Benefits Of Blended Learning: Why You Can’t Ignore It Anymore
While there is no questioning the effectiveness of a well-structured instructor-led session led by a passionate teacher, this type of training is not always affordable or feasible.
This is especially true for training being delivered to employees working for a business.
The complexity of managing the time of the sessions, combined with the costs involved in developing a dependable learning infrastructure that includes equipped classrooms and knowledgeable instructors is more often than not, an overwhelming amount of responsibilities.
As learning and development become more important to employees and employers alike, technology has provided us with a solution to the increasingly high investment into classroom training: blended learning.
What Is Blended Learning?
As the name suggests, blended learning combines in-classroom, instructor-led training (ILT) with online training. The blended training approach combines the benefits of ILT sessions and self-paced learning while combating their shortcomings.
In other words, blended learning offers a variety of benefits to organisations and their employees. Let’s look at some of them in more detail.
Blended Learning Demands Less Investment (Of Time & Money)
When in-classroom training is combined with online training, the cost of developing a training infrastructure goes down drastically. Sure, developing custom courses, purchasing an LMS and other aspects of deploying effective online training are associated with significant costs, but these are relatively lower than deploying all-out instructor-led training sessions.
In fact, by using the right blended learning software and employing a long-term vision for their training goals, organisations can minimise the cost of developing and deploying custom learning content. These savings, combined with savings made in infrastructure costs, hiring full-time instructors, paying for their lodging and travel, add up to significant savings in terms of financial investment.
Moreover, by converting part of their training into a self-paced, online course, organisations can save on employee’s paid time that goes into training them.
Hybrid Training Improves The Overall Effectiveness Of Corporate Training
Just as all employees don’t work in the same manner, they also don’t learn in the same manner. While some thrive with self-paced learning, others may neglect their training, or find ways to “cheat” the system by performing the (training) activities without deriving any training benefits.
Similarly, not all employees perform well when in a “classroom-only” setting. In fact, many of us have caught ourselves not paying attention to classroom sessions, and the same can easily happen with one of your employees.
With a blended or hybrid training approach, companies can accommodate the learning needs of both types of learners, improving the effectiveness of your course.
Blended Training Addresses The Shortcomings of Online Training and ILT
With time constraints and the responsibility of a group of students, instructor-led sessions may not always accommodate students with a slower learning pace. Combining the ILT with an online repository of learning resources will give learners the freedom to go back and revise the modules that they had trouble with.
Similarly, when part of your corporate training course lives online, having a periodical ILT will allow learners to address difficult parts of the training with the help of the instructor.
Conclusion
From cutting down costs to address the learning needs of your organisation and your employees, a blended learning approach can supercharge the results of your L&D initiatives. The best part is, blended learning makes it easier to collect feedback on your training. Students can give real-time feedback to their instructors and can also be made to fill out surveys online. By combining the knowledge from both, the effectiveness of your courses can be further enhanced.
