Table of Contents
About This Book
Why is this topic important?
What can you achieve with this book?
How is this book organized?
About Pfeiffer
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Foreword
What the Trainer’s Trainer Says About
Opening and Connections
How TV Changed You and Me
Who Needs to Know?
Twelve Benefits You’ll Get from This Book
It’s Organized to Save You Time
Walking the Talk
Part One
When They Do It, They Get It! - 150 Activities to Make the Learning Stick
A Bird’s-Eye View of 150 Activities
Chunk It
Got a Minute? - Sixty-Second Activities to Help Learners Repeat, Review, and Remember
Connections
Time Sponges
Pair Shares
Shout Outs
Think and Write
Signals
Doodles
Pop-Ups
Mark-Ups
Tickets Out
Action Plans
Celebrations
Take Five! - Five- and Ten-Minute Games That Help Learners RAP It Up: ...
Postcard Partners
The Gallery Walk
Take a Stand
Grab That Spoon!
Place Your Order
Metaphor Magic!
Let’s Trade
Each One Teach One
The Walkabout
Blackout Bingo!
Part Two
Heads Up! - Brain-Based Learning and Training
The Learning Brain
Emotion Directs Attention, Which Directs Learning
Overview of Part Two
Attention Maker, Attention Breaker - The Reticular Activating System and Learning
Picture This
What Is the RAS and What Does It Do?
Time and Energy
Learning, Teaching, and the RAS
Changes That Engage the RAS
Three Brains in One - The Triune Brain and Learning
Picture This
From Parts to Whole
The Downshifting Brain
From Connections to Community
Techniques Are Never Value-Neutral
Building the Learning Community
Pleasure, Not Pain
Back to the Beginning
Let the Compass Be Your Guide - The Learning Compass and Learning the Natural Way
Picture This
The Natural Cycle of Learning
What Is the Learning Compass and What Does It Do?
Helping Others Learn the Natural Way
Compass Questions
Mapping Your Message - Making It Stick with the Training Map
Picture This
What Is the Training Map?
What Does a Training Map Do?
Using the Training Map
Assessing Your Training Map
Power-Hour Training Templates - Time-Saving Design and Delivery Tools
Power-Hour Training Template #1 - With Five 10-Minute Lecture Segments
Power-Hour Training Template #2 - With Four 10-Minute and One 5-Minute Lecture Segments
Power-Hour Training Template #3 - With Four 10-Minute and One 5-Minute Lecture Segments
Power-Hour Training Template #4 - With Three 15-Minute Lecture Segments
Power-Hour Training Template #5 - With Two 20-Minute and One 5-Minute Lecture Segments
Power-Hour Training Sample - Using Template #1: Five 10-Minute Lecture Segments
Part Three
More Timely Training Tools
Bringing It Home to Conscious Competence
More Tools for the Consciously Competent Trainer
Get a CLUE! - Four Elements to Increase Motivation and Memory in Learning
What Are the Four CLUE Elements?
What Does CLUE Do?
The Creative Element
The Linked Element
The Useful Element
The Emotional Element
You Said It But Did They Get It? - How to Check for Understanding
Picture This
What Is Checking for Understanding?
What Does Checking for Understanding Do?
Five Activities to Check for Understanding
What’s a Picture Worth? - The Importance of Imagery in Learning
Picture This
The Two-Sided Brain
The Roles of Images and Words
What Is Imagery?
What Does Imagery Do?
Ways to Use Imagery in Training
Sample Graphic Organizers
Station Rotation - Learning a Lot in a Little Time
Picture This
What Is a Station Rotation?
What Does a Station Rotation Do?
Station Rotation Instructions
Closing and Celebration
Remarkable Resources
Many Thanks!
About the Author
Pfeiffer Publications Guide
About This Book
Why is this topic important?
