First delivery Training of Trainers in Durban
Nine participants of Ethekwini Water and Sanitation successfully passed the exam of the first Training-of-Trainers course. The training was delivered by Agnes Maenhout and Mark van Dodeweerd of World Water Academy (WWA) as part of the Orange Knowledge Program (OKP). The reflections of the participants (superintendants and plant area managers) were enthusiastic. They all showed a very steep learning curve. Starting shy and a bit afraid standing for an audience, the participants grew in being confident and giving a good performance.
A rewarding remark of one of the participants:
‘This is the first training where I felt free to ask, to answer and to come out of my comfort zone’.
Action learning
The participants have learned to be a better trainer. Topics like the roles of a trainer, how to structure a training and different learning styles were discussed. And also they learned how to make a training interactive, by using activating teaching methods and motivating participants. Main learning objective was to give a mini training to apply the theory they have learned. Especially practicing a training was frightening for some of the participants in the beginning, but turned out to be a great and valuable experience.
The majority of the participants are familiar with lectures as the mail teaching method. Action learning and learning by doing were rather new methods. We tried to clarify that it’s of huge importance to create interaction in the lessons to activate participants. This can be done by discussions, grouptasks, presenting a case, brainstorming, and many more…
Personal growth
The personal growth of the participants in just three days was impressive. The course was assessed with a multiple choice exam and a practical assessment. We were definitely impressed with the assessments. The lectures we saw on the first day with poor interaction with the audience, were changed into enthusiastic Q&A’s and grouptasks. Just like a drivers license, the routine will come after a lot of training hours! We are confident that this group will become great trainers.
Bridging the Water is part of the Orange Knowledge Programme.
