HIT embraces technology

For Lester Biddle, HIT’s South East Regional Operational and Training Manager, technology and e-learning are absolutely critical to the future development of the company, particularly in the present financial climate.

It was about a year ago that I first became interested in how technology could be used within HIT to aid assessment and learning.  My knowledge on the subject was fairly limited, so I undertook some CPD (Continuing Personal or Professional Development) on the subject to expand my understanding and also to gain experience for existing practitioners.  

My first intention was to gain sufficient information to design a one day workshop on the subject matter.  This was completed after about 2 months and the workshop was written and ready to roll out.  I offered the workshop predominantly to Trainer Assessors and Internal Verifier's across the country.  Starting in the South East, I took the workshop and delivered in 14 locations across the country.  To date 145 of HIT's staff have attended the workshop.

The workshop focuses on various tools we use in assessment and also introduces the participants to some Web 2 technologies.  Each delegate is asked to video, edit and produce a 3 minute story about a practical subject they can demonstrate on the day.  Some have shown us their driver's checks for the safety of their vehicle, whilst others have taught us new skills, such as learning to tap dance.  Since introducing video assessment technology assessment, we now have approximately 50 Video cameras being used on a daily basis in the company.  Learner's feedback has been very encouraging, as they prefer this method of assessment and for many have found watching themselves back on screen a very beneficial development tool.

Digital Voice Recording (DVR) has become another popular method of assessment, enabling us to reach a wider audience of candidates who do not find it easy to put pen to paper, but are very happy to talk about their knowledge and understanding.  All of our Assessment team now carry a DVR and use it almost on a daily basis.

We have a few assessors using digital pens, which allow the capture of written work and converts and stores in an electronic format, making the emailing of work much more straight forward, plus the signature endorsement on the evidence is real time and current.

For the future, we are looking at setting up our own Moodle (Virtual learning Environment), to enable greater access to our learning materials and resources.  We are also starting to use SKYPE for some capture of professional discussions.  

HIT Training has started the technology journey and embraced the opportunities very well.  Moving forward, I am intending to develop and write a second workshop to build on the progresses so far and introduce the use of new equipment, such as I-pads, bloggers and web streaming.