The Value of Active Peer Learning
Host: Eric Chow · Guest: Susan HayesCulleton · March 25, 2020 · Episode 29 · 62 minutes
Transcribed from the episode audio and edited for names and terms. Speaker labels are assigned automatically and can occasionally place a line with the wrong speaker; the episode itself is the record.
Eric Chow
What is up everybody? Thank you so much for tuning into episode 29 of the Eric Chow Empowers Podcast. I'm so excited to let you listen to this episode about active peer learning. Now, if you're not super familiar, I want to tell you a little bit about what peer learning is. It's involving anything involving working in groups or pairs to discuss and solve problems or ideas. It allows people to. actively engage with whatever it is they're learning and it's by definition an active method of learning rather than learning it from a book or from a presentation or from a talk. You know, even listening to this podcast is passive learning.
It's learning by getting it from a source rather than from doing it. And that's what active learning is about. And in my personal opinion, Active peer learning has fundamentally and significantly been the reason for I think my Successes and pretty much anything I've ever tried to learn. I mean genuinely I think just doing things and Discussing things and working on things with other people has been tremendous Just for for my growth and I think for a lot of other people as well whether you guys use it consciously or not, I really believe that it is through active and pure learning that you guys have learned a lot of things as well.
And that's what we're discussing in this episode. And we're talking, you know, me and my guests, we're talking a lot about this topic from a variety of different angles from sharing our own experiences with them, but also delving into some of the different strategies, issues and environments that active peer learning can be used. The person who I'm bringing on for this episode is not only an author and a speaker, but she is also the founder and CEO of Active Peers at Beck's Search. A startup out of Ireland that I have had the privilege of having a remote internship with. Susan Hayes Colatin is a business professional who utilizes the concepts of active peer learning and puts a structure behind it and puts a process behind it and she has had a lot of experience with this topic and with many other things.
So with my angle as a student and her perspective as a business woman we're tackling the concepts of active learning and peer learning for you guys and I hope that by listening to this conversation, you start to think about how you can use active peer learning in your life. So my friends, that is enough, I think for an introduction. I'm excited for you to listen to this episode.
Susan HayesCulleton
Enjoy. So hi, Eric. Thank you very much indeed for joining me here today. My name is Susan Hayes-Colleton. I am founder of Beck Search and Active Piers. And the reason that we wanted to have a conversation today is around the importance of active peer learning, which is a form of peer learning, which is how people learn from each other, but in a very active way. And before I tell you about my passion about this subject, perhaps, Eric, you could tell us a little bit about you and why you're interested in this area.
Eric Chow
Absolutely. So I'm Eric Chow. I am 18 years old and I am currently attending a Loney College in Fremont, California, United States. I think for me, the reason I'm interested in active learning and peer learning is because it's been instrumental and I would argue vital to my success in anything that I've ever done, whether it was academics or, you know, I was thinking about this earlier. When we learn to walk, we watch other people walk and then we decide to try it. We stumble, fall, get up, stumble, fall, get up. And then eventually we learn to walk. That's right there that's actively trying to learn something.
We observe other people, we pick up on something and then we start to learn it and we start to do it. And I think active learning is important to any kind of learning and not just for me, for really everyone I've observed. just in my short 18 years of life that it's been instrumental to anyone's success in any learning aspect?
Susan HayesCulleton
Well, I will tell you, first of all, I think that's really interesting. And even when you think back to peer learning, beginning from the very earliest age and stage, I think that's very true. I'll tell you my interest in this is actually from a different perspective which is as somebody that's set up a training business almost 10 years ago now and as somebody that runs and workplace programs for teenagers and a wide variety of other educational programs I see so much time wasted on passive learning which is when people are sitting back watching somebody effectively talk over a list of bullet points. Now Eric I have been guilty of that before right I have done that before too much and I have also been in an environment where I have been at the receiving end of that and after the first couple of minutes of that thinking, my God, you know, when is the coffee break?
And the thing is, people's time is really, really valuable. It really is so valuable. And yet on the other hand, we're putting them through learning in certain subjects, which is very, very passive sitting back and listening to things. And therefore, you know, it's not, it's not going in, right? The retention of that is very low. The attention towards that is very low and worst of all is that people can't wait for it to be over. Whereas instead when you introduce active learning, so when you introduce an environment where people are constantly doing things and we talk about it some examples of that throughout this conversation but when people are doing things, when they're engaging with others, then learning happens at every single step, even the small ones, even the ones that don't seem all that obvious.
So for me, the reason that I'm interested in this whole area is simply because it gives people back their time. It gives people back a sense of timelessness, a time of enjoyment, where they're not wondering what time is the coffee break, what time am I going to put it here, but also as well, they're enjoying the experience and learning more along the way. So for me, I think that, for me, that's the reason why I'm quite passionate about it. And I think it would be interesting maybe to hear from you about some occasions when you have used active peer learning in your, as you mentioned in your short 18 years, but in your schooling environment so far.
Eric Chow
Absolutely. I think for me it was kind of like two different uses, two different kinds of things. So whenever it was something math based or science based, it's a lot of problem solving. And so the way I would use active learning was I would work with my friends. I would literally get friends together and we would all work together and bounce ideas off of each other. And I usually found that, you know, one of us would know something the other didn't. So, you know, I would be explaining to them one concept and then a little bit later, they would be trying to work on it and they would, hey, is this right?
I would be, yes. And then next thing, you know, I'm asking the question. And then a little bit later, none of us know what we're doing and we're just like trying to figure it out together. And it's bouncing ideas off of each other. And it's, it's combining all of our ideas together and trying to work it through. And, you know, math and science is a lot of problem solving. And so that's what That's the kind of approach that I often took. And it was extremely informal. Of course, there wasn't really a process to it, but that's how we did it. And then I think the other thing is discussions.
