CompTIA CTT+ TK0-201 – Evaluating the Training Event (Domain 5) Part 2

7. Organization of Learner Training Records

Organization of Learner Training records is important to any educational institution. It allows them to keep track of who’s taken what courses, what to offer next in terms of course offerings, and guiding students long term in their educational and career goals. So depending on the organization that you work for, they will have levels of sophistication in their organization of Learner training records.

If you are working at a large organization where some of this training has to do with security compliance, my experience comes from the federal sector where a lot of this had to be auditable. So you had to have names, dates, training that had been received and how it matched to compliance items for federal statutes. So it can be very important to the risk posture or to compliance and to audits that it be notated when learners have completed certain training events.

If you’re working for a technology academy, this might just be an extension of their client relation management software. So whatever they use to organize their customers, this might just be added onto it. So whatever the case, you want to follow the organizational procedures. If you’re working inside your own organization, that is up to your decision how you roll that out and how you keep track of your students.

But it is good to keep track of obviously contact information, phone numbers, emails, the name, what course they’ve completed and what recommendations you have for future learning. If you’re working with a larger organization, a training organization, then they’ll likely have a robust system and specific procedures on how you input the Learner training information upon completion. Hopefully this doesn’t if you’re working as a contracted trainer, hopefully a lot of this work doesn’t fall on you, but you may have to submit at least test results, some sort of automated process with the training organization.

So make sure you understand your responsibilities in this regard. You might do some research on Learner Management software. So this is very much like a CRM or a client Relations Management software. Basically it just keeps track of everybody’s names, what they’ve completed. It may have some automated processes to email them about upcoming events or keep in touch with them and to process the information or how well they are doing towards the completion of a degree path or something like this. So get an idea of Learner Management softwares and what they look like. If you’ve worked with any of them, or if you know about any of them, please submit a comment in the comments pane and we can share some of our experience there with Learner Management Softwares.

8. The Need for Instructor & Course Evaluation

It can really be a challenge for some of us to receive constructive criticism on our course design or on the way that we delivered the course material, particularly if we spent a lot of time designing a course and we’re very proud of it and we really gave it all during the training event. It can be hard to receive feedback on things that the training organization would like to be changed. It’s important to remember, and you’re going to get some questions like this on the computer based CTT Plus exam, that this is not your training product. It belongs the course design, the curriculum belongs to the training organization, and you are delivering it for them. So it is still good to be responsive to the feedback that you get and flexible enough to implement any changes that the training organization asks of you.

And this benefits the training organization because it allows them to increase the standard of the training materials and the training event that they’re delivering to their customers or to their employees. And it also benefits you as a trainer because it helps you grow.

And even if you’re fundamentally opposed to some of the feedback that you get, you can at least learn some flexibility by applying what they’ve given you. And this goes to your professionalism and your reputation as a trainer. So if you are known as somebody who is cooperative, who is professional and is open to feedback, then you’re going to be easy to work with.

You’re going to be invited back to teach, and your business reputation will carry on with you. So you may get some uncomfortable feedback. Maybe somebody will audit your class. Maybe you’ll get some feedback on the training materials on the way a group activity was executed on your delivery style. Maybe you said too many odds, or, UMS, or you didn’t stand with posture, or they might have some feedback on your choice of unfirming. All of these things can be challenging to hear. But cooperate with the training organization, be flexible, and you will develop a good reputation as an excellent technical trainer.

9. Methods to Evaluate Training Delivery

Another party to the evaluation of the training events are the students themselves. This is particularly the case if you work for an organization that’s charging a lot of money for a training course. From the organization’s perspective, a student is their customer and they want to make sure that their customer is satisfied. In information technology certification courses that I have experienced training, sometimes they charge $2,000 or more for a six to eight week course. And when this is the case, students are really investing in their future career or education, and they want to make sure that they’re getting their money’s worth, and so does the organization.

