Employee Learning Week is next week, December 2-6, 2019.

Wait! What?! Employee Learning Week is an annual celebration advocated by the Association of Talent Development (more here). I know, I know, it’s kinda like a greeting card holiday, tucked into early December and easy to miss.

But wouldn’t it be lovely to use the event as an opportunity to celebrate with your team and focus on your own learning for a time?

Let me help you out a bit.

I’ve put together a short list of activities so you can mark the occasion by advancing your own learning as an L&D team. These activities are easy to pull off with little preparation, so you can be good to go. Most can be done with remote teams just by meeting via videoconference.

You don’t even have to be the leader of a team – just enlist some of your colleagues to get into the spirit with you. And if you’re not so inclined to use these development ideas now  – feel free to tuck them away for a more convenient time.  Enjoy!

Instant Learning Activities for the L&D Team

Trends 2020: Have the team search for prediction lists and bring the ones they find most interesting or relevant into a team discussion. To find them, search trends 2020 along with keywords such as workplace learning, L&D, training, modern learning, HR, educational technology, or future work. (Be sure to note sources as some authors may have a vested interest in highlighting specific trends.) Or check my Diigo list Trends_2020 to find recent reports I’ve saved (some may require you to enter email).  Make a plan for how you will learn more about specific projections or trends relevant to your work.

Game Day:  Spend an afternoon playing games as a team – and then taking time to explore the game structures that can be useful as templates for activities in the kinds of learning programs you design. Share these links beforehand to prime the pump for game selections and discussion about creating game-like activities: How to Design a Business Board Game,  Karl Kapp on Game Thinking, Think Like a Game Designer to Create Meaningful Learning.

Appy Hour: Pour some refreshments and break out some (healthy?) snacks. Share your favorite learning apps, podcasts, and web sites that support your learning in some way. Share other resources (books, templates, etc.) to be inclusive of those who may not imbibe apps quite so much.

Tool Time: Have the team review Jane Hart’s Top Tools for Learning. Ask each person to pick one tool that is unknown to the team and research it a bit: What are the key features? How can you use it to support learning in your context? (Note that respondents to this survey are primarily people who work in some aspect of the L&D field.) Report back to the team in a meeting.

Road Trip: Take an afternoon to visit a local museum. In addition to taking in the exhibits, take notes on how those exhibits are curated and how the museum engages visitors to make the exhibits educational. Museum educators are kindred spirits and many have honed interesting techniques to help people to learn while enjoying the collection. (Virtual field trips can work, too – check out museum web sites to select a few you think may generate some discussion. Some of my favorites are the Smithsonian and National Constitution Center.)

I hope you can find time to explore these and other activities to keep your L&D team up to date. And if you’d like support in planning out impactful team development activities for 2020, I hope you’ll reach out. Together, we can upskill your team for the challenges of the future.