You know, when it's not like a problem solving kind of situation, we're talking about an idea, for example, in an English class, we read a text and we're talking about something. It would always, I found that everyone, the best ideas that came out of those conversations were always when... someone decided to bounce off of somebody else. Like if I tried, if anyone tried in the classroom to raise their hand and say something, and they were the first one to talk about it, it was like an okay, interesting kind of idea. But anytime somebody went, hey, that's actually really interesting. What about, and then they bounced off of it?
Those were the ideas everyone in the room goes, whoa, wait, that's really smart. I always found that bouncing ideas off of each other in those kinds of discussions were the best way to come up with the best ideas really. So I think...
Susan HayesCulleton
When you say that it was extremely informal, did you find that that worked or did you find that some formality would have helped the process or was informality just where it needed to be?
Eric Chow
I think informality in those situations was where it needed to be, but obviously for my specific context that's where it needed to be. I imagine in a lot of other situations that... having a form, having some formality, having a process to that learning process would be incredibly important and in fact beneficial, which is why I like what you do because I know that in those situations having a process for it, having a little bit of formality for it is important in my particular context and those examples I've given not so much.
Susan HayesCulleton
Okay. Well, let me give you an example then of where I would add a little bit of structure to something. And the difference I think between the word that you inhabit, which is going to university, doing your classes, learning from each other in those types of environments, is the output is generally an exam, an assignment, or it is a demonstration that you have a piece of knowledge for somebody else to decide whether it is sufficient or not. In the world that I inhabit, and there's a couple of those, one is where we might be training people how to move into uncharky territory. That could be people returning to work, it could be people who are setting up businesses, it could be people who are very proficient in their area of expertise, but want to supplement their area of expertise with the new domain.
So, for example, we run finance for lawyers, for example, where lawyers don't necessarily study finance, they don't have to. So that's what I mean by going into a new area of expertise. And I tell you one of the challenges that comes with what I just told you is confidence, which is, am I able for this? And when I talk about uncharted territory, people will question not just whether they're able to go into this new environment, but can they? Do they belong there? And maybe they're under qualified, maybe they're two-old, maybe they're whatever. So I'll give you one example of an active peer learning strategy that I use and that is peer to peer interviews.
And the reason I do that is if we take people, let's say who are returning to work or let's say young people, I mentioned that we run workplace programs for teenagers. And the reason I do that to set up a peer to peer interview is to demystify what it's like to sit on the other side of an interview table. I don't know, have you gone from any interviews, Eric? I have. Okay, so, and tell me what do you think of the conception that's out there that interviews are designed really to trip people up?
Eric Chow
I think it largely depends on the person interviewing you. So for example, I remember my first interview, I was nervous. I thought it was going to be real professional. But no, the guy was really relaxed with me and we had a decent conversation and it went well. Other interviews are definitely going to be more... formalized, but I do think that there's a lot of misconceptions people are always trying to, oh, you know, they're trying to trick me, so therefore I have to give them the best answers possible rather than giving an honest answer, for example, would be some kind of thought, like giving them the answer that they want to hear instead of an actual answer. So yeah, they're definitely misconceptions in that regard.
Susan HayesCulleton
I'm spotting a real trend in your informality here. It seems to be something that's happening to you quite a bit, but I think that that's intentional. I would agree with you that they're trying to straighten me up or they're already looking for the bad stuff or they're trying to uncover if I'm doing X-Yers out, whereas really it's actually quite difficult to conduct an interview because you're trying to think, okay, how do I get the right information? Is this person suitable to the job? Does this person fit into the culture of the organization? do I want to work with this person? Do I like this person?
How is my rapport going? How do I come up with the next question? And all the while, you've all the other thoughts that can come into your head as well. Like, I wonder who's going to put on the dinner this evening? Is traffic going to be bad? Et cetera, et cetera. So when you actually sit on the other side of the seat, what I have found with that type of an environment is that you demystify it. And then it gives people confidence because then they say, well, actually, you know, maybe I can do this. I can go into it into an interview situation. Just say, Here's who I am.
Here's and also if they make mistakes, it's okay. It's a very safe space for them. So if they say actually I can't come up with an example of a time that I overcame a problem off the top of my head, it's a safe place to come up with that and to overcome that. So I find myself that one of the key reasons that I like active peer learning is that you can achieve more than a learning output. You can achieve a sense of let's say building, building somebody's confidence. Can I also ask you though, in your case, in your experience of this, Do you think active peer learning helps people with their interpersonal skills, getting on with people, communicating, you know, et cetera?
Eric Chow
How have you found that in your experience? Of course it helps that because the very concept of peer learning requires the ability to communicate. It requires, hey, this is what I know and this is what I don't know. This is why I'm confused. And it's always like bouncing back questions back, bouncing ideas back. You have to be able to express yourself and listen to the other person and see, okay, this is what they're saying. You have to try and understand what they're saying. And depending on the kind of situation that you're in, it might be you and me have talked about roleplay in the past.
We're trying to embody a different character. So it's always learning about a different perspective. and trying to understand a different perspective and that requires communication. So absolutely it's important to have interpersonal skills and to build interpersonal skills through peer learning.
Susan HayesCulleton
Well, I, by the way, I wholeheartedly agree is that active peer learning helps people to, you know, to learn a lot about themselves and about other people, whether it is delegation, leadership, and whole, I know, let's really think about what we're being asked here or even refining down the knowledge gap. or the data deficit that they have. I really do think it does, but I will tell you from experience, the one challenge that people have around this area of active peer learning is the preparation, is this going to take like, you know, do I have to get stuff ready and do I have to download tools and all this sort of thing.