They want to reach a certain standard of excellency. And so by submitting these post course kind of feedback reports or surveys to the learner, then the organization can really get a pulse on how the learners feel about the product that they’re delivering. So these summative evaluations will happen at the end of the class. They’ll be performed anonymously by the students, so they won’t put their names on these forms, either electronically or on paper. That way they don’t have to feel sheepish about grading you as the instructor. Poorly, perhaps, if there’s something that you could do to improve. And it’s good to be aware that these sort of evaluations are going on.

Keeps you on your toes. As an instructor, you may be graded on your technical expertise, on your ability to manage the classroom, or how clear you were in your instruction. And also the student will have an opportunity to rate some of the course materials, how it was presented, the logistics of the course, were they comfortable in the environment, the classroom, how did the technology work? And usually organizations will do this either electronically with an email link to an online survey, or they might perhaps give a pen and paper survey at the end of the course. And a great way of really finding out how people feel is to use a Likert scale. And we’ve done these before.

It’s when there’s usually five options that range from strongly disagree to strongly agree with. Neither agree nor disagree in the middle, and it’ll make a statement. For example, how would you rate your agreement with the following statement I was comfortable with the temperature of the training lab. And then the student will have the opportunity to fill in the blank whether they strongly agree with that statement or disagree or the extent of how they felt. So, liker, scales are great. If you are developing these sorts of evaluations so that you can improve the development of your course, use a Liker scale. Make sure these go out to the students and use them as to improve the product that you’re delivering.

10. The Kirkpatrick Evaluation Model (Revisited)

You’ll recall the Kirkpatrick evaluation model from an earlier video. This model is used to identify and articulate the actual goals of the training event. So when you’re designing the course, what do we want to get out of this? What do we want the learners to have learned? What results do we want to attain organizationally and in the learner’s abilities? So we use the Kirk Patrick model then, when designing the course, and now we’re going to use it again when evaluating the course. So we’re going to go back to those goals that were informed by the Kirkpatrick model and then ask ourselves, well, did we meet these goals? And as you recall, there are four elements reaction, learning behavior, and results. So the first one is learner reaction.

What is their immediate reaction to the course? Did they enjoy it? Do they feel that they learned something new? Were they comfortable with the instructor? You might get some of the information in this first element from the Like Earth Scale Feedback Survey that we talked about in the previous video. The second element is learning achievement. So when you give them the final test at the end of the course performance based or written based test, did they really learn what you wanted them to learn? What were the learning objectives? And are the students now able to understand that new knowledge and retain it? In behavioral change.

We’ve spoken before about how it’s important to really identify what behavioral change you want to effect in the students. So now the question is, can they do this thing or this task that they were not able to do earlier? Whether it’s an improved ability with the technical software hardware, their ability to apply it effectively in their job roles, can they actually perform that behavior now and then finally, results. When you’re working with an organization and you’re training their employees, for example, they are going to be very interested in the results of the training. They brought you in, and they paid you as a trainer, and they paid all these curriculum developers so that they could get a return on their investment.

And it might be that they’re hoping that once everybody understands this technical topic or this software, that now they can perform their job functions better, make more money for the company because they’ll be more proficient and productive in their jobs. Or as we said, it could have to do with some sort of auditing process, a security process. So can they now show that they meet compliance because everybody’s trained on a certain security topic, for example? But the point is, were the organization’s goals met? And how can we show that they were met? So you used this Kirkpatrick model not only when designing the course, but now in evaluating it, going back to the goals that you set for the course, clearly articulated goals, and now evaluating whether or not you met them.

11. End of Course Communication With the Training Organization

Let’s talk a little bit now about end of course communication with the training organization. As you can see in the image below, you want to have a nice handshake of mutual respect when you’re done with your training event. Whether you’re an employee with a company that’s training ongoing or training is only part of your duties or you’re in a contractual relationship.

Whatever the case, you want to be very professional about the training and maintain a positive business relationship. Number one, fulfill all your contractual obligations. So if there are any follow up activities, any end of course reports, you might think you’re in the free and clear when you finish that last day of class, but that may not be the case. There might be some paperwork to be done to really seal up this and conclude this obligation. So make sure you perform all that and get it done timely and do it thoroughly. Correspond to some of the students reports. Make sure all that gets done on time. And then we talked about the value of offering feedback. You may be asked to teach this course again and if you found some real flaw in the course design or the curriculum that you really felt could be improved, then it really makes sense to communicate that with the training organization.