Sound bites. Tag lines. Slogans. One-liners. The thirty-second spot. The sixty-second take. Small chunks of information dished up in short snippets of time. In television-dominated cultures, learners are used to this mode of information delivery: short and quick. Lengthy lectures are out. Short information chunks are in. Keeping this trend in mind, and using what we know about learning that sticks, those of us who are involved in the business of educating others need to design and deliver classes and programs that use shorter segments of time more effectively. We need to create learning experiences that are built on two fundamental learning principles of the twenty-first century: shorter segments of instruction are better than longer ones, and learners remember more when they are involved in the learning. Educating others becomes more effective, and less costly, when trainers use their time—and their learner’s time—more efficiently. Involving learners before, during, and after short segments of instruction is also the basis of brain-compatible training, that is, teaching in ways that the human brain learns best.
What can you achieve with this book?
The Ten-Minute Trainer helps you make the most of your training time. This practical, grab-it-and-go book gives you 150 ways to use teachable moments—snippets of time in which you can reinforce the learning in powerful and memorable ways. This resource also gives you a simple and practical blueprint, based on how the human brain naturally learns, for designing and delivering training quickly and effectively. You will discover the brain research that supports short, quick instructional methods, and new ways to motivate learners and increase their ability to remember and use what they learn. With The Ten-Minute Trainer as your guide, you will involve training participants in their own learning without sacrificing any training content. Best of all, you will be an expert at teaching a lot in a little time.
How is this book organized?
Because your reading time is precious, this book gives you the “how to” information first.
Part One contains 150 ways to use short segments of time to help learners review, remember, and apply important information. From the collection of “Got a Minute?” activities to the “Take Five!” games, these hands-on strategies increase learner motivation, interest, and involvement. They also help move learning into long-term memory. All the activities are from sixty seconds to ten minutes in length.
Part Two gives you the practical brain research upon which this book is based. It also explains two powerful instructional tools—the Learning Compass and the Training Map—to help you design and deliver training in less time and with better long-term results. Finally, Part Two shows you how to include the book’s concepts and activities in your own training by using five Power-Hour Training Templates.
Part Three offers you four “Get a CLUE!” elements to increase learner motivation and retention, “What’s a Picture Worth?” suggestions for making your training more image-rich, ways to check for understanding, and a unique training activity called “Station Rotation.”
You’ll also find a collection of Remarkable Resources to complement The Ten-Minute Trainer.
About Pfeiffer
Pfeiffer serves the professional development and hands-on resource needs of training and human resource practitioners and gives them products to do their jobs better. We deliver proven ideas and solutions from experts in HR development and HR management, and we offer effective and customizable tools to improve workplace performance. From novice to seasoned professional, Pfeiffer is the source you can trust to make yourself and your organization more successful.
Essential Knowledge Pfeiffer produces insightful, practical, and comprehensive materials on topics that matter the most to training and HR professionals. Our Essential Knowledge resources translate the expertise of seasoned professionals into practical, how-to guidance on critical workplace issues and problems. These resources are supported by case studies, worksheets, and job aids and are frequently supplemented with CD-ROMs, Web sites, and other means of making the content easier to read, understand, and use.
Essential Tools Pfeiffer’s Essential Tools resources save time and expense by offering proven, ready-to-use materials—including exercises, activities, games, instruments, and assessments—for use during a training or team-learning event. These resources are frequently offered in looseleaf or CD-ROM format to facilitate copying and customization of the material.
Pfeiffer also recognizes the remarkable power of new technologies in expanding the reach and effectiveness of training. While e-hype has often created whizbang solutions in search of a problem, we are dedicated to bringing convenience and enhancements to proven training solutions. All our e-tools comply with rigorous functionality standards. The most appropriate technology wrapped around essential content yields the perfect solution for today’s on-the-go trainers and human resource professionals.
Essential resources for training and HR professionals
To Mom:
“You played a well game, girl,”
and you would have been so proud
of this “real” book.
And to all the eager readers
who grab a handful of sixty-second ideas
and create unforgettable learning experiences
from quick snippets of time.
Foreword
What the Trainer’s Trainer Says About
The Ten-Minute Trainer
In this bright and zesty book, Sharon Bowman reminds us again of the basic fact of all learning: it is only what the learner creates that is learned.
Boy, do we ever need to hear this—repeatedly. We in the training field often get hung up by the belief that it is the instructor’s presentation that determines the quality of learning. And so we continue to rely on things such as the interminable PowerPoint® lecture as the centerpiece of our training programs.
