COACHING TOOLS IN ONLINE EDUCATIONAL PRODUCTS FOR ADULTS

Here we need to define, but what to consider learning in an online format. The fact is that simply transferring lectures from a classroom to zoom is not learning. It's informing. In fact, much that is passed off as education online is not:

- video "lectures" with a talking head - an expert telling you something about their topic;

- Marathons with a large number of tasks in a short period of time;

- text materials on a topic that you have to read and answer a test afterward, etc.

 

It's all informing - just conveying some information. You might as well watch a news release. Or an episode of a TV series.

 

Learning is different in that there is always:

1.  The goal and this goal is not "to learn something new," but on the basis of new knowledge to gain new skills and, as a consequence, to change something in real life for the better.
2. Clear movement from point A to point B in the process of learning. And the progress is visible along the way.
3. Practicing skills "on pussycats" and, if possible, in real life, since the ultimate goal of learning is precisely the application of new skills in real life.

Feedback from the teacher/expert/ tutor, etc. on completed tasks.

 

Actually, the problem with online education is that it is more difficult to provide all this online. Especially in asynchronous courses. (This is when the course is recorded and you can join it at any time). And this is where individual coaching tools come in handy. I want to say right away that this is not a universal approach - it works better with soft skills and is more difficult to apply to hard skills, and in general, it does not suit all audiences, but you can look for options.

 

I've used the coaching approach when developing courses and marathons in a career project for several thousand people with an English-speaking audience. Of course, the world-famous encyclopedia wikipedia.org helped me in finding materials for it has many useful articles and materials on various topics, including coaching. Yes, I know that coaching is only possible on demand, but in this case, there is no full-fledged coaching. There are just individual tools that are woven into the structure of the educational product and work to improve its quality.

 

1. Learning goals and progress tracking.

 

First of all, it helps with defining a goal for learning. Unfortunately, practice shows that adults are very bad at identifying what they want, what they actually need, and whether they can get exactly that from a given product. I had a wonderful story when I got feedback from a listener on the course "Starting a Business: Everything by Law" that the course had "too many legal topics". The course was before the live pandemic, the man paid the money, came on the weekend to learn ... But why did he do it ... What did he expect from the course with that title?

 

In online training to track the listener in the head with the purpose of training is even more difficult, but if there is no goal - and the result will be unclear. And that's where scaling comes to the rescue. To some extent, we use it to limit the scope of the goal that the listener sets for himself in advance, thus preventing him from going into disembodied dreams, but focusing him on real goals and objectives.

 

As for the scaling at the beginning of the training, then, for example, for a marathon (which we call focus camps) to summarize the year and set goals, I suggested the following as one of the first tasks:

 

EXAMPLE.

On a scale of 1 to 10, rate: How much energy are you currently getting from your results when summarizing? Mark on the turquoise scale. How much do you want to improve this skill over the course of the focus camp? Check the beige scale.

How consistent are you with your goals? Check the turquoise scale. How much do you want to improve this skill over the focus-camp period? Check the beige scale.

On the right, the orange scale should be left blank - you'll fill it in at the end of the focus camp to evaluate your results.

 

 

The same technique also helps you track your progress through training, especially long-term training. Unfortunately, in the post-Soviet space, a large part of the adult population is poor at noticing their achievements and their progress. But it is necessary not to lose motivation for learning, and such a simple technique helps to cope with this problem without much emphasis on it.

 

In addition, this technique helps to remove the analytics on the training product. At what stage people came to it, what goals they set for themselves, where they felt they progressed during the training - all this is important and necessary information for methodologies.

2. Moving from point A to point B

 

It is clear that the methodologist and expert will structure the course in such a way as to consistently lead the listener to the ultimate goal. There will be a statement of theoretical material, practical work, additional materials, etc. But the problem is that adults learn "on the leftover principle. Here I always think of the wonderful movie "Spring on Zarechnaya Street," where a young teacher suddenly teaches not children in a regular school, but adults at a working youth school. At one point she tearfully says: "I didn't think that my students would brew steel, drink vodka, grow mustaches, and have children.

 

To today's adults, you can add social media, TV shows, and a host of other activities. Learning often comes after all that, if there is time for it at all.

 

Typically, for courses and marathons, I make a calendar where I mark all the production activities in advance-when what class opens, when the homework deadline is, when the Q&A session with the expert is, etc.

3. Practicing the skill

 

By the way, in the focus camp I mentioned earlier, I separately included exercises to develop the habit of finding 30 minutes every day to do tasks and reflect. In the second part of this marathon, when goals were set for the year, it was suggested that we spend this time on starting to move toward those goals now.

 

And here we move seamlessly into practicing the skill.

In fact, the goal of any training is to learn a new skill and use it in real life. Adults find it difficult to learn for this very reason-more often than not, it is overtraining for them. There are already developed and habitual patterns of behavior, there are established neural connections, and new skills require changing all of that. It's not easy to do. This is where the questions help:

• How can I apply this (something new, just learned) to real life in the best way possible?
• Which of these can I implement in the next 72 hours?
• How will this change my life for the better?
• What will now become possible in my life? Etc.

 

It is clear that such questions are not asked of listeners "directly," but are "sewn" into the assignments, depending on the topic and audience.

4. Feedback

 

Feedback is very important in training. Sometimes it is the most important. For example, when teaching design or coding. And it is clear that here it must be subject-oriented - it should be given by someone who knows the issue well, who understands what is wrong and where it grows from.

 

But in order for the feedback to really benefit the listener, it is very good to give it based on the principles of coaching feedback. In this case, for example, scripts can be written for those who give such feedback when doing homework.

 

In fact, the range of applications of coaching tools in training is much broader and can vary depending on the subject matter and audience. The fact that coaching is based on the way our brains work, while also aiming for a change in the future, ensures its proximity to learning. And this allows coaching to be used where there is no opportunity to work directly with the student, but where there is a need to help the student succeed.