE - CH AR L E S J E NNING S PERFORMANCE AND PRODUCTIVITY together to collaborate and share, and where knowledge building has been transferred to better channels of delivery. Apart from the two examples above, it is hard to find a situation where classroom learning offers an advantage over learning in the workplace, via technology, or over the water-cooler. Technology offers huge opportunities for social learning, peer feedback, and access to information at the point of need. In our world of information abundance, Google is the largest educational provider on the planet. Google needs no classrooms. THE NEW CLASSROOM? Mobile apps are increasingly being built and deployed by organizations to support workers. One large Australian bank already provides its people with a full HR suite of apps for their mobile phones. Others provide rapid access to performance support. It's not difficult to see the large-scale development of learning and performance tools and services via apps. That future world is not far off. Within the next few years, mobile apps will be the prime way L&D will support learning and capability building. The app will then become the new classroom. Charles Jennings is a director of the Internet Time Alliance and founder of the 70:20:10 Institute. He is the former chief learning officer for Thomson Reuters. Email Charles. 11 http://www.trainingindustry.com/ezine.aspx

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Training Industry Magazine - Spring 2016

Training Industry Magazine - Spring 2016
Transforming the Classroom Experience
Table of Contents
Onboarding Successful Leaders
Will the App Become the New Classroom?
The Evolving Classroom
Developing Micro-Learning for Micro-Moments
Testing the Waters with Mobile Learning
Incorporating Instant Messaging into Communciations Training
Tools for the Mixed Physical and Virtual Classroom
Training a Diverse Workforce
Next Generation Classroom: Providing the Ultimate Learning Experience
Meeting the Five Moments of Need
Save the Learners: Build a Serious Game Strategy
Universal Design for Learning
Cars.com: Revolutionizing the Classroom Experience
Crossing Cultural Training
The Changing Face of Training Outsourcing
Design Learning so Everyone Gets an 'A'
Creating Brain-Compatible Materials
Four Ways to Become an Agent of Learning, Not Change
BizLibrary Invests in the Science of Memory
Company News
What's Online
Training Talk

Training Industry Magazine - Spring 2016