Mentoring: Make a start

On-the-job training is basically showing someone how to do something on the job and then helping them until they can do it well. It is still the most common form of training anywhere, and on-the-job apprenticeships are one of the oldest forms of training.

It even includes the higher levels in academia. Medical practitioners do internships, doctoral students do fieldwork, teachers to practicums, and lawyers do articles. In fact, most professions require some kind of workplace learning for registration.

This is a good place to start teaching. It's not to hard to show someone step-by step how to do something.

This procedure explains step-by-step what to do. Use the forms provided because they will guide you through the requirements to make it as easy as possible. Your organization might require that you to use other forms as well.

In outline, the process looks like this:

Unless you are particularly experienced at this, your instructor will require you to do one or more series as practice before you are assessed.

Stage 1: Planning

You need to figure out who will be your student, what they need to learn, and what kind of person they are. I'm assuming that your student will be it as part of an organization, and some kind of accountability might be important.

First, who will be your student?

Your student needs to be someone who needs a particular skill that relates to a VET unit.

Check that you are the right person for that student. You need the right subject matter expertise and your personalities need to reasonably compatible. You may have to accept students whose personalities are not the perfect fit for you, but you should be wary of accepting a one-on-one student that clearly won't work. Besides, you should meet in an open, visible location if the student is the opposite gender.

About choosing a skill to be learned. The task must relate to a VET qualification at Certificate II level or above. This is because the mentoring unit (TAEDEL404A) requires that it simulate an apprenticeship or traineeship. If you find this difficult, use a general "how to have a job" unit such as Organise and complete daily work activities (BSBWOR202A), then use it to teach what the student particularly needs.

Second, clarify exactly what the goal will be.

The goals need to be clearly focused. Discuss them with the student and write them down. It should be written in the form of "At the end of this series, you will be able to ..." This is not as easy as it sounds, and it will probably take several drafts. Even then they might not be perfectly clear. It is quite common to adjust them later as you better understand the topic

Writing the skill as a set of steps is usually much more difficult than it looks. Try these hints:

1. Start with what you want the student to learn and why.
 
2. State each step in one simple sentence of no more than ten words. Don’t try and explain everything at this stage.
 
3. Put the steps in an order that makes sense to your student, not just to you. The steps in a "how-to" are usually in only one order.
 
4. Some steps might be only "if necessary." Your students need to check whether they need to do that step, but it might not be necessary.
 
5. You will probably have some complicated exceptions, so leave them until afterwards so your students can get the basic steps right first.
 

You will need to look though your list of steps and revise it until it is right. Even then, you won’t really know until you try it with a student. But it’s easy to cover those mistakes in a friendly one-to-one discussion.

Tip 1Start by writing a job description. Then it's often a simple matter of saying That's what you need to learn how to do. | Tip 2Ask someone to describe a competent perfomance of the skills. | Tip 3Ask what's the difference between someone who's good at it and someone who isn't?

Third, if necessary, discuss the goals with the student's supervisor.

If you are not the student’s supervisor, check that the student will get enough support and encouragement from him/her. You might also need do discuss any particular ways that tasks need to be allocated to fit training.

Fourth, identify the student's learning style.

It will help if you can identify the students learning style early. It can make the difference between success and failure for some students.

The idea of "learning style" means that students learn in very different ways. Learning styles are not related to intelligence; the styles are found in people of all intelligence levels.

Here are some of the most important:

• Visual learners want to see something, especially a diagram or picture. If asked to explain something, their natural first choice is to draw a diagram.
 
• Audio learners like sound. They find a verbal explanation very helpful, and will prefer to explain something orally.
 
• Theoretical learners like to think it through and make sure they understand it before they feel ready to do anything. Logical consistency is very important.
 
• Activist learners like to do it straight away and see what happens. They get frustrated if asked to carefully think something through before trying to do it.
 
• Reflective learners want to mull it over before taking action.
 