But PowerPoint, overused, is nothing more than electronic chloroform. It knocks people out. Instead, our job as training professionals is to wake people up. Yes, wake people up—to their full potential for learning, for job success, and for a life that embraces the full mind, body, and spirit.
The Ten-Minute Trainer will certainly wake people up. It contains a gold mine of easy-to-use ideas for getting learners to talk, to think, to move, to create, to act—and thus to learn. And it contains a rapid design method for weaving these ideas together into effective learning programs.
Use this book as a resource. Refer to it often. Consult it when you’re stuck. It will re-awaken you to what good learning really is—a supreme act of creation on the part of the learner.
The Ten-Minute Trainer is bound to make your job easier and more fun, and make you much more effective as a designer and facilitator of learning.
Count on it.
Dave Meier
Author of The Accelerated Learning Handbook
Director of the Center for Accelerated Learning
Lake Geneva, Wisconsin
Opening and Connections
What’s in It for You?
Introducing You to The Ten-Minute Trainer
Quick Start
Mark-Up. Circle the answer to each question.
1. How long is the average length of a television drama, comedy, news, or documentary segment before a commercial break occurs?
a. About 20 minutes.
b. About 5 to 9 minutes.
c. About 8 to 12 minutes.
d. Not long enough.
2. How long are the commercial breaks between show segments?
a. They feel like forever.
b. Probably around 15 minutes.
c. Closer to 8 minutes
d. About 4 to 6 minutes.
Answers: If you circled 1C and 2D, congratulations. You probably watch a lot of television—or you are really good at estimating time. Either way, in this chapter you’ll discover the connection between television and training, and why this connection is important to you.
It used to be that most face-to-face instruction was pretty much straight lecture, with learners listening (maybe taking some notes) and the subject matter expert doing all the talking.
Here’s the truth about that type of teaching: it never really worked well to begin with and it still doesn’t work well. Especially now, it needs to change because learners, as well as entire cultures, have changed how they take in information.
On the up side, most of us who have the job of educating others, and who are good at what we do, have already moved from lecture-based methods of instruction to more learner-friendly methods. We try to involve our learners in a variety of ways to increase interest, motivation, learning, and retention.
On the down side, it takes time—and lots of it—to continuously think of new ways to keep training participants motivated, interested, and involved. While we struggle with this dilemma, our learners have totally different learning expectations than folks did fifty years ago. And the biggest change in how people learn today, according to many researchers, stems from—you guessed it—television.
How TV Changed You and Me
“What has television got to do with face-to-face instruction?” you ask. The answer is simple. Television has
• Conditioned us to expect fast-paced, attention-getting methods of information delivery.
• Reduced the length of time that we pay attention by delivering information and entertainment in shorter and shorter segments of time.
• Reawakened us to the power of the image to teach, entertain, convince, and make a message memorable.
These changes aren’t bad or good; they just are. As trainers, we can rail against them, rally for them, or simply understand and use them to create learning experiences that work better for our learners.
The changes in how people take in information have occurred in the world’s cultures that are television-saturated, that is, where the majority of people watch two hours or more of programming every day. In the United States, that number is now approaching four hours.
Why Ten Minutes?
When we pay attention to what goes on in those two to four hours of television viewing, an interesting pattern of timing emerges. According to the American Association of Advertising Agencies and the Association of National Advertisers, Americans watch about forty minutes of programming and twenty minutes of commercials an hour. This means that in a fifteen-minute viewing segment, we see about ten minutes of an actual program and about five minutes of commercials. Variations to these numbers depend upon the broadcasting station itself, the changing federal and state regulations, the time of the day or evening, and the type of program. These numbers also differ depending upon the country and culture. Around the world, each country has its own regulatory laws concerning commercial break times, but the overall pattern is the same everywhere: most television-dominated cultures are moving toward shorter program times and longer commercial break times.
Those of us who help others learn need to take these changes into account when designing and delivering training. If we don’t, we will lose many learners along the way, or learners will need remediation later because they will have forgotten most of what they heard. This does not mean that we need to dumb down our training. It does mean that we need to change our methods of instruction to meet the television-conditioned learning needs and shorter attention spans of our audiences. More specifically, it means that we should break up our information delivery into shorter lecture segments while increasing learner involvement throughout the training.