So the next time you teach it, you don’t have that trouble again. Something about the environment of the classroom that wasn’t conducive to learning or wasn’t comfortable for you or the students, it’s good to speak up about those things. And organizations, as I’ve mentioned before, really value this feedback because they obviously want to create a high quality product and high quality experience for the students. And so when you speak up and very clearly articulate what could be improved and they’re going to really appreciate that feedback and it’s going to increase their respect for you because you spoke up about that and are contributing to their goals as an organization.

Whatever you do, maintain professionalism. So you want a respectful relationship. If you are a contracted teacher, then you may be teaching at a number of different institutions. Your reputation goes with you. If you seek to be employed long term, then obviously, ah, being somebody that is easy to work with and professional will do a lot to establish you in the field as a professional technical trainer.

12. Review – Domain 5

That’s it for domain five. Good job. At this point, we have covered the entire body of knowledge for the CTT Plus exam. There’s some things we’re going to discuss in the next two video sections that talk about how to submit the forms for the performance based class and how to incorporate some of this knowledge into your performance based video submission. But for now, you can and congratulate yourself because you’ve covered all of the domains of understanding for the test. So great job. Let’s just review domain five before we move on.

And before you move on to take the quiz below. This was all about evaluating the training event at the conclusion of the course, make sure you know the difference between formative and summative assessments. Again, formative are offered periodically throughout the course and they provide insight to the instructor and also help guide the focus of the students. And then summative assessments can be either written or performance based. Final exams. We talked about some things that happen after the course, like post course support methods, how you might have some obligations to students beyond the conclusion of the course to offer clarification or give them education or academic or education or career advice.

And we also talked about communicating with the organization through end of course reports and being clear about positive feedback that you can give to the organization or constructive feedback that you can give to the organization from the perspective of the technical trainer. And we talked a little bit about learner management systems, keeping good track of all of the students and where they are in their academic journey. And again, we spoke about evaluating the training delivery and how important it is for you as a trainer to be open to that feedback.

We talked about the feedback forms that students may complete that will give feedback to the organization not only on you as a trainer, but on the course design and the logistics of the class and the learning environment too. And finally, we looked again at the Kirkpatrick evaluation model and those four elements of evaluation that went into the creation of the course and now are going to be reassessed at the conclusion of the course to identify whether you met the needs of the training, organization and the learner. So that wraps it up for domain five. I think you’re ready to take the quiz. Please move on and take the quiz and then I’ll see you in the next section.

13. TK0-202 or TK0-203?

All right. So before you move on, I wanted to speak with you a little bit about how the rest of the videos in this definitive CTT Plus course are laid out for you. As you know, now, we’ve covered all the domains of understanding everything that you’re going to be tested on in preparation for the TKO 201 computer based exam. But in addition to that, you’re going to have to give evidence that you can perform all of these knowledge areas in either the TKO 202 or TKO 203. That is the classroom trainer or the virtual classroom trainer, respectively.

So my suggestion is at this point that you make a decision on that. Are you going to submit a video of you teaching in person, or are you going to submit a video recording of you teaching virtually? And so the way that the videos are set up now is that section Seven is specifically designed for the TKO 202, and section eight is particularly for the TKO 203. You really don’t need to watch both sets of videos. You’ll find them a little bit repetitive. And if it doesn’t apply to the test you’re submitting for, then you don’t need to waste your time. So keep that in mind moving forward. Make your choice and go ahead and watch the videos in those sections.

We’re going to cover everything from performance to recording to submission of of those videos. So you’ll be well prepared for that. And regardless of which one you choose, I will see you all in Section Nine, where we’ll go over some, you know, last minute preparation for both the computer based and the performance based exams and make sure that you feel motivated, encouraged, and ready to go to get your CTT Plus certification. I’ll see you there.