• Relaters feel that relating to people is most important. They look at relationships and want to learn from other people. They very interested in how people tick but aren’t very interested in abstract ideas.
 
• Kinaesthetic learners are good at physical activities such as sport and dance. They naturally want to touch the object that they are learning about.
 

Plan the student’s learning experience

The next step is to use the job description to plan the student’s learning experience. A list of ideals is not very helpful; the plan needs to be practical enough to implement. (This plan has also been called in the jargon a work-based learning pathway.)

1. Identify specific learning goals and write them down
2. Identify activities to be included in the learning process
3. Put the program into a series of steps that start with the simpler tasks and progress in increments to the more advanced.
4. Will experienced co-workers and experts give the students guidance? If so, how will they do it? Will the students feel comfortable with them?
5. Will they get enough opportunity to follow the example of experienced co-workers and experts?
6. What opportunities for practice will there be?
7. When is an appropriate time for the student to observe and talk to others at work?
8. Will the students be able to rotate between several jobs?

You will find that you need to talk to some people on some of these points, for example, managers, experienced co-workers and experts will each have a part to play. While things must be tentative at the planning stage, having people in on the planning will make the decision to implement much easier.

At this stage, you need to identify the kinds of supervision that you will need. You must normally have at least a training program supervisor and a local workplace supervisor. You will probably need a skills development mentor, and you might also need a personal mentor, depending on the industry.

As part of your planning, you must consider any contractual requirements and responsibilities that affect what you do. There may be links to WELL training (federally funded program for Workplace English Literacy and Numeracy) or external courses.

When you have worked out how the program will work, document it in a training plan. Your RTO probably uses a form or template.

About working with external providers

Does your program use an external training provider? These may provide off-the-job class work, training on equipment from an equipment supplier, online learning, conferences, seminars or workshops.

If so, contact the provider and find out who you should liaise with. Contact the person to integrate workplace training with the external component. Keep in contact to monitor the effectiveness of the arrangement.

Plan your sessions

Plan the beginning of the first session

• Explain your goals to the student.
• Tell your student how you will teach the course.
• Discuss any ground rules (e.g. how you will communicate outside meetings and how available you can be) and negotiate realistic expectations.
• Fill in the learning agreement.
• Go though the OHS rules and ensure their health and safety.
• Make a start on the steps.

Plan the rest of the sessions

First, write anything that the student needs to know to do each step.

• Don’t explain lots of things that won’t help the students do that step. It's tempting to include lots of interesting and "nice to know" stuff that the student doesn’t need, but you should leave it out.
• Do include the things that go wrong and what to do about each one.

Try this basic sequence for each session:

1. Ask how they have been going with what you taught them last time. Help them with anything they need to apply their skills better in the workplace.
2. Tell them what you are going to do today.
3. Tell them the purpose of the activity.
4. Show them how to do it in clear steps, and explain it as you go. Be clear. Answer any questions.
5. Ask them questions to see if they understand it.
6. Check that they understand it.
7. Let them try to do it, and explain what they are doing.
8. Give them a chance to practice the skill and ask questions.
9. Give them constructive feedback. Be supportive and non-judgmental.
10. Plan ways for them to get more practice between sessions.

TipKeep to a simple set of steps when teaching someone how to do something for the first time.
Only after students have first mastered the basic steps, add the special cases and exceptions to the rules.

Evaluate the plan

The next step is to evaluate your planning. Some of these criteria may be relevant:

1. Does the plan cover a broad enough range of skills?
2. Does the plan cover skills in sufficient depth?
3. Does the plan include of a range of both routine and non-routine activities?
4. Are activities appropriately sequenced?
5. Is there sufficient learning and practice time?
6. How well does the relationship between workplace learning and external provider courses work?
7. Does the program address and language, literacy and numeracy needs?

At this stage you may want to fix anything that looks like it won’t work. When you’re happy with the plan, you’re ready to go to the next step.