Take a Break
Time It. You don’t have to take the advertising association’s word for it. Run a quick test yourself. The next time you sit down to watch a major broadcasting station’s prime-time programs, have a stopwatch handy.Time the program segments over a one-hour period. Also time the commercial breaks over that same period. Get an average of each. Jot down your numbers here:
The Brain Gain
One worthwhile outcome of television viewing is that it demonstrates the power and potential of an image-rich medium of learning. In that respect, it is very compatible with how the human brain really learns. The brain can absorb visual information at a much faster rate than verbal information. Television does just that: it delivers images in rapid-fire sequences, sending a lot of information to the brain in the medium the brain processes best—images. In contrast, traditional instruction, with its emphasis on lecture and listening, is a brain drain—numbing the neurons and damaging the dendrites with boredom, tediousness, and deadly dull learning.
In addition to being an image-rich medium, television is also brain-compatible in that it keeps the mind engaged by using a variety of constantly changing sounds and images. This sensory stimulation activates the part of the brain that responds to changing stimuli in order to stay awake and alert.
The connection between how television delivers its messages and how we, as trainers, deliver ours is clear. In order to create brain-compatible learning experiences, we need to include more imagery and change in our training. We must supplement our words with pictures, photos, cartoons, drawings, doodles, metaphors, analogies, stories, symbols, icons, and so forth. We should include three-dimensional imagery as well, such as physical movement, spatial activities, improvisation, and games that get the learner’s whole body involved in the learning. We need to change more things during training: instructional strategies, presentation methods, room environment, learner involvement, and sensory stimuli. In other words, we must design and deliver training in ways that television viewers expect and that the human brain loves: with short informational segments followed by quick breaks, and all of it packaged in high-energy, fast-paced, image-rich ways.
Who Needs to Know?
If you give information to other people and you want them to learn it, remember it, and use it in some fashion, The Ten-Minute Trainer is written for you. It doesn’t matter what you call yourself—teacher, trainer, instructor, educator, facilitator, human resource specialist, performance improvement technologist—it’s the work you do that counts. And your work is educating others so that they can become better at what they do or so that their lives improve because of what they learned. Whether you are new to teaching and training or an experienced pro, your work is important, and this timely resource will help you do it even more successfully.
New Trainers. Read Part One first. Choose one or two activities to include in your scripted training. Simply slip them in where a natural break in informationdelivery seems to occur. When you become comfortable with these activities, choose one or two more. Observe which ones work best for you, your learners, and the topics you teach. Keep these as part of your standard training delivery. Later, when you want more information about brain research and training design, read Part Two.
Experienced Trainers. Read Part Two first. Familiarize yourself with the brain research about effective learning and teaching. Use this information, and the activities in Part One, to fine-tune what you already do well. Substitute new activities for ones you always use but that don’t excite you anymore. Experiment with the two design tools—the Learning Compass and the Training Map—and combine them with what you already know about effective training design.
Busy Trainers. Read this resource like a newspaper. Skim the Contents for chapter titles that interest you. Read those chapters first. Or use the book as a back-pocket resource when you want a quick activity and have only a short time to find one. Skip to what you need or want. Save the rest for later.
Twelve Benefits You’ll Get from This Book
The Ten-Minute Trainer is based on two fundamental training principles of the twenty-first century:
shorter segments of instruction are better than longer ones, and learners remember more when they are involved in the learning. With these concepts in mind and this book as your guide, you will be able to
1. Choose from 140 “Got a Minute?” activities to include in your lectures so that your learners review, repeat, and remember important information (Part One).
2. Use ten short “Take Five!” games to RAP up the learning—reinforce, apply, and practice—so that learning is moved into long-term memory (Part One).
3. Soak up ordinarily wasted instructional minutes with thirty Time Sponges such as Quick Starts, Take a Break, and Early to Finish activities (Part One).
4. Experiment with quick, high-energy ways to involve your learners without sacrificing content (Part One).
5. Apply two powerful instructional tools—the Learning Compass and the Training Map—to shorten your training design and delivery time (Part Two).
