There is a tendency going towards more blended learning and as part of this the deployment of virtual classroom training. Benefits of virtual classroom training include:
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Occupancy rate; no whole day out of work
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Flexibility work/home, domestic and/or abroad
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Costs including less time, transport and car costs and contributes to sustainability
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Accessible, flexible and excellent to use in blended learning pathway
Do not make it a poor mission!
There are a number of crucial issues that you need to know and be able to apply to give the virtual classroom a chance of success. Even more to create a beautiful interactive live online learning experience. So that it is not a one-time version that is then put into the cabinet because it fails. And I see and experience that this is still done too often. A note from a company:
“We started a virtual classroom training, also performed it, but the momentum was not there. The trainer has been more frequent for groups, so that can’t be. And we’ve really used a presentation. This presentation comes from our classroom training”.
That last sentence about the presentation gave energy to ask about how things were dealt with. What else was used or deployed? How did they build the virtual classroom? The answers that followed were disturbing to me.
Profession separately
There were some important issues, perhaps you should say boundary conditions, not applied. No script used, a presentation from a classroom training one to one transfered, no interaction moments built-in, 1 person as trainer present, and so a few more.
What is really important and a must to achieve that live online learning experience:
- Classroom training does not transfer one to one to a virtual classroom, in most cases it is better to start with a clean slate
- Determine what the outcome/learning purpose of the training should be
- Create a script and build your virtual classroom as a result
- Take care of enough interaction and put tools in it
- Virtual for a group requires skills other than a classroom group
- Rule that there is a co-trainer/moderator
In order to get a virtual classroom training off the ground you have to do all these things (and even more like knowledge of tools) can be controlled and applied. And that’s a profession separately. You need a specialist; someone who has had a training for it. A virtual classroom moderator or perhaps producer is a better name.
Do you want to set up and run a virtual classroom training, but don’t know how or where to start? Or are you struggling with the technique?
Stilios helps and takes care of you! Please feel free to contact us. Call or mail if you want to know more or if you want to experience a one-on-one demo of a virtual classroom. Free of course!