Introduction
Learning guides are a very useful means of offering flexible delivery when the topic and circumstances are right. According to Bruhn and Guthrie (1994), a learning guide is a “structured booklet designed to guide the learner through a series of learning activities and a variety of resources to achieve specific competencies or learning outcomes”.
A tutorial is not an instruction manual like the manuals that come with televisions, microwaves, computers, etc., but can be used in conjunction with them. The key focus of tutorials (hereinafter ‘guides’) is that they guide users through a structured learning experience. Manuals don’t do that, they simply provide a series of activities that users can follow to achieve certain results. An example will highlight the difference.
Example:
I once used guides to cover a half-dozen small topics that were important, but didn’t warrant group training sessions (I later redesigned them as computer-based instructional modules delivered online). This was an organization that had six offices spread across the Northern Territory (Australia), two of which were remote. Training delivery costs were often very high due to the need to travel, therefore it was desirable to find alternative modes of delivery to keep costs down.
One of the topics my guides covered, for example, was titled “Using Delegations” and was only 16 pages long.
Note: For those unfamiliar with delegations, they refer to the acts or omissions that a person with a specific job may or may not do, for example, approving a staff member’s leave of absence, purchasing valued goods and services up to $30,000 or terminate an employee’s service. . The people who exercise a delegation are called delegates. If you don’t have delegation, then you can’t legally run a task.
It was important for delegates to know what they were or were not authorized to do. Non-delegates had to know who had delegation to carry out the required tasks. My brief tutorial included the following parts:
- An overview of the module setting out the purpose, delivery strategy, learning outcomes, how to achieve the outcomes, resources needed, and details of how the topic would be assessed.
- five learning activities
- An evaluation questionnaire
- A summary and review page.
- An answer guide for the intermediate evaluation topics (self-assessment) is attached.
Learning activity one detailed the framework in which delegations exist, that is, the constitutional and other legislative issues that allow for delegation. There were two activities at the end of Learning Activity One. The first required students to obtain a copy of an Act of Parliament and study various sections (on delegation). The second required people to read a description, find the section of a law related to that description, and write the answers in a blank table. (This was my way of making sure people actually read specific sections.)
All learning activities two through five had a similar process of getting students to do something followed by a brief self-assessment.
Finally, students were expected to answer 10 “complete the answer” questions and provide answers for two small case studies involving real-life delegation activities. The first required students to consult the organization’s Delegation Manual and record which delegation (if any) fitted a specific circumstance. When the students completed the evaluation questionnaire, they sent it by fax to the Training Department. One of my people would bookmark it and provide feedback on the result.
Each learning activity covered a small separate part of the whole topic. (People learn in small bits). I provided feedback through the self-assessment and the fax assessment. (People need feedback). Topics were logically sequenced. (People need to work from general concepts to specific concepts). The students used the manuals and the legislation that really applied to them in their daily work. (Adult learners in particular want to learn ‘real’ practical solutions, not deal with fiction.)
You will now understand how the structure of a tutorial and the use of instructional design principles differentiate it from a standard operations manual. A key advantage of tutorials is that you don’t have to embed documents that are available elsewhere… all you do is reference them. If they change, it’s not that hard to update your tutorial.
conclusion
Just as there is a time and place for everything else, there is a time and place for tutorials. If you use them at the right time AND your target audience is conducive to self-directed learning, they can be a great solution to some of your training delivery challenges. Design turnaround time is relatively short and can be delivered effectively using electronic or print media; they can be used for just-in-time training.
However, like any training intervention, they must be “designed” using appropriate instructional design principles. That means it is a specialist job to produce quality guides, not the role of a person who is a ‘presenter’ or ‘facilitator’ who has completed a two or three day course on workplace training and assessment.
Most of the learning guides I produced were based on the work of Bruhn and Guthrie, although I had used other methods during my teaching/training career and read many other texts. For example, Derek Rowntree’s book, details of which follow, also contains excellent advice and information for anyone wanting to learn the art.
The next time you need to deliver a number of small, concise, and unobtrusive topics, consider using tutorials to accompany your organization’s procedural and operational manuals.
References:
Bruhn, P and Guthrie, H (1994), Learning Guide Design for TAFE and Industry. National Center for Research in Vocational Education Ltd, Victoria.
Rowntree, D (latest edition), Teaching through self-instruction: How to develop open learning materials. Kogan Page Publishing, New York.
Copyright 2005 Robin Henry