6. Use five Power-Hour Training Templates, with any topic, any size group, and any age learner (Part Two).
7. Organize your lecture time so that your learners get the most from your instruction (Part Two).
8. Understand the brain research behind the concepts in The Ten-Minute Trainer (Part Two).
9. Include four “Get a CLUE!” elements to increase motivation and memory (Part Three).
10. Make your training more image-rich—by using graphics, cartoons, doodles, and more (Part Three).
11. Change your concept of training time as you use small but mighty seconds and minutes in creative, interesting, and memorable ways (Parts One, Two, and Three).
12. Become a more time-efficient training professional and be able to explain the what, why, and how of it all to your training colleagues (Parts One, Two, and Three).
Take a Break
Mark-Up. Skim the list of benefits you’ll get from this book and circle the three that, for you, are the most important. Use this list as a preassessment of what you want to get out of the book. Now label those three A, B, C in order of importance. If you’re short on time, skip ahead to the parts of the book that contain that information and read them first.
It’s Organized to Save You Time
Most busy trainers seldom have enough time to sit down and read a training book cover to cover. Often, they will flip quickly through books to find one or two activities that are easy to combine with what they already have planned to do. If this describes you, turn to Part One, which gives you the “how to” information first. Later, when you have more reading time, you can turn to Part Two, where you’ll find the practical research upon which the book is based. In Part Three you’ll find a number of other useful tools to increase learners’ motivation and memory.
Part One Contains . . . • “Got a Minute?” Activities to Help Learners Review, Repeat, and Remember. Each of these 140 activities lasts about sixty seconds and involves learners in a variety of hands-on, upbeat, thought-provoking ways. All you have to do is to sprinkle your training with a few of these activities, including them where they seem to fit best or where you want a quick review before moving on to new information.
• “Take Five!” Games That Help Learners RAP It Up: Reinforce, Apply, and Practice. The ten games and activities are from five to ten minutes in length. Some are collaborative and some are competitive. You can use them with most topics and most audiences. Include them as openings, as closings, or when you want a longer review break between informational pieces.
Part Two Includes . . . • “Attention Maker, Attention Breaker”: The Recticular Activating System and Learning. You’ll discover what attracts the attention of the human brain, for how long, and what you as a trainer can do to increase motivation, interest, and retention.
• “Three Brains in One”: The Triune Brain and Learning. You’ll find out why connections are so crucial to a successful learning experience, and how to create a safe learning community whatever the training topic or duration.
• “Let the Compass Be Your Guide”: The Learning Compass and Learning the Natural Way. This instructional tool shows you how humans naturally learn and gives you four learning phases to guide you, as represented by the compass points.
• “Mapping Your Message”: Making It Stick with the Training Map. Together with the Learning Compass, this training tool forms the easy-to-use blueprint that will enable you to design and deliver training in less time and with better long-term results.
• “Power-Hour Training Templates”: Time-Saving Design and Delivery Tools. These five templates are easy-to-use instructional design tools that will save you time by combining your content with the ideas and activities from this book. The templates are excellent examples of how to use the Learning Compass and the Training Map. They also show you how to include the “Got a Minute?” and “Take Five!” training activities.
Part Three Contains ...
• “Get a CLUE!” Four Elements to Increase Motivation and Memory in Learning. When you include all four elements in your training, you increase long-term retention while keeping learners interested, motivated, awake, and enthusiastic.
• “You Said It But Did They Get It?” How to Check for Understanding. Here are five ways to make sure learners understand, and can use, what they hear.
• “What’s a Picture Worth?” The Importance of Imagery in Learning. You’ll understand the human brain’s need for images and how to include a variety of image-rich instructional strategies in your training.
• “Station Rotation”: Learning a Lot in a Little Time. The Station Rotation activity is a powerful training strategy that has participants learning new concepts, reviewing learned concepts, practicing skills, applying what they’ve learned, and doing it all at the same time!
Walking the Talk
Inasmuch as a book can, this resource will model what it teaches: short and quick is better than long and slow, and involving the learner (in this case, that’s you, the reader) increases long-term retention of information.
