| |
|
| |
Business Rule #37:
Involve Your Audience
November 4, 2005
by Caroline Pfouts
The world of adult education is changing. Students are no longer willing to hang in there as a teacher drones on and on with a dry lecture. These days, the burden is on the instructor to make learning fun. Teaching has become as much about keeping the students engaged and amused as it is about providing useful knowledge.
The task this week was to design and teach a Learning Annex class. In keeping with the modern trend, success was judged on three criteria: was it informative; was it entertaining; and was it presented well?
The first part of this challenge was to pick a subject to teach. Adam Israelov, the project manager for Capital Edge, put Alla Wartenberg in charge of the brainstorming session to pick a course topic. But when “Sex in the Office” captured the team’s imagination, Adam became visibly uncomfortable. His personal sense of propriety seemed to balk at the very thought of saying the word “sex” out loud, let alone discussing it in a room full of strangers. Confronted with the enthusiasm of the rest of the group though, Adam capitulated.
| |
| advertisement |
 |
|
| |
| |
The Excel team, with Randal Pinkett at the lead, also had some difficulty deciding on the subject matter for their class. Although they said were looking for a “sexy” topic, they seemed stuck on rather ordinary ideas for a self-improvement course. Randal came up with “Stand Out/How to Make Your Mark.” Even George Ross thought it was pretty mundane. Rebecca Jarvis thought it would be tough to teach and doubted that anyone on the team had the necessary expertise.
I’ve taught workshops and lectured on everything from sales techniques to banking—and I always do something to encourage audience participation. When I was invited to speak at a conference for a professional association, the organizer warned me that it was tough to get their members involved, no matter what the subject matter. Naturally, I accepted the challenge.
After a brief introduction, I broke the room up into groups of five or six people, having them collaborate on short workshop projects. As soon as they understood this workshop was an invitation to get them personally involved with the subject, the energy level in the room took a huge jump up. The smaller group discussions also allowed attendees to get acquainted with a handful of the other participants. Then I asked them to pick one person from each of the smaller units to report their results to the whole group. Once they knew their opinions were welcome, there was no holding them back. They all participated in full. I still have the letter of thanks from the organizer, confirming that everyone at the conference learned something and enjoyed the presentation.
|
|
I always do something to encourage audience participation.
