5 Lessons I have learnt from delivering and attending education CPD training

 

Depending upon your past experiences the words continuing professional development (CPD) may conjure up a variety of thoughts and emotions, from memories of breakthroughs and intense learning experiences to severe boredom, frustration and feelings of time wasted.

Having participated in and delivered many CPD sessions I have experienced all of these emotions and many more and so wanted to share 5 lessons I have learnt that could enhance any sessions you might be delivering.

1.       Understand the audience.

Regardless of the session being to a large cohort or a small group, understanding who the audience are, why they are there, what experiences they are bringing to the session, what they want to take away, and any other needs they have is extremely useful.

While this may be a challenge with a larger cohort, considering ways that a pre session ‘needs analysis' can be conducted is useful. This might be through a brief pre session questionnaire, group/121 discussions, or collecting information via postit notes or online boards such as Padlet or MS whiteboard.

This information can be utilised to tailor the material to meet participant needs, ensuring any barriers to learning are removed or mitigated. In addition it can provide the opportunity to add a level of personalisation, for instance if in response to a pre session questionnaire someone indicated that they have firsthand experience of a concept that will be covered in the session, you could name check the individual and ask them for their perspective, or if an individual has suggested that they would like a specific aspect or concept outlined, you can make reference to them when it is covered.

It is also important to recognise that some participants will not want to be there, this can be due to a range of factors, for instance poor prior experiences of CPD, lack of interest in the topic (especially if attendance has been mandated), as well as workload pressure impacting their ability to focus on the delivery.

While we might not be able to alleviate all of these issues and win everyone over, understanding participants perspectives and situations can help us to move towards a point where the session is beneficial and engaging to all.

2.       Understand the context.

As a facilitator of CPD sessions we may have limited control of the context in which the session is being delivered. If the session is being delivered internally to the organisation to which we are employed, we may have more insight into the parameters in which we are working than if we are delivering to an external organisation, however both situations may present specific contextual limitations we need to work within.

We therefore want to know as much information as possible regarding the factors that will impact the effectiveness of our delivery. For instance:

·       what outcome does the organisation want from the delivery (as well as the participants – see lesson 1)?

·       what is the culture of the organisation towards the topic/concepts and towards CPD generally?

·       do participants have designated time to commit to the session and if appropriate any follow up activity to implement the ideas?

·       what has come before and will be provided after the session, have the concepts been covered before, if so when and how, how were the concepts perceived?

·       Is the questioning of ideas and concepts encouraged, or is it expected that whatever the organisation has deemed appropriate for CPD needs to be accepted and adopted?

With this information we can make an informed decision about what to include, how to package it and the expectations of participants. For instance it might be that the session is simply a showcase of ideas, it might be a deep dive into a concept with detailed workshopping of how to implement it. It might be that we want participants to conduct follow up work, however we need to be mindful of the time they are allocated to engage with activity, as well as attitudes and perceptions towards such a request.

Understanding the context therefore allows us to more accurately plan and deliver a session that is achievable and realistic for the situation, and hence meet any expectations we have set.

3.       Less is more.

Following on from lesson 2, as a rule I would always suggest ‘less is more’ is a good phrase to work towards. I once attended a CPD session with a respected and well published academic in the field of education. He had been booked to provide a session for 1 hour and proceeded to work through 100 slides in one hour! Now clearly his goal and motivation was to provide significant value for money to his audience and that should be commended, however this led to a massive cognitive overload with the audience such that many switched off as they couldn’t process even a fraction of the material.

Even if we are adopting a more discussion based approach to delivery, the temptation can be to pack as much material and activities as possible into a session, again to maximise the value that participants get from the session and the time they have committed.

Unless you are delivering mandatory CPD training that requires specific material to be covered for instance to comply with external regulations, my recommendation is to reduce expectations – select a limited number of concepts and activities and provide the opportunity for them to be explored in detail. This may sound like a risk, for instance what if we don’t fill the time, however this can be managed by planning contingency activities whereby participants might be asked to apply concepts to their situation or scenarios, or ask for concepts to be critiqued to uncover the limitations, and then potential solutions to issues.

Additionally if appropriate for the situation, we can also use digital media as a source of learning before and after sessions. This aligns with the principles of flipped learning whereby material in video, audio or written digital form can be provided outside of the session, freeing up time in session for more discussive and active learning activities.

4.       Discussion and Collaboration

Where possible I would always recommend that your goal in any CPD session is to get participants talking and discussing. This can be about anything to start with (for instance most people like talking about themselves!), however should be turned towards the concepts and topics covered, whether is it sharing experiences, limitations in understanding, ideas, questions and concerns.

Talking and discussing concepts provides a number of benefits. Unless you are an outstanding orator maintaining participants attention and interest for an extended period of time can be challenging, not to mention tiring for us. Turning sessions over to participants, with interjections as required, providing activities that require collaboration and discussion can be a great way of engaging participants, leveraging the expertise in the room, and switching the focus, allowing you the time to assess how the session is progressing and identify the next steps you want to take – such as stick with the plan or go off piste if the opportunity presents itself.

This approach provides flexibility such that we can extend discussions if conversations and collaborations are being effective, as well as move the session on if required or appropriate as a task reaches a natural end. It also may help to reduce our workload, for instance thinking of some interesting questions to pose can be less demanding them creating resources such as a PowerPoints or materials for more complex learning activities.

One way to think about questioning to elicit discussion is to align with the stages of blooms taxonomy - lower level questions require students to describe and explain their understanding of concepts, then as they progress we can ask them to apply the concepts to real life situations, and beyond this we can facilitate discussion that analyses and evaluates concepts, which might encourage discussions that lead to the creation of new solutions, ideas and concepts.

5.       Practice what you preach

If you have got this far you may have recognised that I favour discussion based CPD sessions more than didactic lecture style. This isn’t to say I don’t think presentations/lectures are effective, as I do, it is simply that they have to be deployed appropriately, with the right pace and volume of material that can be processed by participants, and will generally benefit from opportunities for discussion and collaboration.

Either way if as I do, you deliver sessions on how to teach - then it is imperative that you teach in the same way that you are teaching people how to teach!

For instance on a number of occasions, I have experienced CPD session where the facilitator has espoused the benefits of student centred discussion based teaching -  through a lengthy didactic lecture – do what I say not what I do! This might not be directly applicable for different disciplines, however to ensure your currency as a professional and encourage people to listen to you, please ensure any behaviours, processes or protocols that you expect participants to adhere to, are adhered to by yourself.

Finally a quick point here about professionalism and respecting participants. Be on time, be organised, start on time and finish on time. Some participants may want to hang around and discuss the concepts further (as long as you have time) but many may want to be in and out at the specified time because they have other work and commitments to attend to. If you are due to provide further training to the same participants these little aspects will help to build trust with participants, that may help further engagement and ultimately enhance the outcomes that you are working towards.