You’ll be encouraged to participate along the way with three kinds of readercentered activities. These are examples of the sixty-second activities in Part One and generally fall into the category of Time Sponges, that is, activities that connect you to the concepts while soaking up a minute or two of time. You have already done a few of these:
• Quick Start. This is an opening activity that will focus on what you already know or what you’re about to learn regarding the concepts in the chapter.
• Take a Break. This is a review activity that will enhance your understanding of what you are learning.
• Early to Finish. This is a closing activity that will add to what you just learned or suggest ways to review the information in order to move it into long-term memory.
The book’s format is informal, conversational, and easy and quick to read and use. But don’t be fooled by its simplicity. The concepts are based on solid research (see the Remarkable Resources at the back of the book) and are presented in this easy-to-learn format in order to save you time.
The best thing about The Ten-Minute Trainer is that it will empower you, motivate you, and increase your energy level and enthusiasm for learning and training. It will get your creative juices flowing. It will spark lots of spin-off ideas—variations on activities that you’ll come up with and that will work even better for you and your training participants. So relax, enjoy, experiment, and have fun with it all.
Wrapping It Up
With The Ten-Minute Trainer, you will polish what you already do well by using shorter segments of instruction followed by quick, learner-centered review activities. You will consistently turn passive listeners into active learners. You will design and deliver training that is both timely and terrific. You will tie everything you do to these two fundamental training principles: shorter segments of instruction are better than longer ones, and learners remember more when they are involved in the learning. To that end, welcome to a “teach it quick and make it stick” learning experience!
Take what you can use and let the rest go by.
—Ken Kesey
Early to Finish
Think and Write. To become more aware of how you use your training time, jot down your responses to these questions, then read the author’s italicized comments.
• Who does most of the talking in a one-hour training segment, you or your learners?
The person doing the most talking about the topic is doing the most learning. So, if that person is you, you are doing the most learning. According to most research, learners don’t remember much after about twenty minutes or so of simply listening. But long-term memory increases measurably when learners say or do something every ten minutes with information presented to them. If you aren’t sure how long you talk, have someone time your lectures.
• Where do you include most of the learning activities in a training hour (beginning, middle, end, or throughout)?
In order for learners to remember more of what you teach them, you should space activities throughout the training. Shorter, more frequent activities are better than fewer, longer ones. The more you involve your learners in the learning, the more they will remember. Involvement can be done in simple, quick ways. If you aren’t used to involving learners, begin by choosing one or two of the sixty-second activities in this book. Get comfortable with them and then experiment with a few more.
• What instructional strategies do you usually use during one hour of training? (Examples: lecturing, using visuals to enhance information, demonstrating a skill, including short quizzes, telling stories, asking questions, showing a video, facilitating a game.)
Whenever you change your instructional strategies, you engage the part of your learner’s brain that thrives on changing stimuli. These changes help learners stay awake and alert throughout the training. Even during a one-hour training segment, using a variety of instructional strategies enhances learners’ motivation and memory.
• How often do you use images in an hour training—and what kind do you use? (Examples: photos, cartoons, clip art, doodles, shapes, lines, stories, metaphors, analogies.)
Anytime you include an image—a cartoon with a computer slide, a metaphor to explain a procedure, a story to dramatize an important point, a physical movement along with a verbal fact—you increase the length of time learners will remember the information. If you aren’t using images, begin with a few simple graphics to enhance your slides, charts, transparencies, and written or computerized materials. Or tell a story to illustrate a point you’re making.
Part One
When They Do It, They Get It!
150 Activities to Make the Learning Stick
Quick Start
Mark-Up. All the activity names in Part One are listed below. Circle any that sound interesting to you or that you think you might be familiar with. As you read the chapters in Part One, you may discover that these activities are similar to ones you use or ones that you know by other names.
| Time Sponges | Quick Starts | Take a Break |
| Early to Finish | Connections | Pair Shares |
| Shout Outs | Mark-Ups | Signals |
| Doodles | Think and Write | Pop-Ups |
| Tickets Out | Action Plans | Celebrations |
| Gallery Walk | Take a Stand | Grab That Spoon |
| Place Your Order | Metaphor Magic | Let’s Trade |
| The Walkabout | Each One Teach One | Blackout Bingo |
| Postcard Partners | | |
Sometimes in your work as a training professional you have probably felt as though your job is at “warp speed,” with each training looming on the heels of the one before. You seem to stay one step ahead of where you have to be. You find yourself squeezing in moments (instead of hours) of study time in order to become even better at what you do. You often skim training books, looking for the activities you can put to use immediately and promising to read the rest of the material when you have the time.
