Case study

Paul Kendall came to Skill Training Limited in 2003 having worked all his life with motor vehicles. Part of his new role was to pass on his knowledge to groups of young apprentices, most straight from school. Paul was offered the opportunity to achieve his NVQ Level 3 in Learning and Development and he grabbed it wholeheartedly. He had not had any formal training in how to train others, especially this client group, and indeed one comment he made during his training was that he had never even considered how he learned, let alone that anyone might learn in a different way. In just under a year (from a standing start) he had achieved it. He now works for Springboard Sunderland Trust at their new Rivergreen centre in Sunderland. Paul works mainly with e2e learners using a motor vehicle project to help re-engage young people back into learning and society.
Train the trainer

The Learning and Development NVQs (Levels 3, 4 and 5) were developed in partnership with government, training companies and employers to raise the standard of delivery of those practitioners and organisations who deliver work-based training and government funded training programmes.

They offer a common-sense approach developing the skill, knowledge and understanding of work-based trainers, and cover the learning cycle from identifying learning needs, planning and carrying out training sessions and programmes, and evaluating the effectiveness of them. The individual learners are placed at the centre of the process. There is also a focus on the candidate evaluating and developing their own practice, on encouraging innovation in training, and on striving to improve.
Tip of the month

3 Circles

3 circles is a great ice breaker.  I haven't yet met anyone who didn't enjoy taking part.  Split your group into groups of three people and ask each group to draw 3 interlocking circles on a piece of flip chart paper.  Each person in the group owns a circle.  Through discussion, each person needs to find something that is unique to them and write it in the part of their circle that does not overlap at all.  Next ask the group to find something they all have in common and to note this in the central part where all 3 circles overlap.  Finally, where each pair of circles overlap, write in the things which that pair shares but the other does not.  At the end of the allotted time, teams introduce themselves to everyone else.  This activity is good for bonding the group, for getting to know people and for establishing both common bonds and diversity.