So I just wanted to mention this idea to you. So one day I was walking in the rain and I was walking from my house to a cafe and it started to rain and then I thought of The biblical story of Noah's Ark, which is that the animals went into the Ark two by two. And that day, I had also come across this great tune where you could do really interactive quizzes and there would be all sorts of things happening on the screen and look great. But I would have had to come up with all the questions for the quizzes and I thought, I'm not really sure that the return on investment was going to be there.
And then I thought, hmm, how about this idea? Here is where I have two doors coming into my room, coming into my train. And what about if I put everybody outside? And then as they walked in, then they would be paired up, you know, two by two, right? And then let's say I'm paired with you. Then I gave them the task which is to write down five questions that they knew the answer to. So to fit it right down the five questions and the five answers, but then turn to the partner and say, right, Eric, what is this? Discuss that to find that, you know, whatever it was.
And then they had to also note how you got on, right? So did you know them? Did you struggle? Et cetera, et cetera. Then what I asked them to was go find somebody else in the room. Find someone else's room. I actually don't have a work before and I go over and do the same with you. And after that then I had created a Google form. And what I asked people to do was to send in the five questions that they had, five questions that they had, the five answers that they knew, and then the five reactions, the two reactions for each question. Now what I got from that was 320 questions appeared magically on a Google show to me.
And then what I did was over a webinar because the next session I had was a webinar was I corrected them all, right? Because the problem with if you feel you know something and that's incorrect, you're not going to go and relearn it again. Because you know it. Like if I said to you, Eric, how do you edit a podcast? You're not going to go because I know you can do that really well. You're not going to go under YouTube and find better ways. You're just going to do it because you just know. And that's really expensive to learn in an assessment. Then when you write down the correct answer, but it's not correct because you've had a false assumption.
So in my mind, right, what this enabled me to do was generate the data that I was going to use for subsequent quizzes, but enabled such rich learning to take place along the way. I found a very random mechanism through the two doors in order to connect people together. It allowed me to correct incorrect assumptions. And then it also generated a huge study aid for everybody else. So in my opinion, one of the barriers to active peer learning that people have is the preparation. Whereas I think What is so much better to do is to actually engage people in the process of developing them. Is to engage people in the entire process of actually, of them generating the peer learning on the road.
Because that to me is actually a huge part of the learning process. It's not just about the outputs or the amount of them and it's not just about the inputs. and the lesser amount of them. Instead, it's about putting the process together and helping people to learn throughout that process along the way. I 100% agree.
Eric Chow
I think that it's great if you get all these great ideas from it, but it's also like, how does this person think and how are they figuring this out? I love it. I think it's, you know, when I think about like my situations where I don't know something and everybody else I'm in a group with also don't know something and We're all we're just trying to all figure it out together. I find that it was never about did we actually get the answer or not because sometimes you know we didn't get the answer We were just like email somebody like hey teacher Can you help us because none of us get it?
Sometimes we would resort to that but it was the process of trying to think through it and and bounce ideas off of each other and figure it out I think that process of learning and problem-solving was tremendous to our ability in the future to look at a problem on our own and say, hey, I know how to do this now because I know how to think this through. So I 100% agree it's like not the input or the output, it's the process of the learning, it's the ability to work through a problem that's so much more beneficial and important than...
Susan HayesCulleton
What I was going to say there is here is where the focus on exams... you know, it distorts us and I don't blame teachers. I don't blame educators who have to focus on the output of the time. I don't blame them because that is the way the system is set up. But what I'm saying is that my, in my job, right, my role at the top of the room are my role in cultivating an environment where people can learn in the best way possible or where I can design a program to facilitate the learning that happens or where we also do some education consultancy. My job is not necessarily on Can we prove that everybody learned x y and z?
My job is to consider what entire learning happens throughout so for example do people learn more about themselves do people Know more about their interpersonal intelligence like I mentioned do people know more do they actually know more things at the end of the day? But and an awful lot of that is about getting things wrong and learning from a failure is a brilliant teacher So actually hundred percent garment it is so crazy if I was actually you know what fail guys That's okay. But the premium I'm putting on this is that you actually don't short cut the process to get the right answer because that is failure.
That's not working here. And so that certainly has been my experience. But I would also be interested, Eric, what barriers do you think people have in whatever parts of the education space to active peer learning? As I say, in my case, I have found and I've experienced it myself artificially. is that it's the amount of preparation that can go into it. Whereas, you know, I changed my mind on that. And there's really good creative ways you can do that.
Eric Chow
What do you think are the barriers to active peer learning in this space? I think one big thing is people are afraid of how everyone else will react. So it might be, oh, why are we doing this? Like, why would I? I don't want to participate in this thing. And they might have some sort of animosity towards that. And pure learning. doesn't work very well if people aren't participating because that's kind of how it works on. So I think that's a big thing, figuring out how to deal with that animosity or that hesitation that people have. Another reason might be the person who's in charge and at the head of the room, I guess.
wants to teach. They feel like, hey, I know this stuff. Why don't I just teach everyone everything? And they'll be good to go. We'll save a lot of time that way. And it makes sense logically in their head, but they don't realize that the actual learning happens because they're thinking about it, because they're working through it, because that's what's happening. And that's what happens because of active learning. And so. it makes sense for the head of the room like, hey, why don't I just teach all of this? It makes sense to me. I know everything. I can figure I can cram all this in half an hour instead of spending an hour on an active learning method. But that's where the actual learning happens. So I think that's another reason.
