The Ten-Minute Trainer

150 Ways to Teach it Quick and Make it Stick!

Sharon L. Bowman

• Publisher: Pfeiffer
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN: 9780787974428
• eBook ISBN: 9781118046661
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Human Resource Management
• Index: Business

Discover more than one hundred of Sharon Bowman's training-room-proven exercises and activities -- many derived from the high-impact strategies of NLP and Accelerated Learning -- and reduce delivery time, increase retention and improve knowledge and skill transfer. These back-pocket activities are easy, quick, topic-related, and fun, and you can draw on with a minimum of preparation.

The Ten-Minute Trainer features a variety of exercises, ranging from one to ten minutes in length, and provides content-specific exercises as well as activities for transitioning between topics and gauging understanding. You'll find a useful answer section that explains the brain research behind the book and a special section on learning styles that ties in with the philosophy of "learn it fast and make it last."

Order your copy of this effective resource today!

Part One

When They Do It, They Get It!

150 Activities to Make the Learning Stick

Quick Start

Mark-Up. All the activity names in Part One are listed below. Circle any that sound interesting to you or that you think you might be familiar with. As you read the chapters in Part One, you may discover that these activities are similar to ones you use or ones that you know by other names.

Time Sponges	Quick Starts	Take a Break
Early to Finish	Connections	Pair Shares
Shout Outs	Mark-Ups	Signals
Doodles	Think and Write	Pop-Ups
Tickets Out	Action Plans	Celebrations
Gallery Walk	Take a Stand	Grab That Spoon
Place Your Order	Metaphor Magic	Let’s Trade
The Walkabout	Each One Teach One	Blackout Bingo
Postcard Partners

Sometimes in your work as a training professional you have probably felt as though your job is at “warp speed,” with each training looming on the heels of the one before. You seem to stay one step ahead of where you have to be. You find yourself squeezing in moments (instead of hours) of study time in order to become even better at what you do. You often skim training books, looking for the activities you can put to use immediately and promising to read the rest of the material when you have the time.

With that thought in mind, you’ll find the practical, how-to activities listed in Part One up front, where you can get to them quickly. Later, when you have more time, you can read Part Two, which covers the brain research and training design tools that support using these short, quick activities in your training.

A Bird’s-Eye View of 150 Activities

Here is what you’ll find in Part One:

• An introduction to the “Got a Minute?” activities. This will explain the rationale for these sixty-second activities, what you can accomplish by using them, and some tips to keep in mind as you experiment with them.

• 140 “Got a Minute?” activities to help learners review, repeat, and remember important information.

• An introduction to the “Take Five!” games. This will explain why these fiveand ten-minute activities are important, what you can accomplish by using them, and some tips to keep in mind.

• Ten “Take Five!” games to help learners RAP up the learning: reinforce, apply, and practice.

Here is a more detailed list of the sixty-second activities and how you might use them in your training:

• Connections. These are opening activities that connect learners to each other, to what they already know about the training topic, and to what they want to learn.

• Time Sponges. Use these to soak up time at the opening, during a break, or when participants finish an activity or game early. Use them also as connection activities to connect learners to each other and to the training topic or concepts.

• Pair Shares. Use these as quick review exercises throughout the training.

• Shout Outs. Use these as opening activities to find out what learners already know about the topic. Use them also as quick review exercises.

• Think and Write. These are introspective review activities you can use throughout a training.

• Signals. Use these to check for understanding or as yes or no answers to verbal questions.

• Doodles. These are visual, right-brain ways of representing important facts or concepts.

• Pop-Ups. These are kinesthetic review exercises, that is, they include movement in the review process.

• Mark-Ups. With these, participants interact with written material by marking the text in various ways.

• Tickets Out. Use these as closing activities to help participants think about and evaluate what they learned.

• Action Plans. These are closing activities that encourage participants to make a commitment to use what they learned.

• Celebrations. These are closing activities that celebrate the learning with a high-energy, enthusiastic end to the training.

And here is a more detailed list of the five- and ten-minute games, along with how you might use them in your training:

• Postcard Partners. Use this as an opening activity to connect learners to each other and to the training topic or concepts.

• The Gallery Walk. This can be an opening activity, a review activity, or a closing exercise. Or use it as an ongoing activity throughout the training or during training breaks.

• Take a Stand. This is either an opening activity or a review activity when you want participants to discuss topic-related issues.

• Grab That Spoon. As a closing exercise, this is a competitive game for a general review. Or include each game round, that is, one question and answer, at various times throughout the training to review specific concepts.

• Place Your Order. Use this to review procedural concepts during the training, that is, information that needs to be learned in a certain order.

• Metaphor Magic. This is a creative, right-brain way of reviewing concepts, which makes learners think about what they have learned in unique and unusual ways. It can also be a creative closing activity.

• Let’s Trade. Use this as a closing activity in which participants make a commitment to use what they have learned.

• Each One Teach One. Use this as a kinesthetic exercise to help learners practice skills or review information in an active, hands-on way.

• The Walkabout. This is a closing kinesthetic activity that is also high-energy and celebratory.

• Blackout Bingo. Use this as another high-energy, closing activity. It is also a kinesthetic review exercise.

Chunk It

In order to use these 150 activities in ways that will make them work best for your learners, you will need to “chunk” your material, that is, divide your information into shorter lecture segments. If you’ve never done this before, then the easiest way to begin is to cut your material in half. You will deliver both halves, but you will also include a sixty-second activity in between each half.

For example, if you’re used to lecturing for an hour, lecture for thirty minutes instead. Then stop talking and lead the participants in a sixty-second review activity. After that, continue with the next thirty minutes of lecture. You can also include a sixty-second activity at the beginning of the first thirty minutes and at the end of the last thirty minutes.

If your normal lecture time is about a half hour, take two thirty-minute lecture pieces and divide that material into four fifteen-minute segments. Include sixty-second activities at the beginning, the end, and in between each of the four segments for a total of five short, quick activities in an hour.

Your goal in chunking your material is to get close to the ten-minute mark, not only because of the television-affected, shortened attention spans of your participants, but also because the human brain learns better that way (see Part Two for the brain research that supports the ten-minute lecture).

Remember, ten minutes of information delivery is the goal, not the rule. You decide what’s appropriate for y...

Table of contents

• About This Book
• About Pfeiffer
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Foreword
• Opening and Connections
• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three
• Closing and Celebration
• Remarkable Resources
• Many Thanks!
• About the Author
• Pfeiffer Publications Guide