With that thought in mind, you’ll find the practical, how-to activities listed in Part One up front, where you can get to them quickly. Later, when you have more time, you can read Part Two, which covers the brain research and training design tools that support using these short, quick activities in your training.
A Bird’s-Eye View of 150 Activities
Here is what you’ll find in Part One:
• An introduction to the “Got a Minute?” activities. This will explain the rationale for these sixty-second activities, what you can accomplish by using them, and some tips to keep in mind as you experiment with them.
• 140 “Got a Minute?” activities to help learners review, repeat, and remember important information.
• An introduction to the “Take Five!” games. This will explain why these fiveand ten-minute activities are important, what you can accomplish by using them, and some tips to keep in mind.
• Ten “Take Five!” games to help learners RAP up the learning: reinforce, apply, and practice.
Here is a more detailed list of the sixty-second activities and how you might use them in your training:
• Connections. These are opening activities that connect learners to each other, to what they already know about the training topic, and to what they want to learn.
• Time Sponges. Use these to soak up time at the opening, during a break, or when participants finish an activity or game early. Use them also as connection activities to connect learners to each other and to the training topic or concepts.
• Pair Shares. Use these as quick review exercises throughout the training.
• Shout Outs. Use these as opening activities to find out what learners already know about the topic. Use them also as quick review exercises.
• Think and Write. These are introspective review activities you can use throughout a training.
• Signals. Use these to check for understanding or as yes or no answers to verbal questions.
• Doodles. These are visual, right-brain ways of representing important facts or concepts.
• Pop-Ups. These are kinesthetic review exercises, that is, they include movement in the review process.
• Mark-Ups. With these, participants interact with written material by marking the text in various ways.
• Tickets Out. Use these as closing activities to help participants think about and evaluate what they learned.
• Action Plans. These are closing activities that encourage participants to make a commitment to use what they learned.
• Celebrations. These are closing activities that celebrate the learning with a high-energy, enthusiastic end to the training.
And here is a more detailed list of the five- and ten-minute games, along with how you might use them in your training:
• Postcard Partners. Use this as an opening activity to connect learners to each other and to the training topic or concepts.
• The Gallery Walk. This can be an opening activity, a review activity, or a closing exercise. Or use it as an ongoing activity throughout the training or during training breaks.
• Take a Stand. This is either an opening activity or a review activity when you want participants to discuss topic-related issues.
• Grab That Spoon. As a closing exercise, this is a competitive game for a general review. Or include each game round, that is, one question and answer, at various times throughout the training to review specific concepts.
• Place Your Order. Use this to review procedural concepts during the training, that is, information that needs to be learned in a certain order.
• Metaphor Magic. This is a creative, right-brain way of reviewing concepts, which makes learners think about what they have learned in unique and unusual ways. It can also be a creative closing activity.
• Let’s Trade. Use this as a closing activity in which participants make a commitment to use what they have learned.
• Each One Teach One. Use this as a kinesthetic exercise to help learners practice skills or review information in an active, hands-on way.
• The Walkabout. This is a closing kinesthetic activity that is also high-energy and celebratory.
• Blackout Bingo. Use this as another high-energy, closing activity. It is also a kinesthetic review exercise.
Chunk It
In order to use these 150 activities in ways that will make them work best for your learners, you will need to “chunk” your material, that is, divide your information into shorter lecture segments. If you’ve never done this before, then the easiest way to begin is to cut your material in half. You will deliver both halves, but you will also include a sixty-second activity in between each half.
For example, if you’re used to lecturing for an hour, lecture for thirty minutes instead. Then stop talking and lead the participants in a sixty-second review activity. After that, continue with the next thirty minutes of lecture. You can also include a sixty-second activity at the beginning of the first thirty minutes and at the end of the last thirty minutes.