Susan HayesCulleton
I mean, what do you think are some of the other barriers? And I think another barrier is the feeling that this could go wrong and this. you know, but I mean, isn't that always a barrier when you're going to be creative? Like, okay, what if this goes wrong? So I give you an example of time to go wrong for me. And I'm also going to talk to you about this, first of all, in the very real context, but also in just showing you how little impact this growing wrong had, right? So what I did was that we do a lot of webinars and based on what's going on at the moment, I think we're going to be doing a lot more.
So therefore, we, when you're delivering a webinar, you have got the competition of social media, email, the entire internet, you know, you're really, you're up against it, right? When someone is sitting in front of you, they're not going to open up their laptop and Google something at the same time because, you know, out of politeness, they won't do that. You haven't got the same restrictions when you're on a laptop. So, yeah, rather than fight that, I embrace that. And I say, okay, what tools are available on the entire internet?
Eric Chow
So, I created a Google flight. And I was basically splitting people into breakout rooms and then they had to work on this Google side together, right? And I'm not brilliant for collaboration. However, I made the mistake of actually giving them all a link to the site, but then they needed permission to edit it instead of simply changing it. So they had viewing access and editing it, exactly, right? And I was like, oh, because I had sent them all off and all excitement and told them all not to do. So... Anyway, I realized this so then I went into the breakout rooms and I realized this so then I quickly went off, changed all the accesses, brought everybody back into the room, so sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.
Now I'm going to do all that again. This time I'm going to give you different links and yes, it was a bit inconvenient to people like, oh God, why was this right? But the thing is, is that then as soon as they got into the activity, they were off. So... Okay, there was no learning in that for anybody except me, right? Let's be clear about this. But imagine that I had been standing at the top of the room and that I had explained something inefficiently and everybody nodded and smiled out of awkwardness and then nobody learned from that time or whatever. The point I'm making is creativity is by its nature, creative, and the person who has the stature to stand at the top of the room or to stand digitally at the top of a room and lead at a discussion or lead in activity Like you have to be able to think in your feet and if it goes wrong it goes wrong But you know what an awful lot can go wrong by by just not things By not being creative at all.
I listened to a podcast last week And I heard a great saying and that is if you don't risk anything you risk everything and that's you know And you do you do unless you're actually going to try different things out And I've also said to people on occasion said look I haven't done this particular activity before So first of all, I'm interested in trying this out with you. And also say why I think you're a particularly interesting group or you're a particularly adventurous group or I think to be right for you. Secondly, I'm interested for you to tell me, analyze this activity. Tell me, what do you think is it useful, is it not?
What can we do better? What can we not? And then we enrich that or anything. But in addition, there's also a sense that, oh, let's try, let's all try and try this out together. So I would say, worries are on creativity as well can be another one. But could you maybe describe for us Eric, what is a typical US learning environment? I mean in a university, as you mentioned, you're in Alone College in Fremont, which is very close to San Francisco and California. How would you describe typify for us the learning environment in the US? How could you describe that to us? Certainly, before I answer that question, I was also thinking as you were sharing that example.
When I was saying earlier that like the head of the room wants to share their knowledge with people instead of having them actively participate, I thought of, well, if you do an active learning and you try to have and you have to problem solve those kinds of situations that you were describing, doesn't that also make it fun for the head of the room? Instead of just teaching what you already know, which can get pretty boring, I imagine, especially for a teacher who teaches like the same subject for like five classes in a day or something, like it's boring. But if you're doing an active learning method, that becomes fun for the head of the room too. So that's just something I guess that I noticed and I thought about it just makes a difference.
Susan HayesCulleton
I think fun is hugely important. By the way, I think serious fun, as in fun with the purpose, I think is hugely hugely important. And I think we've lost a lot of that. And particularly, I deliver a lot of training in finance and it can be quite high level or as you know, and if it's in economics, particularly as of what's happened over the past 10 days. And by the way, like this COVID-19 didn't start in the past 10 days, it just crossed into Western societies in the past 10 days. This has been in China since the end of last year. You can be dealing with very, very serious, heavy, weighty, hmm, type of subjects and incorporating serious fun into that and narrative and tension and excitement and dynamism.
People don't expect to, expect to dry death by power point loads of olive oil get me there, you know? Fun is so important, so important. So. It makes the learning process. I just wanted to comment on your account. So yes, yes, a US learning environment.
Eric Chow
Tell us about it. Yeah, I think one of the things that I like is with our, my experience has been that teachers will always teach differently, which I kind of like. It allows them to put in their own personality and their own strategies. But I do think, and this is why I love what we're doing here, I love having a little bit of a process. Like I don't, you know, I wouldn't want like all my teachers to teach the same way. That would bore me to death, regardless of how fun the activity might be that would bore me to death. But having processes that they know they have access to, like, hey, I can do all of these different things, which one do I want to do today?
Okay, I'll do this one. Having some processes I think would be good, but you know some some classes are Pure lecture somebody goes to the front of the room and starts talking. There's not even slides I just like They're just talking and I just look at a piece of paper and the right notes. It's boring Unless there are good jokes to it and then it becomes better if I'm lucky There we go and and if I'm lucky, you know, I'll get slides that I can actually look at Most of the time, especially in college, that's kind of how it is. It's always a lecture kind of thing.
Like there are slides and then they do things. And what I like is sometimes I get to do things while they're doing things. So they're working through something and I'll be able to work on something with them. Since I'm doing online classes as well, sometimes it's purely read the book. And those I've always found to be the worst. I mean. anyone who reads textbooks for fun, that's crazy to me. So that's really boring. Some classes, it's lecture, some classes, it's reading a book. If I'm lucky, I get to do something while they're lecturing that helps me. I think that's automatically active learning right there and that helps me to understand concepts.
