“Surfing the Internet has become everyone’s favored solution for resolving information challenges large and small.”

There has been a shift from formal to informal learning in the corporate training landscape.  Granted, there are still topics that demand formal learning such as compliance and safety issues, but more and more learning is happening on the job, informally driven by the employee.  Employees now have a wealth of information at their fingertips with the internet, social networking sites and collaboration with peers.  Formal learning does not always allow the learner to apply the knowledge to their job immediately, thereby decreasing retention of knowledge.  Usually with informal learning the learner applies the knowledge right away (by answering a customer’s question, following a process etc.). 

Given the growth of social networking, the internet and other technologies, there has been an explosion of Personal Learning Environments (PLE).  These PLEs include both formal and informal learning and allow the learner to be in charge of the needed knowledge.  PLEs “are highly personalized portals that employ filtering technologies to recognize individual users and their preferences and provide them with highly customized experiences.”  PLEs are a perfect solution to being able to offer different content to different audiences.  For example, when addressing the training needs of the novice vs. intermediate vs. expert employee; potentially a novice needs full blown training while an expert only needs to access a performance support piece.

Given the movement from a very structured, planned training event to a more fluid model driven by the learner, Dr. Sivasailam “Thiagi” Thiagarajan has created the Four-Door Model where the “four doors” represent four different areas or components of the learning environment: 1) The Library, 2) The Playground, 3) The Café and 4) The Evaluation Center. The Library contains the content of the course or module—the information required to master the learning objectives and to successfully complete the final performance test. It typically contains pre-built or existing content, such as videos, documents, slide shows, photos, and audio files. Anything that contains meaningful content and could be put on the Web is used. Learners are invited to study the content in any way they prefer. The Playground contains fast-paced frame-games that provide practice in recalling and applying the content from the library. These games help increase fluency. The frame-games typically require the learner to type or choose short answers. Learners can play each frame game repeatedly at up to three levels of difficulty. The Café contains social learning activities. A good example is the open-question game which uses open-ended questions to encourage the learner to reflect on the content presented in the library. Learners respond to each question by typing an answer in a text box. When complete, the learner can review the answers given by experts and fellow participants. The café may also include other social-learning components such as wikis, blogs, message boards, etc. Facebook and LinkedIn groups would fall under this category. The Evaluation Center is simply the test center. It contains the performance test. Ideally, instead of using multiple-choice questions, the evaluation asks the learner to complete or participate in an actual job-related assignment.

The learner controls their learning path when instruction is a non linear experience. Allow learners to figure things out on their own and  still establish metrics for success. This flexibility allows every employee to jump into the training at their own place.  For example, a new employee versus and experienced employee has very different learning needs and would use the Four Doors very differently.