If your normal lecture time is about a half hour, take two thirty-minute lecture pieces and divide that material into four fifteen-minute segments. Include sixty-second activities at the beginning, the end, and in between each of the four segments for a total of five short, quick activities in an hour.
Your goal in chunking your material is to get close to the ten-minute mark, not only because of the television-affected, shortened attention spans of your participants, but also because the human brain learns better that way (see Part Two for the brain research that supports the ten-minute lecture).
Remember, ten minutes of information delivery is the goal, not the rule. You decide what’s appropriate for you, for the material you’re teaching, and for the learners who attend your training. Sometimes your lectures will take a little longer, sometimes they will be a little shorter.
Not sure about how long you lecture? Use a timer while rehearsing portions of your material. Or have a friend time you as you talk. Be aware that time seems to fly when you’re the one standing in front of an audience. But for those who have to remain seated for long periods without doing anything except listening, time often seems to crawl.
Wrapping It Up
So what’s the bottom line? Simply this: these 150 activities aren’t about you. They are about your learners—including them, involving them, honoring them and what they already know, and making sure they remember the concepts you’re teaching them. When you use these activities in your training, the underlying message you give learners is a powerful one: they are important, they matter, and the real learning comes from them.
As with any skill, the more you practice it, the better you are at doing it.The more you use these activities—varying them and experimenting with them—the better results you’ll get in terms of learners’ increased interest, involvement, and long-term retention of important information.
Go ahead—jump in.The water’s fine. Choose an activity or two from this part of the book, include them in your next training, and watch what happens. And by the way, in addition to learning more and remembering it longer, your learners will think you walk on water!
Most people tire of a lecture in ten minutes.
Clever people do it in five.
Sensible people never go to lectures at all.
—Stephen Loncock
Early to Finish
Action Plan. Go back to the Quick Start at the beginning of this chapter. Choose two of the items you circled and write them in the space below. Then flip to those activities and read them first. Plan to use them in your next training.
Got a Minute?
Sixty-Second Activities to Help Learners Repeat, Review, and Remember
Quick Start
Think and Write. Time one minute. If you have a watch with a second hand, look at it for sixty seconds. Or count a slow sixty seconds out loud. Then decide: did the minute feel like a long or short time to you?
What kinds of learning activities could learners do in that length of time? Make a list of at least four things learners could do with sixty seconds:
As you read all of Part One, notice whether the activities are similar to the items you listed. If you can’t think of any sixty-second activities, choose four from Part One and write them down on the lines above.
Picture This
You are feeling a great deal of work-related stress so you decide to take a one-hour stress management workshop offered at your local community college. You walk into the classroom and immediately notice the large screen in front of the room on which is printed:
Quick Start.
After reading this, introduce yourself to three people seated near you.
Tell them what you want to learn in this workshop.
Be ready to state what they say when asked to do so.
This is your Expert Group.
You sit down and start chatting with two people seated to your left and right. After a couple of minutes, the workshop instructor begins by asking the class to state a number between one and ten. Someone speaks up, “Six.” The instructor responds, “Let’s list six things you want to learn in this session. You can shout out one of the things you heard your expert group say.” People take turns stating what they discussed while the instructor counts the statements. Then she summarizes what people said and links the summary to the goals for the workshop. Finally, she introduces herself as Diana and gives a brief outline of the session.
As the workshop progresses, Diana stops after every ten minutes of lecture and tells you to do various things with what you’ve just heard. For example, one time she directs you to take one minute and think about what she has presented and then write one sentence explaining it in your own words on an index card. Another time she directs you to pair up with one of your expert group members and chat for sixty seconds about the most important fact you’ve learned so far. Yet another time she tells you to stand and stretch. Then she says, “In order to earn your chair back, tell your expert group one technique for lessening stress that hasn’t yet been mentioned in this workshop. When everyone in your expert group has done this, you can all sit back down.”
Toward the end of the hour, Diana tells you to write “I plan to ...” on the back of your index card. She explains, “Write an action plan on your card. This is what you are making a commitment to do the next time you find yourself in a stressful, work-related situation. If you have time, read your action plan to your expert group.” She gives you a minute to do this.