And then occasionally in high school we would implement discussions or group work or things like that that would always be helpful. But yeah, definitely the lecture thing is big.
Susan HayesCulleton
And it's the learning styles of teacher, sorry, the teaching styles of teachers. And just how you say that that that could bore you. Like I mean, I had some lectures and as I had some lectures directly from from people in my university where it was. You know, you hope that there would be slides because it was just maybe talking, but primarily the focus of a lecture was active, sorry, passive learning. So it sounds like my experience and your experience are broadly similar. I don't know if that's working really in universities. I'm not really sure it is. Now I know tutorials have tried to change things and like, you know, the...
the way in which universities are incorporating remote internships, which is how I met you and a range of other different things like that, I think are going to be helpful, but I think that's a 1% like that is that is small. In order to bring people from here is a theoretical degree and that's by the way that's what it is no matter how life like you make it it's still theoretical. Okay, off you go, boom. And I give you an example of this is This morning I was actually, and I was used to being Munich in Germany on Tuesday to give a guest lecture and I wasn't obviously because of what's going on.
So I delivered it here via Zoom and the assignment was given to a group of students where project management students and they had to come up with how to make and deliver a conference, right? So they brought me in to explain my experience of working with like thousands of conferences, both as an attendee and as a deliverer, et cetera. Like I was talking about things like stakeholders and of course everyone in that course that I already did on the stakeholder analysis but I said, well what about the people who aren't in the room? What about people on social media? You need to create a formal fear of missing out.
You need to create a really, really active hashtag. You need to create an experiment where people want to pre-set the ticks for next year. I also spoke about, for example, the thinking about who in the room is already aligned with the objectives of somebody else with the view to bring together an organic sponsorship package. And then I was talking about like, okay, what would you have done in March, April, May, June? And all of this was very, very practical. And actually, you know, funnily enough, the lecturer said stop at this stage. He said stop, Susan. You were giving them everything in their assignment. They don't have to think anymore.
But, you know, he was right and I did stop. But the point I'm making is that that engagement actually, between that college, it was called Globe College in Munich. and me was saying right here we've got the theory let's bring in someone who's done the practice and let's see let's hear from her now not it was what i mean is we i had a very captive audience because they were doing an assignment but this was top of their heads so i thought that that was actually that was an example you could say of active learning because we had this interactive discussion where I was really putting in place things and as you would recognize Eric and I was telling them about the impact of using Slack as a communication tool and all that sort of thing.
So that's how we interact. But I think that universities need to really reconsider this whole passive lecture. I'm going to pour knowledge in my head over into your head and then I'm going to ask you how much of that you know and off we go and then hopefully you'll be in my own. I'm not really sure. the audiences engage, but I'm also not sure the lecturers are engaged and that's what I think is different.
Eric Chow
And I think- I agree with you. I agree with you. Well, thank you.
Susan HayesCulleton
But as you move forward then, as you look towards employment, et cetera, can I just ask you, how do you see your host university person development, professional development, whatever you want to call it? Do you see yourself being a lifelong learner? How do you expect to consume that? Do you think it will be like? you know, podcasts, do you think it'll be courses, do you think it'll be on the job learning, do you think it'll be everything, will it be structured, will it be not, what do you think?
Eric Chow
Fortunately for me, I think a long time ago I realized that school wasn't going to give me all the learning that I could. So I already started to many years ago figure out how I can learn on my own. So yeah, absolutely, I'm going to be a lifelong learner. I think that's important. I think there's no chance I'm 80 years old and know everything. There's no chance that's gonna happen. Especially since things change so quickly. So those always new things to learn. So yeah, I'm absolutely gonna be a lifelong learner. And I think everything you mentioned, all those different ways are great. Podcasts are gonna be great videos or courses.
I might step away from courses for a little while, because I think I've had a lot of courses. I might step. Yeah, so I might I might step away from that for a little while before getting back into it But yeah, like video podcast definitely on on the job like and and also I learned from you as I you know work in this This internship like this is this is learning as well. So opportunities like this are fantastic Books are always great. So yeah, absolutely definitely gonna be keep keep learning and in any way that I can who knows if it will be structured or not to be honest, but I think I'm definitely going to make that an important part of every day. Cool.
Susan HayesCulleton
And I mean, Eric, as we bring this conversation to a close, tell me what are your top learning tips that we could share with anybody who is joining in today?
Eric Chow
Actually, before we do that, I was actually, I wanted to ask you, you know, we've been talking a lot about academic situation. So. Obviously you've had a lot of other situations that you have applied active learning and of course you've also seen passive learning. So what are some of the other environments beyond education that you've observed this in?
Susan HayesCulleton
Sure. Okay. Well, I see, I mentioned some earlier, you know, where people are moving in charge of territory. I just, I suppose elaborate a little bit here on the unworkable teenagers because it's a big part of what we do and so we run we plan programs in our in companies or organizations where we teach them about the business right and when I say we teach them in a hugely active learning way so for example we work with PWC the global accounting firm where we bring in 30 teenagers at a time and they learn all about tax audit and consulting but they learn by doing So what I mean to read about our teenagers there is how little I suppose if I could imagine that there is like I think the order we get there's more of a concrete block over our heads which stops information seeping in because we've cynicism right and that cynicism is going to be oh I don't need to know this or that's not part of my job or and it's all right for that person they have X and that's why it doesn't apply to me there can be a lot of cynicism here right And I find with the teenager that there is nothing, right?
