Book Image

User Training for Busy Programmers

By : William Rice, William Rice
Book Image

User Training for Busy Programmers

By: William Rice, William Rice

Overview of this book

If you need to write a successful software training course and are unsure of how to start, then this book gets right to the point with clear, concise directions for developing an end-user software course. This step-by-step job aid walks you through the process of developing a successful, instructor-led software class. There are many good books on training theory. This book takes a more practical, condensed approach for when you don't have time to learn training theory. It is based on fifteen years of technical writing and training experience. In under 100 pages, the book guides you through the process of developing an end-user software course using a method that is tested, proven, and based upon sound instructional theory.
Table of Contents (13 chapters)

Misconceptions about Training


There are several misconceptions that prevent many software training classes from succeeding. If this book accomplishes nothing more than making you aware of these myths, you will still have benefited greatly.

Myth: Your Software Training Class should be about the Software

Your students did not come to your class to learn about the software. They came to learn how to accomplish specific business tasks. In the training profession, we call this approach as task-oriented training. We teach how to perform a business task, instead of how to use a menu option.

For example, a chapter called ‘The Data Menu’ pertains to learning about something, in this case, the Data Menu. ‘How to Import Data’, on the other hand, is learning how to do something, and reflects our task-oriented approach.

Myth: Your Students Want or Need to Know It All

The success of a training class is measured by the students’ ability to be productive and not by the amount of material you covered. Saturating your students with information is not the most effective way to help them become productive. Your students need to leave the class with competency in all the basic tasks.

Research shows that one of the biggest challenges that workers face today is locating the information they need. Make the process of locating help and further instructions a part of your course. Refer your students to the online help, manuals, and other resources for refinements, shortcuts, and rarely performed tasks. During the class, focus on developing your students’ competency in the core concepts and tasks.

Myth: In a Training Class, the Instructor Must Answer All of the Students’ Questions

You don’t need to tell your students the answers to all of their questions. You’ll help them better by giving them the opportunity to discover some answers themselves. Adults are more engaged and learn more permanently when they discover some answers themselves. This approach is called discovery learning. You can give your students the freedom to explore in the class, while still keeping control of the class. For example, you can present a question during a lecture or demonstration, and then have the students perform an exercise designed to answer that question.

Myth: When Teaching Software, You Should Begin at the Beginning

This is almost never true and almost always done. Start with the background information, and you lose most adult learners within fifteen minutes. If you want to catch and hold your students’ attention, start with something they can use. For example, begin the class with a demonstration of the process that they will learn, or by showing the documents that they will learn how to produce. Showing the end result of the class first is a good way to motivate your students.