SKILL-BASED TRAINING

SKILL-BASED TRAINING

WHAT IS SKILL-BASED TRAINING?

Ø  A skill-based training is a type of education that comprises teaching and learning specific skills.

Ø  Attempts to concentrate on developing and applying specific skills and behaviors.

Ø  Learners must spend the majority of their training time engaged in learning, developing, and practicing skills in a variety of hands-on activities and real life scenarios.

Ø  Skill based training will fall short if there is insufficient time dedicated for the application of the skills.

Ø   The skills training is to not only enable the learner to acquire proficiency in the specific skill/skills, but have confidence to competently apply it at workplace/job.

Ø  The skill-based training is arbitrary since it is not limited to certain scope only. It is widespread all across genres be it the training of speaking skill for high school students, writing skill for the journalism graduates, listening skill for telephone operators,reading skills for the newscasters, or learning social skills for fresh graduates.

Ø  The skills involved for the training/teaching have their own unique criteria and requirements to be fulfilled in its best condition.

Ø  The success of the skill-based training can be proven when the learners are able to acquire the skills learned and apply it in their job or tasks.

FUNDAMENTAL STEPS/GUIDELINES IN CONDUCTING A SKILL-BASED TRAINING

STEPS	EXPLANATION
1)      Identify the competencies	-          Identify the learners strengths and weaknesses -          Identify the learners needs -          Develop/revise individual task requirement
2)      Sequence skills and tasks	-          Logical categorization of skills to be trained -          Incorporate skills training and hand on task -          Integrate new training technologies
3)      Implement training strategy	-          Ensure learning transfer and retention -          Focus on problem solving/troubleshooting -          Reinforce skills by integrating into other events later in course
4)      Evaluate and revise	-          Conduct supervisor/key leader survey -          Revise, as required

Ø  In any field of jobs or studies language is always on its top position to serve several purposes. Thus, the skills in using language is fundamental to enable people to speak their minds, write good business report etc. The four language skills which are speaking, writing, reading, and listening should be acquired in order to become a competent worker or student.

LANGUAGE SKILLS ALL ACROSS GENRES OF SKILL-BASED TRAINING

No.	Skills	Requirements
1.	Listening	-          Recognize sounds, words, and phrases -          Get the general idea, remember salient points and predict what’s coming next -          Understand the discourse type of genre you are listening to -          Get used to listening to different types of people for different lengths of time -          Screen out what you are not interested in and focus on what you are interested in -          Deal with accents and dialects -          Interpret a message against a background of expectations and respond accordingly
2.	Speaking	-          Use different parts of the mouth and body from those needed in your own language -          Make individual sounds and combine them -          Produce correct stress on individual words and on longer stretches depending on the meaning you want to convey -          Use intonation (including tones across discourse) -          Work with appropriate rhythm and pace -          Express your own meaning and your own personality by choosing from a range of physical and verbal expressions -          Interact with people appropriately, repairing breakdown of messages, taking turns and speaking alone for short and long periods -          Describe agree, beg, plead, insult etc. all as naturally as possible (Naturalness also involves clothing, posture, and body orientation, gesture, body contact, facial expression and gaze.
3.	Reading	-          Recognize different formats such as headlines or faxes and different styles and genres -          Know letters, words, and phrases -          Understand implication and style -          Skim, scan, predict, guess, and remember -          Relate what you have read to our own experience, mentally agree or disagree, criticize or commend, physically turn the pages from right to left, and read the lines from left to right -          Survey books, speed read -          Read aloud -          Pore over what every word means or read for pleasure and the general idea
4.	Writing	-          Form individual letters, both upper and lower case, space them from left to right in relationship to a line and join them up -          Think of something to write -          Make sentences with punctuation -          Indent and know what a paragraph is -          Write different kinds of texts such as letters, postcards, and summaries, with appropriate choice of layout, vocabulary, and logical structure -          Read and reread our own work, crossing out, rewriting and reorganizing as well as correcting grammar, spelling, and punctuation -          Write with accuracy, fluency, and confidence

SKILL-BASED TRAINING PRINCIPLES

1)      Student Centered

-          Learn by doing/Outcomes based training

-          Facilitate learning among students

2)      Active Learning

-          Learner responsible for learning

-          Problem solving/troubleshooting

3)      Train on Most Difficult Piece of Equipment First

-          Sequenced skills acquirement

-          Stage by stage teaching/training

4)      Focus on Skills

-          Identify & reinforce specific knowledge & skills

-          All tasks are not performed on all equipment

5)      Shared Learning/Experiences

-          Learn based on experiences of doing things before

-          Share experiences be it among students or between students and their instructors

6)      Build Confidence

-          Challenge with complex situations

-          Allow the students to act confidently

THE EXAMPLE OF SKILL-BASED TRAINING COURSE

Source: http://www.the-centre.co.uk/courses/detail/listening_skills

Course summary

Ø  This one-day workshop focuses on a key but often ignored communication skill: focused listening. If you consider the four basic communication skills - listening, speaking, reading and writing, it is interesting to note that listening is the first learned, the most used and the least taught whereas writing is the last learned, least used and the most taught. With that in mind, reflect on your years in education - from primary school through university. Was there ever a dedicated course offered to you in listening?

Course outline

Ø  By 'focused listening' we are referring to moving away from our hectic, 'get it done NOW' lives and moving towards more meaningful interactions with other human beings - something of a haven from our fast-paced world. More importantly, the skills taught will help create deeper, more rewarding relationships with your staff, colleagues, customers, clients and other stakeholders.

Ø  Focused listening is a way of listening that involves a clear intention and ability to concentrate on the speaker's words in order to discern what is being communicated on multiple levels. By focused listening you will hear what is, and is not being said and can pick up on subtleties that are often missed with more superficial, hurried listening. By taking the time to truly listen to what the speaker has to say, the other person is likely to feel respected and heard. Real and focused listening leads to greater trust on the part of listener and the potential for a stronger overall relationship.

Ø  This one-day course covers: 

• why listening is so important
• best and worst listeners exercise
• the concept of ‘slow listening'
• principles of communication
• five types of listening
• giving and getting feedback
• asking questions
• too much noise level and overcoming it
• listening to learn
• listening to decide
• listening to connect
• a year of free support

Ø  The course is highly interactive with useful exercises, group discussion and role play.

Who is this course for?

Ø  This course is for anyone who wants to improve their listening skills, from administrators and assistants through to line managers and senior managers. You may feel that you have difficulty with your focused listening, or simply that you wish to strengthen your work relationships through improved listening skills. The Centre works with people from all sectors including the public sector, voluntary sector, corporate sector and private sector.

What will this course help me do: learning outcomes?

Ø  By the end of this course you will be able to understand the listening process in the context of facilitating effective interactions with others by identifying your barriers to listening and practicing skills and attitudes which facilitate effective listening.

Ø  You will have an increased awareness of how state-of-mind impacts the quality of listening. You will be able to identify and confirm what is going on in the other person's world. This includes identifying their core issues, needs and concerns.

Ø  You will have an understanding of how to discern the deeper meaning behind the other person's communication. This includes listening beyond the words for both spoken and unspoken messages.

Ø  You will have an enhanced ability to summarise the conversation and confirm next steps.