Micro-Learning in a nutshell

It is said that until five thousand years back, the memory of humans was so strong that they did not need to write down what they had learned! They remembered everything just by listening once. This might seem unreal as we can be totally lost without our To-Do lists now! You can blame it on the effect kali-yuga though. Our memory retention has degraded so much that we don’t even easily remember what we had for lunch the other day.

Having said that, humans have always tried to make the best of what is available. When it comes to combating low memory recall, we have developed some effective learning techniques. And among all - Micro-Learning is selling like hot cakes these days

So, what is Micro-Learning?

Micro-Learning is a type of eLearning method in which the learner is presented with short nuggets of data, not exceeding 3-5 mins at a time. It combines the advantages of eLearning along with an impactful way of feeding and retaining information. 

Benefits of Micro-Learning:

• More Engaging: Research shows that our attention span has gone down over the years. This calls for more engaging and shorter learning courses. You can now say goodbye to the long and formal training with Micro-Learning. Its rich multimedia and short format help you remain focused through the entire duration of the course

• Better knowledge retention: The Micro-Learning nuggets contain only the must-have information and are always up to the point. It is easier to go back and revise any concept quickly. Constant and quick revision in this way help us retain the knowledge well

• Lightweight: Micro-Learning is easy to produce, develop and share. Its biggest plus point is its small size, which can be easily shared phone. You can share them as text in form of regular mailers. Including multimedia content also won’t increase the size of the package too much.

• Less laborious: Of all your tasks of the day, which seem like a breeze to you? Micro-Learning is like brushing your teeth. You do it so mechanically that you don’t even realize when it has finished. Still it comes with the great benefit of keeping your teeth and gums healthy. Similarly, Micro-learning courses will take very less time and still pack a big punch

• Mobile friendly: With the advent of mobile phones, connecting to a person through a call or message anytime was a great achievement. But now the whole world is condensed in your mobile. From banking to shopping, there is an app for everything. As mentioned earlier, easy access through your mobile phone makes it a great learning tool. Micro-Learning combines this benefit with brevity

Conclusion: Micro-Learning is highly beneficial for revising concepts periodically or learning new simple concepts which do not need a long explanation at length. It can be used for most corporate and K12 trainings. But if your concept demands in-depth explanation of complex ideas, it is better to stick to traditional eLearning.

In today’s world, people prefer T20 cricket to one day matches and web-series to a three-hour long movie. Likewise, when it comes to eLearning, Micro-Learning is the hero who fights the problem of low attention spans. Do not underestimate the power of small as Micro-Learning packs a big punch!