Templates and Tools

• Communication toolkit, including project logo, word and Powerpoint templates are available at: https://wiki.eosc-hub.eu/display/EOSC/Communications+Toolkit
• The current list of tools and/or services available for supporting the delivery of training events are available at: https://wiki.eosc-hub.eu/display/EOSC/Online+tools+and+services+for+supporting+training

Reuse of Existing Materials

It is possible to reuse existing training material. However, the information should be checked and kept up-to-date.

Review

It is highly recommended that to have contents checked before publishing on an online training catalogue. 

Evaluation should consider the following aspects:

• Recommended contents are covered

• Technology description is sound, logic is clear

• Keep target audience in mind, the contents are easily understood, expressions are simple and clear

• Licence issues -- special care should be taken whether there are contents related to licence or copyright issues

It is recommended to have a lightweight review process, e.g., identify 2 reviewers :

• a technical expert

• a user expert who has experiences of working with end users

Training Materials Developing Tools

(Thanks to Baptiste for the information) some nice tools for developing training courses including: 

• Teachable https://training.robustperception.io/p/introduction-to-prometheus (quite nice, lots of features, seems to be generally praised by the users, there is also a free offer with unlimited courses but limited to one authors, and the interesting offer (5 authors) is 83 $/month)

• Thinkific: https://www.thinkific.com/(a recurrent alternative to teachable)

• Podia:  https://www.podia.com/features (a newcomer, trying to get some clients from teachable)

• Newkajabi: https://newkajabi.com/ (most expensive (and maybe just too expensive for us) but seems nice wrt features)

The following checklist can be used to ensure things are ready for the events:

• Materials (VMs/containers/slides/guides): completed and reviewed
• Advertising message: completed and reviewed
• Event webpage: created and online
• Event is promoted via right communication channel
• Event facilities: arranged
• Registration and logistic information: provided
• Request for trainees: provided
• Involved people: confirmed
• (Budget): approved
• Feedback forms: ready for distribution 

Tips for promoting your events

Tip 1: Choose a date that works for your audience: Tuesdays and Thursdays make for good meeting days, avoid holidays and Fridays. Don’t compete with similar events.  Send out save the dates early. Build your schedule/agenda early and communicate it to your audience

Tip 2: Write an attractive and convincing message. Consider who are your main targets audience (industry, senior, academic, PhD/PostDoc), write a message that attractive (one-lines, joke, visual), and convincing ("what is in it for me", well know/respected trainers, quotes from participants, 'bring your own data/use cases/work')

Tip 3: Promotion time: 3 weeks in advance for webinars -- people get next two-week calendar full. But don’t be too early either -- people will forget. Send Reminder one-week, then 1-day before. For face-to-face events, at least 4 months in advance for small to medium size events.

Tip 4: Promote via right communication channels. Ask your joint organisers, your speakers, attendees, partner project or organisations for help with the promotion. Promote at conferences, mailing list; Use flyers, posters, etc. Advertise on social media and consistently updates with information about your events including registration page. Using google ad (small cost to put your adv at the top), twitter, LinkIn, etc.

Effective Training Techniques

Tip1: Combine different training styles:

• Powerpoint presentation

• Blackboard or whiteboard

• Video portion

• Storytelling

Tip2: Engage with audiences, use interactive methods, such as:

• Quizzes

• Small group discussion

• Team work

• Individual work

• Case studies

• Teach dialogue

• Active summaries

• Q&A sessions

• Role-playing

• Demonstrations

• Participant control: Create a subject menu of what will be covered. Ask participants to review it and pick items they want to know more about. Call on a participant to identify his or her choice. Cover that topic and move on to the next participant.

• Games (treasure hunt to find learning information, competition or cooberation team works)

It may take longer time. Some methods, such as participant control, can be less structured. Trainers need to make sure that all necessary information is covered.

Tip3: Hands-on training:

• Demonstration: are attention-grabbers. Combined with the opportunity for questions and answers, this is powerful, engaging form of training. Give demonstration before letting the learners try.

• Hand-on exercise:

  • Can be either individual work or break-up groups

  • Depending on exercise, can consider either to group people with similar knowledge background or different expertise so they can learn from each others

  • Can encourage participants to bring their own data, work on own use cases/issues

  • The trainer should be active to:

    • Answer questions

    • Suggest more effective strategies

    • Correct errors

    • Guide toward goals

    • Give support and encouragement

    • Provide knowledgeable feedback

You may need assistants for a large group (>20). Ask local host for volunteers.

The latest trends in training

• Mobile learning: meets the needs of millennial professionals, who want (and expect) instantaneous access to information. Look for more innovations in microcontent (short, mobile-optimised content, usually on a single topic and intended to spark curiosity), such as a brief (two- to three-minute) videos, charts, graphs, chat features, audio files and surveys that convey learning materials in a quick, easy-to-absorb format on smartphones or other type of portable electronic devices.
• Social and Collaborative learning: People get more of their information from social media platforms. Social learning tools take elements of popular social media channels and contextualise them within an organisation to allow team members to share and collaborate on content in new ways
• Microlearning: By delivering short, fast learning modules that take less than five minutes to complete, people can get the information they need, when they need it
• Gamification: using game mechanics to spur involvement in learning. Friendly competition is a great incentive for learning. Video games, simulations and other online games relating to workplace scenarios boost creative thinking and enhance problem-solving abilities.
• Emphasizing Quality over quantity
• Improved tracking: how learners responded to training, what concepts need follow-up
• MOOC (Massive Open Online Courses): it is an interactive approach where people from different parts of world share their knowledge in the form of communities. you can take course from the world’s best university with the world’s best teacher, it is completely free https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_open_online_course
• TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) : experts of the subject share their insights. Short, inspiring, story-driven.
• Virtual Reality