Three Steps for Teaching Software

The other day, I got a great comment about my post Are You Challenging Your Learners? Don’t treat them like babies.

The question:

When do you think people in your class reach their threshold level? When does it turn from ‘difficult/challenging’ to ‘impossible’ – leaving the student frustrated and ready to give up? I teach adults who have a very low computer literacy level yet live in an environment where technology is required for learning (northern Arctic). How would you approach a class who has difficulty reading a university level text? The sink-or-swim approach hasn’t worked too well for me.

Teaching procedural software calls for strategies other than the sink-or-swim. Try these to help learners grasp software and to become computer literate.

The answer:
First, when I say that the tasks is difficult, it doesn’t mean I don’t help at all in fact, I ask my students to reach out to me whenever they have a question, get stuck or feel like they are getting frustrated. I tell them I am a guide and mentor and a resource that they must utilize to be successful. So, I encourage students to be their own judge of when they need help and then to seek me out to offer that help, however, I don’t leave it at that, I also check in with them on a weekly basis to check on progress. So I am checking on their frustration level to ensure they don’t go “over the top.”

In terms of teaching where technology literacy is not high and you want to convey knowledge, I might use the following methods.

Teach to a Task
Often with teaching technology or a software, we teach by menus instead of tasks. For example, when teaching MS Word, we typically take the approach of starting with the “Home” menu and then teaching the learner every item on the home menu and what it means and then we move to the “Insert” menu and teach what every icon means on that menu and so forth across the entire screen.

This seems to make sense but it doesn’t speak to what the learner needs. No one really wants to learn a word processing software, what they want is to write a letter, or draft a report, or write a paper. They don’t want to “learn word processing”.

So, with software, I start with a task. “Ok, we are going to learn to write a letter” and then I only teach what the learners need to know about writing a letter. Creating a document, how to space the document, how to create a new paragraph. Then, as we go through the document someone might ask “how to I make this word bold?” Then I teach how to make a word bold. If no one asks the question, I might say, “Ok, now we have a draft of a letter, lets pick a word and make it bold.”

So, that you build upon the knowledge (this is the opposite of an impossible task, instead you start with as simple task and build on it to reach the goal of mastery). Using this technique, you might not cover every nook and cranny of the software but, by the end of the class session, the learners will be able to complete specific tasks. This is important with software training that the learners can do the task that is required of them after the training, otherwise, they get frightened and even more intimidated by the software.

Use Games to Build Confidence
People are often intimidated by computers, especially if they are new to them. One good way to overcome intimidation is through games and, conveniently, many games teach computer skills. You might want to start off the class with 15 minutes of “game” play.

For example, one of the most difficult tasks to teach is how to double click and drag and drop with a mouse. if you’ve done it for a while, no problem. If you’ve never done it, problems. It is frustrating and difficult to learn and teaching it can even be more frustrating. However, the Microsoft Solitare card game is excellent for teaching learners how to drag, drop and double click and, because it is in a game context, people are not as intimidated. I would have the solitaire game open and ready to go on each learner’s computer and then let them play. Find other games that work on those skills as well. One of my all time favorites for teaching typing is “Typing of the Dead but there are lots of typing games that can be played and even a game like Zombies vs. Plants which can help someone learn navigation skills.

Demo, Walk Through, Exercise
When teaching software, first provide an overview of the task you are teaching. For writing a letter, demonstrate how to open a document, type the salutation, create a new paragraph, indent, bold, etc. You demonstrate the entire process. The learners just watch.

Next, give a walk through where the learners follow along with you. So you open a file and then they open a file on their computers, you type “Dear John” and they type “Dear John” so they follow you step-by-step.

Then once they have done that (or maybe twice) then have them do it on their own and walk around the classroom providing assistance where needed. If one learner gets it faster have her help the others. This provides a chance for the learn to watch, apply and practice. It is a great technique for software training.

Hope these ideas have helped and let me know if you tried any of them and how they worked for you and your learners. Software and technology literacy is always difficult because people do have a fear of computers that is much different than any “fear of books” or “fear of paper” that I’ve ever encountered (I think it is from all the sci-fi moves where computers destroy the world.)

Good luck and thanks for the great question.