Nuts and Bolts: Blended Learning

Afew years back I wrote a columnon the problem of Frankenworks courses, with well-meaning designers “bolting together so many different tools that thelearner is lost in the maze of technologies. Too many tools can overwhelm justas much as can too much content.” Jennifer Hofmann offers a deeper dive intothat idea both in this month’s Guild Research report, Blended Learning in Practice, and in her new book Blended Learning (What Works in Talent Development).  Hofmann’s work is a good reminder to those ofus pushing to move beyond training-as-traditional-courses to workplace learningapproaches that include digital content, social interactions, AR, VR, or mixed-realityexperiences, AI supported activities, self-paced, self-directed, and self-studymaterial, spaced learning approaches, and the like.

Creatingthe blend  

Hofmann discussesseveral critical factors for success with blended learning, among them theimportance of managing the interaction between learners and content. Learners needa holistic experience, with items carefully chosen to help them meet specificgoals and sequenced as necessary, rather than walking up on a hodgepodge ofactivities strung together with little to connect them. I remember a couple ofyears ago asking a new hire how his onboarding experience was, and he said: “Itwas okay, except for the constant messages from the LMS. I kept getting noticesto complete a bunch of courses and access all these materials, but they didn’tseem to be in any particular order, and I couldn’t tell which were reallyrequired, and everything seemed to be due on the same day.” When building a blended solution one of Hofmann’sresearch participants offers a great metaphor: “Before you hang anotherornament on the tree, it has to at least look good with the others alreadythere… The risk in adding additional content to the blend is the dilution, oreven complete loss, of the underlying narrative—and the learner—if it’s notclear why some piece of content is in the blend.”

What else?

Keepin mind, too, problems with fidelity: often the people at one end of the chaindon’t have control over what happens at the other. I’ve seen classroomfacilitators decide to drop a bit of online pre-work in favor of covering thematerial face-to-face, or swap in a different video, or see an LMS “demand”creation of a quiz or note or record of completion that has no real purpose. Evenif the changes are equivalent, they may not mesh in the way intended, and thenew structure may not be evident to learners. Information is hard enough tomanage as it is; we need to take care not to make it worse. Be clear about whatneeds to happen when, show how it clearly ties to desired outcomes, make surethe plan is communicated, and—to my onboarding example above—ensure thatmessages from the LMS and elsewhere make sense to the end user.

Andanother thing: Leave room for learners to contribute back. Respondents inHofmann’s research report said they loved the opportunity to “create content,provide feedback on and influence existing content, and have an ongoing sayensuring that content is current and relevant.” That last bit is particularlychallenging now, with the shelf life of much information growing ever shorter.Inviting some partnership with learners will help with maintaining theintegrity of content and credibility of the experience.

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