Engaging, intentional, adult learning activities, face-to-face and virtual instructor-led, can make the difference between a session that helps learners to apply new skills or knowledge and one that falls flat. The following interactive training ideas for adults are designed to help you meet your learning objectives.
Games to Engage Adult Learners
Whether in-person or virtual, instructor-led training often includes games to make things interesting. Games are useful if they serve a goal beyond being “fun”.
Quiz Games
You are making a mistake if you believe that adult learners are not interested in games and cannot learn from games. Setting up games like a Jeopardy-inspired quiz game can make sure that your learners know your content, but they may not be able to do something with it.
When your session is online, this may be even easier than in person (learn more about Quiz Software here). Starting a game of Kahoot is much easier in a virtual meeting because everyone is at a computer already.
Newlywed-inspired Game
You don’t need to be old enough to have watched the original Newlywed Game to be able to apply this training activity for adults. A Newlywed-inspired game will help you see if learners are on the same page or to see how much they know about the work others do.
To do this training activity in a virtual training session you might have participants use the chat or breakout rooms to share their answers.
In-Person and Virtual Instructor-led Training Activity: Compare and Contrast
Facilitators can use compare and contrast training activities to engage small and large groups in distilling any number of subjects.
Venn Diagrams
The Venn Diagram is a simple diagram designed for business analysis that shows how two concepts are different and overlap. Using a Venn Diagram as an adult learning activity provides a wealth of opportunities for instructor-led training. You can engage the whole room in a very visual activity to compare and contrast. Have you tried the annotation tools in virtual platforms?
In virtual instructor-led training, you could have learners write their answers on a Venn Diagram on the screen.
Debates as a Training Activity
Conducting a debate can help adult learners explore a topic in more detail and identify both its strengths and weaknesses.
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Facilitating In-Person and Virtual Brainstorming Activities
Whether in a meeting or instructor-led training session, brainstorming activities are a constant. Creating structure and varying the type of interaction can have tremendous benefits.
Write-n-Run
Write-n-Run may feel like an activity to get elementary students engaged after lunch, but don’t sleep on this as an adult learning activity. It can generate a lot of thinking and capture it on flipcharts. This has multiple benefits, including turning the tables from instructor-led training activities to learner-led training activities.
Sticky Notes-n-Run
Sticky Notes-n-Run is a twist and have participants work individually and then do some concept grouping.
Polling
You may already use polling as an activity in your virtual instructor-led training (VILT), but have you used it during your is going to be a great option in virtual training sessions.
Most online platforms include some sort of polling function that you can set up in advance (or on the fly if needed). If they don’t, you can incorporate a free tool or do an old-fashioned show of hands. Polling your audience can help you ask open-ended questions to a large group and share the responses with the whole group.
Discussion Activities
You have most likely used discussion in your training session. We have used a variety of other discussion training activities for adults to create more engagement and keep the energy level high.
Try these alternatives discussion activities to engage your learners.
How I See It
How I See It is a great training activity for adults that works in a ton of scenarios. The key is to prepare cards with statements that lead to good discussion and maybe some disagreement. The goal is to create discussion, not to get to a right answer.
If you are delivering this in an online session, you may want to put the statements in a handout or share them in the chat.
How I See It Success Story
I could tell you stories all day about how this has been successful, but the most recent was incredibly telling. We were meeting with a client who was hesitant to adopt some of the adult learning activities that we know through research and experience are critical for training session success. We had built a How I See It activity into the training design. The subject-matter-experts (SMEs) were skeptical. I decided to try something different. We adjusted the agenda for the meeting and I delivered a How I See It right then. Instead of their content, which was highly technical, I used a How I See It activity that I had used with adult learners focused on adult learning theory!
Within 20 minutes they were sold on including adult learning activities that looked different than anything they had every done.
Without having to study Malcolm Knowles, John Dewey, Jane Vella and the rest of the adult learning experts they had bout into a new way of designing training activities for adults.
Like many of these activities, you can download a free guide with detailed instructions in our free Activity Cookbook.
Pair-Share
Using a Pair-Share learning activity for adult learners puts the onus on individual participants to share in a safe environment and can lead to increased large-group participation.
In your online training sessions this can be supercharged by using breakout rooms. They may feel intimidating but can be incredibly useful for this type of training activity.
Concentric Circles
Concentric Circles is an instructor-led training activity that gets people up and moving and facilitates diverse discussions.
Voting / Prioritizing Content in ILT
Many meetings and training sessions involve some sort of voting, be it a show of hands or voting dots. No matter what you choose, make sure it is actionable in the session.
Voting Dots Training Activity
Voting Dots are a standard way to quickly gauge experience in the workshop or priorities for learning. The benefit is that the whole class can quickly participate and the instructor can see where adult learners are on key questions.
Online Polling
Online Polling like PollEverywhere can engage learners who may already be tempted to check their phones during your session. Don’t shy away from more fun platforms like Kahoot! We’ve proven that a Kahoot! quiz can be a powerful learning activity for adults.
Show of Hands
A simple show of hands can work in a training session, but there are risks. If you ask everyone in the session to raise their hands if they agree with a statement, watch for stragglers to follow the group. It can be valuable but it also comes with the risk of group-think.
Colored Voting Cards
Picture a situation where you are about to vote in a class and you have to pick which colored voting card to use. Your learners will be less likely to fall into the trap of group-think if they are using notecards in pink, blue, and green instead of raising their hands.
Colored Voting Cards in Action
I regularly use this in my Train-the-Trainer session. I ask participants which adult learning theory will have the biggest impact on their training delivery. There isn’t a right answer per se. The goal of this training activity is to show both the instructor and the group that there is room for discussion of different persectives.
Sticky Note Ordering
Sticky Note Ordering allows participants to prioritize or organize a list of items. Instead of using sticky notes on your computer to remind you to call your parents, use them to support powerful and engaging adult learning activities.
Alternative Adult Learning Activities for Content Presentation
Alternatives to lecture, especially for virtual instructor-led training, can be intimidating when you have content that NEEDS to be shared with your learners. Consider some of these content presentation techniques to keep your learner engaged.
Storytelling
Storytelling is a way to mentally transport your audience to a different place and time. While you are still talking to the group, it is not a lecture.
Panel Discussions
Panel Discussions allow you to bring multiple expert voices into the discussion and give participants a chance to engage with different perspectives.
Gallery Walks
Gallery Walks let participants explore content posted around the room and can be useful to raise the energy level in the room. Learners digest the information at their own pace.
Video
Video is an option when there is an outside resource that is better than what can be done in the room or Zoom room.
About Endurance Learning
Endurance Learning is a full-service training development partner, specializing in elearning, instructor-led training, and train-the-trainer programs. Since 2015, our team of expert instructional designers and developers has helped professionals with deep subject matter expertise design and develop training that incorporates the interactive training ideas described above and delivers real impact to your organization. You know your content. We know learning design.
Let’s partner to build training that works!
