Wessex Training - Online Elearning

Filling the gaps in our learning can sometimes seem like a never ending journey.  One person cheerfully quipped that her learning curve was getting more like a spiral – which is one way of looking at it.  This person was doing the mandatory online anti fraud and money laundering course set by our employer.  There were always online courses of undertaken during each quarter.  These were automatically monitored and anyone not completing, or not even registering to take part, would be notified to their line manager by default.  As with every employer, they are persuaded by training suppliers that all the employees would benefit from this course or that.  It’s much easier to make it mandatory for all to undertake it than spend time assessing who would actually benefit & who wouldn’t.  If the course is well written and not bunged up with jargon and repetitive formula, everyone will gain something from an online course, if only to wake up the brain cells now and then!

There is never a bad time for getting to grips with online learning.   Whilst the country has been enduring and getting used to a ‘stay home’ life style for health sake, there have been many opportunities cropping up to do more with this time.  So many new vocational and life changing career focused courses are out there and as so many of the younger generation have grown up with online and e-learning systems, they know instinctively how and where to access the means of developing skills to take their initial interest forward.  Some collges provide world class training for the very much more advanced electronoc management systems that companies need to employ now.  Personnel and security systems are very hi tech and every aspect of an organisation’s modus operandi is logged and backed up.  Training the ttainers is also very big business and the suppliers of this learning feature are leading the way.

Some of the online trainers and educators are now feeling their place in society.  With the restrictions governing the schooling of our students and pupils still in place, there is a tremendous emphasis on home learning.   As with all generational matters, the parents are often finding they don’t understand what exactly is being taught.  Take Maths for example.  Over many years the teaching of this absolutely essential subject has varied as fashions and whims have changed.  I know that various methods have been adopted to try and make long multiplicaiton much easier to accomplish, and the opposite, long division.   They turn to their phone or other form of calculator.  Ok, the result will be accurate, assuming the correct digits have been pressed, but the skills to work out something for themselves has very rapidly been lost in one single generation.  This is tragic.   What’s needed is a refresher class for all adults every few years so they keep up with what needs to be learned and how best to learn it.  Online education is the only way of achievig this.

If you’ve thought about taking further courses of study, you may have come across online learning packages, or E-Learning as they are sometimes known.  There are as great number of benefits to online study, as we break down right here:

1. Flexible!  Online learning allows you to study whenever and wherever you like.  No need to attend lectures and seminars at specific times or travel to college campuses.  As long as you have internet access and a computer/laptop you can complete your course.
2. Wide range of subjects: you can study almost anything through online courses, from first aid to computer skills, and some courses are even accredited so you gain meaningful qualifications at the same time.
3. Expert knowledge: the courses are often wrtitten by experts in the field, so you can be certain that you are receiving up to date knowledge and skills.
4. Connections: it is highly likely that you will be able to connect with others also taking the same course, allowing you networking opportunities.

There are some fantastic online learning institutions out there.  Some have been in business for decades, quietly building their niche market.  Today they are more valuable than ever before with the urgent need to replace some of the previous ‘norms’ of atttending schools or colleges.  The complications arising from the global epidemic means that external learning as we know it will be a long time returning.  Face to face lectures will be less and online courses replacing these will become the norm.  A student wanting to enter law as a career will need to have exactly the right combinatin of GCSE and A level grades to start with so why not take additional learning in Law to help the selection process.  Only the best get selected and a student with the very best qualificaitons, bolstered by the best online training and e-learning resources will stand a much better chance of selection in this very competitive area.

There are many varied and wonderful names for the different e-learning and training platforms available today.   No longer do we have a training manager with one or two side kicks who take up an inordinate amount of your working day reading out the ‘how to do’ sections of the employee operational manual.  Things have most definitely moved on a tad.  There are VLE systems which to you and me is Virtual Learning Environment and LME, in English : Learning Management Environment both of which take a company training requirement and make it fully accessible by all members of the staff for their particular sector and where they are totally absorbed in that learning process during the task allocated time slot – the learning is controlled and measured.    The software is custom designed to suit each company – ensuring only the required effort is required and no extraneous interests are entered into.  Even the government has introduced a fully comprehensive online learning platform for children – all of whom are in total school lock down.

Learning Management software is a specialised area geerally used within businesses to ensure they can reach out to their workforce and keep them engaged with the in-house learning programmes.  If a company has workers i.e. learners spread all around a large geographic area, an online learning platform is ideal for them.  Each learner will have their own login and be able to carry out the distance learning without travelling to another site, there will be no travel cost or time to be considered.  The development programme can be delivered to all those who the leaders feel would most benefit or need to step up.  Their progress is monitored online and learners can be grouped together or set individual lerning goals.

All workers, colleagues, managers will benefit from any kind of learning scheme.  An inhouse programme for their particular area can be role focused and will help them feel more integrated and empowered.    In these days of self isolation and social distancing, learning a role focused course or general company specific learning will help keep everybody feel they still belong whlst remaining safe!

The history of learning and teaching pupils anything at all has of course been around since the ealiest cave men.  Those first few tentative lessons on how to hunt, prepare an animal, build houses etc. were the very basics and although we have moved on many centuries, the principal is still the same.  Knowledge is presented in a format conducive to the candidiate’s learning capability and if they work hard, that knowledge will be fed into the candidate via e-learning.  They can utilise a laptop, palm top, even mobile phone.  Prior to having internet, many students coudl only rely on manuals, CD-ROMS and a gammit of other somewhat restrictive methods of learning and training.  These are so one dimensional – you can’t easily check into a point for further information, it has to be manually located in the index.  Exasperating, now that we’ve had internet and instant access to any subject.  The focused learning tools in e-learning make this much smarter and such good value for money.

For quite a few years now we’ve seen how youngsters are able to grasp the world of online learning very quickly.  This is generally through playing online games and just play and fun.  However children do pick up new trends and absorb information very easily when they enjoy what they’re doing.  With baby computers that would have just allowed them to tap a choice of answer, graduating up to the full blown chance to learn basic computer languages at school, many a young person can thank those early steps as they become fully qualified and absolutely vital members of our community – by way of taking careers as software programmers and computer geeks!  Those evenings sat in front of a screen with hand held controllers, zapping at the screen will have made them ultra quick in thought and reaction and that makes them ideal candidates to progress through e-learning and online training courses to turn this round to a paying career.  Some of our best gaming developers were those girls who made a point of trying, and succeeding to beat the boys at their own game!