First blog

Overall, my online training/ learning experience has taught me many new things. The online training modules for both the Sexual Harassment and Frontline Customer Service (in Turkish) have allowed me to experience what it is like to learn online independently, without a teacher by my side to help and facilitate my learning. Hence learning online has familiarized me more with the use of technology. My overall thoughts about learning online to be honest is not in favor of technology and I have my reasons, which I wish to discuss.

Before I took part in online training I answered a few questions on my expectations of these courses. A few of what I expected was a user friendly system for both the courses that I completed, a clear structure where the training provided a lot of examples and scenarios. Some of these aspects were fulfilled to my expectations and others were not. The first training session I did (Sexual Harrassment), was user friendly at the beginning up until I had to do the exam based questions. The exam was a 100% must pass, where all questions had to be answered correctly in order to complete the course successfully. This frustrated me and confused me because some of the questions had more than one correct answer. After doing the exam for the seventh time I gave up and did not get 100%. Although I must say that the Frontline Customer Service training developed in Turkish was much more intriguing, as it was much more colorful, it drew my attention as it spoke to me in Turkish and provided animated scenarios for the type of questions it was going to ask me. I thought that this training module, even though I found it harder to understand because it was not my first language more effective for my learning process, as it caught my attention and explained everything in depth.

I also expected the Sexual Harassment training to relate back to Human Resources and more about the clear steps on what to do if sexual harassment occurred someone I knew or a case within the company. The only thing that was provided during the course about the steps to take about sexual harassment was to refer to the company manual. This did not teach me anything at all, and was not clear about how to facilitate sexual harassment when it does occur. I thought that the Turkish online training would have been the less effective training as I knew I was going to have language barriers but surprisingly it was the opposite. My learning experience was damaged in the process of conducting the Sexual Harassment training towards the end as it became all most impossible to get 100% in the final exam, when the information they provided was not clear and informative enough for the standard of the exam. I gave up at the end because I became frustrated, and this should be raised as a valid point… that training should be created at a standard which reflects the quality of the training and clarity of information provided to the learner.

Through many negative points of the learning process I did learn many new things. From the Sexual Harrassment training I can distinguish between bullying, discrimination and sexual harassment. Also, I have learnt a few things in the training for Frontline Customer Service, especially on how to listen actively, passively and general etiquette.  

From a learners perspective the entire learning experience was different and unique (besides the disadvantages). Even though I may not use the internet as a means to learning in the future, it allowed me to get a perspective on how people learn through technology and experience for myself the advantages and disadvantages associated with the learning experience.

Advantages for a learners using the Sexual Harassment & Frontline Customer Service:

• Convenient location anywhere, anytime
• They can either complete the training quickly or take their time
• It sometimes becomes cheaper to go online rather than have a teacher facilitating you
• Learners can search the world wide web and select any type of training they want to complete, without being certified or need pre-requisites before completing training.

Disadvantages:

• Attention span is less because you can procrastinate, as you are not communicating with a person
• When you have questions or problems, you can not ask a teacher for help
• There are no set objectives present before the learner starts their training online
• Exam based questions are not consistent with the rest of the information standard provided on the training

In conclusion, my learning style of the traditional classroom setting I believe has influenced my experience online. As I generally do not feel comfortable with using technology especially to learn new things, has caused me to become frustrated quickly while completing the courses and confused as I am not a technology “wiz”. But I am happy that I have completed two different courses that took me hours to understand and navigate through, as I have learnt new techniques online and have become more comfortable and patient while online.