I think in net forms, there is nothing, right? So they just take it and run with it. And when I say, OK, guys, we're going to learn about Arctic now. And audit is about the ensuring that the accounts presented are perfect, right? They need to be completely without error. Now, I have put an error on every page in this set of accounts. I want you to find it in some of them are really easy and some of them are not. And I love seeing like seven students delve into this set of accounts and they pull them apart and it's like, you know, this great competition between them all.
And that's what I mean by that is that they're not thinking, oh, how is this relevant to my development? Or they're not, you know, they're not thinking like that. They're really, they're open-minded to it. So I love working with that age group because there's four key things that I love, for I want to teach them about themselves, around self-awareness. I want to teach them about the world of work. I want to teach them about the business of our client. and I also want them to get an understanding of the breadth of careers available in a company like PWC. Yes, it is tax audit consulting, but it is marketing and social media and recruitment and catering and management and all sorts of things.
So that's really lovely, a lovely learning environment where the output is all of those four things and we can really achieve that in a great way. Another example that I've been working a lot is people who are very, very technically competent, let's say that they've got degrees or they've masters in finance or whatever, and what I need to do is I need to bring them from there up a level in terms of taking that technical competency and applying it in the real world, but also holistically widening the application of that competence as well. So it might be, for example, to give you an easily accessible example is When you are very confident in finance, but then you're selling to people who are not What you need to be able to do is you need to be able to take whatever concept you're talking about.
Let's say it's stock market returns. Let's say it is the understanding of a pension and tax relief. Let's say it is understanding how insurance how you reinsure insurance. Let's say it's any of those things. And let's say you're dealing with somebody who was absolutely not able to do that. You need to be technically competent enough to almost reverse. So you need to know the jargon and break the jargon back down again. But you also need to say, well, why does this matter? Why does this matter to you? So you also need to be able to sell. And what I mean by sell, the reason I'm saying it in Bratacamas is you may not be selling a product, you might be selling a concept, or you may be trying to sell to somebody that you know what you're talking about.
in such a way where they trust that they don't have to know everything. And that there to, you know, technical competencies is not enough there. You need more. So that's also a different learning environment about where there is no exam, you know, there is no, okay, tick the box, you're now ready to go out into the world. You're in the world. It's how you engage with the world. That's your sales figures that matter. Now it is the depth of your conversations. Now it is your retention. Now it is your ability to potentially get promoted. And in that environment, the metrics are much more different. And you have to be very understanding.
And one thing I will also say about that is I've often worked with a client where they say, we want this, and then you go into the learning environment, and then they say, we want this. And you have to figure out, OK, how do I achieve both simultaneously and in such a way where they're aligned, even though sometimes they can be wildly different. So that is also the thing that I would have to say around. That's why we've pursued this area of education and consultancy because a lot of the time it's not just about, can I use this phone? No, I know how to use the phone, put it down.
You might also need to consider, why would people want to use the phone? Why would people not want to use the phone? Why do you want people to use the phone instead of the laptop? And what barriers do they have about using the phone? Maybe they used the phone in a previous environment and it wasn't effective or productive and now they're bringing up different problems. and their disguise as the other ones. How do you deal with all of that? And that's what education consultancy about is like, how are you actually ensuring people are upskills? And who and what and why are you doing so? And let's figure out how we could maybe fix something along the way that would really unplug and off that board.
So for me, there are learning environments everywhere. There is nowhere. there is no corner of the world where learning hand-take place, there is no interaction where you can learn. And what what I do think is that wouldn't be such a pity then if you were to waste that time learning on not enjoying it and not optimizing it and just not being happy in doing so. That would be my long answer to a short question. So thank you for asking and it's you know because we often think that education is Up until you take that until you have a cap and gown and then you then you leave university.
We often think that's it, but it's not it's not not the world that I inhabit anyway at all at all. So now back to your learning. Yes. What have you got for us?
Eric Chow
I think a couple of things that I'm thinking about, especially coming out of, you know, this conversation so far. One thing I'll definitely have to mention if when it comes to any learning The mentor of mine once taught me humility is key to any kind of learning. You have to be humble to some extent, and that goes back to the adult cynicism that you were talking about. You have to be open to the idea that you don't know everything and that you can keep learning from whoever is currently in charge. I have a belief that I can learn something from everyone. And I just happen to believe that is a 100% fact.
And so I think that's been instrumental to my ability to look at anyone and any situation and try and learn something from it. Like you said, it's a lifelong process. So I think humility is a big deal. And I think you can develop humility. I don't think that has to be like a character trait that you have to be born with or anything. So I think developing humility is definitely possible. The other thing is that I was also thinking about Sometimes I like to think in discussion. What I mean by that is I'm learning an idea or some concept or some whatever on my own, but I think about it in a way where I have to explain it to somebody else or I have to discuss it with somebody else maybe.
And I decided to start doing that because I realized, because I was a math tutor at the time, that The knowing a concept and being able to, like you said, explain the concept to somebody who doesn't know the concept is a very different level of understanding. And so I realized if I could explain this topic, I pretty much know the concept pretty well. So I started to think in discussion and think in that presentation and think in explanation. And I think that's a practice, even when I'm on my own active learning, I'm pretending I'm peer learning. but at the very least it's active. So I think that's another strategy that I've used.
And I think the last thing is have fun with it because learning should be fun. Like you said, like, why would I, if I'm going to be learning my whole life, why would I make it boring? And I might as well try and figure out how to make it fun and make the growth and the process interesting and beneficial at the same time. What do you think about that and what would you say are your three big tips for active learning?
