Clarity Learning & Development Blog
Perspectives on the continuous evolution of workplace training, learning and leadership development.
Instructional Design Mini-Lesson: Distributed Practice
If you’re struggling to help learners who forget what they learned shortly after a training ends, don’t stress—there might be a way to re-organize your course without having to start over from scratch.
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July 28, 2016
5 Scenarios When Hiring Consultants Will Improve Your Business
If you’ve never hired an outside consultant, you may question why a business would spend money to outsource help when it can delegate the task to someone inside the company. However, in many circumstances, the most effective solution comes from outside the firm, and a consultant can prove his or herself well worth the investment. An outside consultant can bring a ton of experience and a refreshing new outlook to the equation.
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July 26, 2016
Who Steers the Ship? The Impact of Learner Control on eLearning.
That’s a much more complicated question than it appears. Many say that allowing online learners to influence aspects of the learning process gives them a sense of autonomy that increases motivation and engagement. Learners love having control over the course experience—after all, they are used to the internet, where they are free to wander through sites at their own pace, click on content that interests them, and walk away from the computer when they feel like it. Why take that freedom away from them just because they’re doing an online training?
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July 21, 2016
Teaching for All Learning Types
Individual learning styles gained popularity in the 1970s, as we learned that different people learn best in different modes of learning. It is now widely accepted in the academic community that three main learning styles exist: visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. While no individual absolutely subscribes to a single type, most people instinctively favor one to the point where they retain certain types of information better than others.
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July 19, 2016
Beyond PowerPoint: A Guide to other Visual Teaching Tools
It is no secret that visual teaching tools are important to both audience participation and memory retention. Having visuals makes it all the more likely that the audience will stay engaged and remember the material that you’re teaching them. However, it can be irritating for an audience member to be faced with another white Powerpoint with black text that calls itself a “visual.” Many instructors default to Powerpoint as an easy option for visual communication, but there are a multitude of other options that are more creative and just as simple to use.
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July 13, 2016
The Case for Business-Centric Learning
Even though it’s been on nearly every “top trends” list for Learning and Development in the past two years, business-centric learning isn’t a trend, and we should stop thinking of it that way. Rather, it’s an entirely new framework for thinking about organizational learning – a somewhat radical shift in how we prioritize L&D initiatives in companies.
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June 30, 2016
The Role of Emotion in eLearning
Many think learning is a dispassionate exercise for thinking only—anything that engages feelings will only hinder rational thought. But emotions are a central part of the learner experience because they are a central part of the human experience.
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June 28, 2016
Principles for Designing in Multimedia Environments
The Handbook for Multimedia Learning is a must-have for instructional designers who work on courses that combine graphic, textual, and video elements – which is almost every course now, online and in-person.
The basic principle behind multimedia learning is that humans learn best from a combination of words and images, rather than words alone. So if your training consists solely of a text-based manual or online course, it’s not as effective as it could be.
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June 24, 2016
Get Better Ideas by Tweaking Your Brainstorm Sessions
Brainstorming sessions are the heart of pursuing new ideas. But a major mistake companies make is running idea-generating sessions right out of the box, without structuring them to fit their goals as well as their team’s needs and personalities. Brainstorming sessions are most fruitful when they are adapted to fit your needs.
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June 16, 2016
Mindfulness in the Workplace: Can It Help, or Is It Hype?
It’s hard to find an article or blog on leadership practices these days that doesn’t mention – and recommend – trying mindfulness. But what is this practice, and how can it help achieve your organizational goals?
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June 15, 2016
Best Practices for Hiring Top eLearning Professionals
The sudden interest in organizational learning and development in recent years has led to the creation of a flood of eLearning jobs in today’s market. In many ways, the market belongs to the L&D professionals, who can be selective about picking jobs that best suit their interests. On the other hand, this is also the perfect time to attract experienced and eager candidates to fulfill your company’s eLearning needs.
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June 9, 2016
Ready for the Big Change? Preparing for Organizational Change.
Being flexible and adaptive in today’s increasingly complex world is a necessity. In order to stay competitive, organizations have to be like trees: firmly rooted, but able to move enough with the wind so the branches don’t snap.
But it’s not such a simple task. The most optimistic forecasts indicate that only 25% of major change initiatives are successful over the long term. Other research grimly suggests that 80-90% of those initiatives fail or even make the organization worse off than it was to begin with. And it’s not for lack of trying—the road to failed change initiatives is almost always paved with good intentions.
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June 7, 2016
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