The average learner does not exist

Icebreaker

The Assumption Spectrum

Most training assumptions are held quietly, and never put to the room.

1. 1Mark a line across the room with opposing views at each end.
2. 2Read one out: teaching should start with content, or teaching should start with the learner.
3. 3Stand where you actually sit, not where you think you should.
4. 4Tell two or three people near you what experience put you there, then run the next prompt.

Working on your own? Mark your position on each prompt, then find the moment that put you there. Assumptions usually come from one bad session, not from theory.

Icebreaker

Learner Profile Match Cards

Designing for the average learner means designing for nobody in the room.

1. 1Fill in a card on your own: how I learn best, a habit that helps me, a challenge I hit in group learning.
2. 2Pair up and introduce yourself using the card rather than your job title.
3. 3Join another pair and lay all four cards out. Look for what matches and what does not.
4. 4Agree one reason designing for the average would miss someone at your table.

Working on your own? Fill in your card, then fill one in as the average learner in your sessions. Nobody fits it, which is the point.

Icebreaker

Design a Better Introduction

Two minutes to open a session for a room you have not met.

1. 1Get into small groups. You have seven minutes to design a two-minute opening for this chapter.
2. 2Build at least two different ways in. A sketch, a script, a demonstration, a question.
3. 3Decide what goes first, and what you are willing to leave out.
4. 4Present your opening and say who in a mixed room it would reach.

Working on your own? Design the two minutes, then rewrite it for a room that already disagrees with the chapter. The second version is the one you will need.

Journaling

Thinking Differently About Training

A session that covers everything may still teach very little.

1. 1List three assumptions about training the chapter challenges, and why each one limits what is possible.
2. 2Explain the average learner does not exist in your own words.
3. 3Describe a time you were taught as if you were that average learner. What helped, and what did not?
4. 4Name two things you would do differently, and how you would find out about learners beforehand.

Working with a group? Write alone, then share only the assumptions. Seeing the same three come up around a table is the argument in miniature.

Problem solving

Fix the Session Design Problem

Every slide covered, on time, clearly explained. A week later, nothing held.

1. 1Name the assumptions behind this session, and why they produced the result.
2. 2List four design flaws, each with what it costs and which chapter idea explains it.
3. 3Redesign it: what you would want to know before, and how you would check learning as it happens.
4. 4Define success differently from the original trainer, and say what the difference is between a subject expert and a learning designer.

Working with a group? Diagnose alone, then compare assumptions rather than fixes. People who agree on the fix often disagree about what went wrong.

Worksheet

Content First or Learner First

Designing for the middle sounds practical until you look for who is standing there.

1. 1Read Approach A. Planning starts with the content that must be delivered. A session is efficient when everything is covered on time, and a clear explanation from an expert is taken as evidence that learning happened. The target is the average participant in the middle.
2. 2Read Approach B. Planning starts with the learners who will receive it. Efficiency means understanding, retention and application, so coverage alone proves nothing. The target is the actual range in the room, which is harder to design for and more demanding of the trainer.
3. 3Compare them: how each one defines an efficient session; what counts as evidence that learning happened; who each approach is designed for; what happens to the people it was not designed for.
4. 4Critique both. Why is content-first planning so durable? Who is underserved, and why is that invisible? What improves once the learner comes first? What makes it harder to sustain?
5. 5Make a judgement. Designing for everyone is unrealistic, so design for the middle. Say why that argument appeals, where it fails, and what you would put in its place. Finish the sentence: One assumption about training I now question is…