Susan HayesCulleton
Okay, so if I go back through yours, I think the fun, yeah, I'm told totally in agreement with the fun side of things. All right, I think that that definitely needs to happen. The one about thinking is, I think that that's very interesting and I often The more I do this, the more I realize the benefit of this is actually almost taking yourself out, just like you're talking about, take yourself out of your own situation and looking back into it and seeing one of my learning from this discussion. And you know, it would be good for anybody who's listening to this conversation is not just to think about what they're taking from it, but also maybe what they're taking from the platform that we're using now or the way maybe they're listening to this in podcasts, maybe they're listening to this in video, maybe they like this idea, maybe they want to do this with somebody else as well, it's really extract, it's to look in on the subject also.
So, yeah, so I mean, you know, everything there that you said I think is really, really important and I would also be interested, Eric, as time goes on and now that you may be through these conversations as you're becoming more and more aware of learning styles. is how that will change, how your learning ideas will change. In terms of my own tree, I've actually touched on two of them already. So I just reiterate, those one is be creative. And I suppose I'm looking at this in the point of view of the person who's facilitating the learning. One is I would say be creative and don't be afraid and realize that the creation of something is learning in itself and also to involve people, rather than trying to pull something off and look.
look like, oh yeah, I do this all the time, even though you're doing it for the first time. It's tell people that you're beta testing with them and that this you're learning to and that you'd love their feedback afterwards and you feel that doing this with them is that they're able for this and that they're able to comment back and if this goes wrong, which really does anything really ever like even in my example I told you about earlier, like I fixed the links and you know. We were back in the game in two, two or three minutes. So I think being great is key.
The second thing I would say, and again, I've already said this, is let other people generate the content. But involve them rather than take out this huge amount of work saying, oh, we're one of the great quizzes and stuff like that. Let other people generate the content. Let them generate the content and learn with you. But... But quality control, you need, don't assume that what people tell you when they think their rights is right. And that is a superbly useful activity to do with students. Because when you can actually correct their false assumptions, that is so much more effective. And that will dramatically help their matters.
In my case, the time, in between two different groups, I had a group where we did, where we didn't do this one year, and then we did do it the next year. difference of 5% in the overall result. And that was because I actually gave the space to correct assumptions before they put them forward to me in assessment. So what I would say is let others generate the content. Find ways of doing that that are good and fun and useful and logistically efficient. Like I could have said, OK, everybody write down your questions and then I'll type them up. But oh my god, we would have been back to the same thing.
Google Farm, click about and Google Sheet boom. The third thing that I would say, and I haven't said this yet. is I've often seen this happen where if somebody is facilitating active peer learning, they're often as the person at the top of the room, lecturer, teacher, trainer, whatever, they're not doing anything. So let's say in the case, the nose arc activity there that I mentioned, like you're matching up two people around the room and then you're standing at the top of the room and you're not doing anything. You can sometimes feel, am I getting paid to stand around here? You're not standing around. You've facilitated the environment where there's an offload of than you standing at the top of the room constantly speaking all the time.
So what I would say is that my test, my tests were really good active peer learning is that you're standing at the top of the room and you are able to drink a cup of coffee at the same time without anybody needing you. And then you know you've cracked it because you're not involved then. You're not involved. That learning is swirling around the room and after, now of course, don't do that for all the time obviously. But the point is is that when this is actually happening, The real test, you're not doing something wrong by doing nothing. You're doing something right because then you've enabled everybody to be empowered to learn independently or independently or interdependently. That's the test. And if you can pass that test, best of luck to you.
Eric Chow
So I really enjoyed this conversation. I wish you do this again. Oh, I'm 100% agreement. I love a love some of the things that you were saying there, like especially when you were saying Hey say that I'm beta testing say that I am Testing this out and this is the right group I think that creates the right attitude in the room of we were talking about how it's important to have people want to participate When it no longer feels like the head of the room is trying to say hey, I know all this information take it and Instead hey, I'm learning at the same time I'm learning something different than you guys, but I'm learning as well So you guys are helping me out then it creates a nice a better sort of attitude coming into whatever the activity is and I think that context makes it just more likely for people to want to participate. So I love that idea and I also like what you were saying.
Susan HayesCulleton
Do you have something to say? I was only going to say is what you also do is that you build in the room for forgiveness. If that link doesn't work. you're leaving room for forgiveness. It's not, oh for God's sake, she should know exactly what she's doing. You're creating the room, say, okay, we haven't done Ivan on this before. I think this could be really cool. Let's try this out. And then you create the slack for forgiveness, which I got, fixed it up, job was done. And then they were like, wow, this was really effective. This is really good revision. And now we have everybody's questions and answers.
Yeah. So, so that's the other thing that that you do by using that language. And as you said, creating the right tone and attitude, you're also creating the slack for forgiveness. love it.
Eric Chow
And I like that other thing you said, when you're able, I love that last, the third one where you just like, if you can stand in the front of the room and drink a cup of coffee and everybody else's, there we go. I don't got coffee near me. But I guess I failed. Damn it. But, but if you're able to stand in front of the room and nobody is bothering you, I mean, I thought of just the idea, isn't it better to have everyone be able to learn rather than need you. Like it's great if you help them learn, but isn't it so much better they learn without you having to do anything? That's pretty cool I think.
Susan HayesCulleton
Yeah, and I've been in the room where let's say we're and where there was two of us, or let's say we were taking turns on our feet on a one stage. I had I run this you know this pretty complex activity, but anyway At the time through, I was there and so anyway, I was doing nothing, you know, because everyone else was, they were basically coaching each other in a certain area and the two people that I was there with, she said like, they both said to me, what do we do now? When I said you do nothing, I said you sit down, you keep quiet or else you talk to the other, would you not interrupt what's going on right now?
