Boost Learner Engagement: 10 Tips for Training New Trainers

Keeping trainees actively engaged during Train-the-Trainer programs can be challenging. Let's face it - sitting through hours of instruction on facilitation, training, presentation, design skills, and learner preference skills is not everyone's idea of a riveting time.

However, with the right techniques, you can spark lively participation and excitement in the room. Combining gamification, roleplays, and humor with sound instructional design greatly enhances participant involvement and learning outcomes.

In this post, we'll explore actionable tips to get your trainees energized and immersed during your next train-the-trainer workshop or certification course. You'll discover proven methods to motivate adult learners and equip new trainers with the critical skills they need to deliver impactful training.

Set the Stage for Engagement

First things first - you need to set the tone for an engaging learning experience right from the start.

Bring Your Enthusiasm

Your energy and passion set the pace for the entire program. Greet trainees with excitement on day one by sharing your own stories of facilitating impactful training over the years. Convey your enthusiasm for equipping a new generation of skilled trainers. This motivates participants to fully engage so they can attain the same mastery.

Establish Group Guidelines

Develop ground rules together on standards for participation, respectful interactions, mobile device usage, and so on. This empowers learners to take ownership in creating a safe environment for lively discussions and activities. Having trainees suggest guidelines also gets them primed to actively contribute.

Provide the Big Picture

Explain the big-picture, real-world value of the training skills trainees will gain. Tie it back to their professional development goals and reasons for enrolling in the first place. When adults understand the immediate relevance of content back on the job, they engage more meaningfully.

Leverage Icebreakers and Energizers

Fun icebreaker activities at the start of each day get trainees socially engaged with each other. This conversational energy powers greater participation in the sessions. Be sure to also sprinkle short energizer breaks throughout long sessions to refresh learners' minds and bodies. Get them up and moving!

Promote Active Involvement

Now it's time to dive into the curriculum. Employ facilitation techniques focused on getting learners to actively contribute versus passively listening to lecture-style deliveries.

Facilitate Discovery Exercises

Pose challenging questions or tasks related to key concepts you want trainees to internalize. Have them work in pairs or small groups to discover answers together. This peer-to-peer problem-solving makes understanding stick. Populate teams with diverse experience levels to enable peer knowledge sharing.

Demonstrate with Roleplays

Avoid lengthy explanations of how concepts work in the classroom. Instead, immerse trainees in realistic roleplay scenarios where they can experience techniques firsthand. Take on the role of a difficult trainee for example, and have participants practice strategies for engaging disinterested learners.

Foster Peer Feedback

Train peers on providing constructive feedback using the situation-behavior-impact model. Empower teams to observe each others' roleplay performances, pinpoint growth areas, and offer recommendations. Guiding each other through hands-on practices accelerates skill development.

Spark Discussions

Based on your experiences facilitating training over the years, pose open-ended questions about challenges participants may encounter when facilitating their first programs. Get the whole room engaged in an active discussion sharing thoughts and solutions. Adult learners love contributing their perspectives.

Administer Knowledge Checks

Avoid veering too far into lecture mode. Frequently test understanding by having individuals summarize concepts or apply them in sample scenarios. Keeping everyone on their toes activates their brains and deters zoning out. Gamify it by awarding points for participation.

Infuse Engagement Boosters

Take your training up a notch by infusing bonus activities that make learning more fun and active.

Incorporate Training Games

For learning games, split trainees into small teams and have them compete in review challenges testing their grasp of instructional concepts covered so far. Award silly prizes to the winning team and watch energy levels soar! Educational games add a spirit of fun competition.

Change Up the Environment

Get trainees out of the classroom for an afternoon session at a local venue conducive to group activities. A museum or park, for example, provides a fresh setting to practice facilitation skills. The environmental change re-energizes learners and inspires creative applications of techniques.

Surprise Learners

Throw participants a curve ball by changing up planned activities unexpectedly, keeping them agile. Improv exercises are great for this. Role model how trainers must adapt when faced with surprises or technical glitches during programs. These moments become memorable learning points.

Leverage Humor

Look for harmless ways to interject humor into your facilitation style. Share funny photos and cartoons that illustrate concepts in memorable ways. Funny anecdotes from your facilitation blunders also help trainees relate. Laughter lifts energy and sparks creative thinking. Just don't overdo it!

Manage Group Energy

Scan the room frequently and assess energy levels based on body language. After deep discussions or technical sessions, reset the energy with a fast-paced team activity or competition. Take mini-breaks for learners to stand, stretch, and recharge. Keeping the energy up maximizes engagement.

Equip Trainees to Succeed

Now that you're actively involved learners in the training, ensure you set them up for success in facilitating programs back on the job.

Provide Comprehensive Resources

Equip trainees with digital facilitation guides, lesson plan templates, activity instructions, and other handy resources to reference as needed. Having these assets at their fingertips builds confidence in delivering their first programs independently.

Facilitate Teach Backs

Toward the end of the program, have each trainee conduct a short teach-back session to the group on a key facilitation concept they learned. Observe their delivery and provide individualized coaching to fine-tune skills. This final test run prepares them for show time.

Share Your Ongoing Support

Offer learners your personal contact information and availability for mentoring after the training wraps up. Knowing they have an experienced trainer in their corner as they transfer skills to real programs keeps motivation high.

Encourage Peer Connections

Suggest trainees exchange contact info with fellow participants. Peers become valuable sounding boards as they begin facilitating training and encounter real-world challenges. Having a support network boosts their resilience and likelihood of success.

Let's Recap: Maximizing Learner Engagement

We've covered many techniques for igniting involvement and excitement in your next train-the-trainer course, including:

• Setting the stage through your energy, guidelines, big-picture connections, and icebreakers
• Promoting active participation via discovery exercises, roleplays, feedback, discussions, and knowledge checks
• Infusing engagement boosters like games, environmental changes, humor, and energy management
• Equipping trainees for success with resources, teach-backs, mentoring, and peer networks

By bringing these strategies together, you can facilitate truly engaging and high-impact training of new trainers. Learners will gain critical facilitation skills and confidence to deliver training excellence back on the job.

As you plan your upcoming train-the-trainer courses, consider which methods will work best for your particular trainees, culture, and learning objectives. Get creative in blending informative content with the spirit of fun!

I welcome your thoughts and ideas on what has worked for effectively engaging learners in your programs. What challenges have you encountered? Please share your experiences so we can all keep improving our skills and enriching learner outcomes.

Now go empower those new trainers! I know with the right blend of knowledge, practice, and encouragement, they will accomplish amazing things in training. The ripple effects of building talent across your organization will be invaluable