And they said, but like, you know, shouldn't we be doing something? And I said, we are being optimally effective right now. I have an uncle who's that's, you know, He once told me, he says, when I'm doing nothing is when I'm at a 100% capacity. And I thought like, oh my God, what sort of a job do you have? But he was right. He was absolutely right. And that's the thing is that you need to have that attitude as well at the top of the room is thinking, right, now you can't walk into a room unless, and you have to be careful in this. Sometimes you have to introduce new information to circulators.
And sometimes you're circulating things held information. So right, there's there's a difference there. But when I could at the top of the room. When I got to that point where we were now circulating previously introduced information, no, as long as I... and this is all was the test. The reason that I say the... and the reason that I'm saying it, you know, that I'm saying it, I'm not saying it tongue and cheek, I mean it. Because it's not that I've a pen in my hand, it's not that I'm supervising anything. It's that I'm literally... my hands are tied up by holding... holding the coffee and I'm literally sitting there and listening and it's so exciting to watch.
silent, sorry not silent, invisible, knowledge, move. And that's what it's saying and it's sticking. And I'll finish on this Eric, but particularly it's so cool when you see two people talking to each other. And then you see the person going, let me think, let me think. Oh, I have it. You can see they're mentally searching for the information, like they're extracting it, but pulling it out, they're articulating it. Now that's going to be much more readily available for when they're being assessed on it later. And imagine if I was to go around to do that to every one of the 30 people, how much time would you waste?
Oh my god, for the other 29. But it's still doing this. Everyone was doing this together. So certainly it's brilliant and it works and it's super helpful and it's much more enjoyable for me and for them. So yeah, I'm double thumbs up to active peer learning. So thank you so much for your time today. And certainly we will have another chat like this again soon. This is going to be available on video and on podcast and just thanks in advance to everybody who is going to watch or listen to this. Please do feel free to log on to our website at activepeers.pexsearch.com and please feel free to contact us also of course.
Both of Eric's blog posts that he's written, one is how to maximize peer learning and the other one is his first experience of peer learning are both available on the blog as well. And when we post this on YouTube, we'll put up those two links too. So Eric, thanks so much for your time. Have a wonderful day today in California and thank you again for your research, for your publications and also for being here with me today. Oh, so much fun. I love doing it. Thanks, Eric.
Eric Chow
I'll have a great day. Hey everybody, thank you so much for listening to episode 29 of the podcast. I had a lot of fun recording this conversation with Susan and I hope you guys got a lot of value out of it. You know, this is a different topic for me in terms of what I've done on the podcast, but one of the things I really value in life and pride myself on is my ability to learn and I really believe that all of us should be life long learners. And that's a question that Susan asked me and I really believe in that. We should all be lifelong learners because there's just an infinite amount of knowledge out there and it would be a shame for us to not keep going.
You know, there's this idea that if you're not growing, you're not really living. You may as well be dead. So, you know, if we're going to physically age, we might as well mentally grow as well. So that's really what something I believe in. And I think that active and pure learning is a big part of our ability to learn. I really mean it when I say I sometimes think as if I am having a conversation with someone. And I think that that has been tremendous for building my understanding of a ton of different ideas and topics and working through different ideas and topics. Sometimes if I have a random idea that I'm not sure about, it's a creative kind of.
I imagine myself having a conversation with somebody and that helps me work through this idea and build it out and then I'm able to implement it as a more built out thought process rather than just a random idea I had. or if I'm struggling with something and I don't know something, I imagine myself having a conversation with somebody and that helps me to figure out what I'm struggling with, whatever it may be. So I really believe that active and peer learning are beneficial even just in terms of me working it in my own head but also like I gave examples and I have plenty more examples that I can always give but I think you guys get the point working with others, collaborating with others, and really trying to do things rather than just think about things.
Or even in my case, when I think in my own head, I'm thinking as if I am having a conversation with someone about it. And I think that while not directly like active and peer learning, it simulates it in my brain and that's good enough. It's obviously not as good as if I had a conversation because if I'm having a conversation involving other people, I'm putting multiple brains together and that just compounds and makes it even more effective. But I feel that simulating it is already, you know, if simulating improves my abilities or my efficiency or my understanding, let's say by 1.5 times. you know, if you get into a group, that's like three times as good, you know what I mean?
So I hope this helps you. I hope that you can start to use this in whatever venture, anything you're trying to learn or figure out or think about or whatever it may be. I think that having conversations with the right people, of course, and thinking in an active and peer learning sense is going to be very beneficial for you and I really do believe that. As always you can find Susan, actually this one's a little interesting, so Susan, you can find her on Twitter in the episode description. There's also a video I've linked that Susan made a while back about what Beck's search, which is the startup that she is the founder and CEO of and also the startup that I have a remote internship with.
So you can check out the video of what Beck Search does in case you're interested. And we also had this conversation after I had written two articles, two blog posts for Beck Search and both blog posts are linked, are linked in the episode description. You can check those out. If you want to hear more about what we've talked about in this conversation. I hope you guys enjoyed it as always. You are welcome. In fact, I would love to hear you guys' thoughts on Twitter or Instagram at underscore choweric. That's at underscore CHOW on Instagram and Twitter. Let me know what you think about this episode.
Also, feel free to share the episode if you think you are gonna be able to use this stuff. And if you think that this was valuable, I'd love if you could share this all across social media and tag me so that I can express some gratitude. And that would be great. I will see you in episode 30, but until then my friends, as always, have a fantastic rest of the day.