Scenario-based learning (SBL) is an immersive training environment where learners are presented with simulated work challenges – and then based on their choices and decisions, they receive realistic feedback as they progress (and traverse) through the course.
Unlike many e-courses, where learners passively absorb information by reading a text and taking a test afterward, in scenario-based training, they actively participate in the process from the very beginning to the end of the lesson.
What Can Be Taught with Scenario-Based Learning
There are four scenarios in which students can benefit from scenario-based learning. These scenarios are:
- a decision being made at a certain point affects how things go later;
- a task (or tasks) requiring analysis and problem-solving skills;
- an event or situation with no single correct solution to the problem;
- when it’s difficult – or unsafe, to provide real-world practice.
As an example (and in a transport context) an SBL based course or training environment can provide organisations with the ability to assess students undertaking a defined sequence of events and these events may present students with potential issues or situations and individual students would need to choose or traverse these events in order to complete or satisfy the assessment process.
The primary advantage of SBL learning is that students are required to complete or respond to a series of real-life situations while in a controlled setting. This factor alone proves highly beneficial within the transport sector as there may be safety concerns as well as difficulty in placing students in all possible environments or situations.
As with standard training courses, there is a range of specific training programs that are well suited for scenario-based training.
These training programs are:
Mandatory compliance training
In any company, there may exist numerous requirements for mandatory compliance training that employees must legally or policy-wise undertake. This can possibly include training on fire safety, health and well being, removing hazardous materials, ethical issues, inclusion etc — and let’s be honest — not particularly exciting topics. At the same time, serious consequences exist for organisations whose staff have not undertaken such training.
As opposed to straightforward lectures that allow employers to simply mark employees as “compliant”, immersive scenario-based training programs places people into a realistic context where they can see the consequences of misconduct and therefore, potentially change their behaviour and workplace culture.
Communication skills training
Scenario-based learning naturally fits into interpersonal communication skills training. Branching scenarios can efficiently imitate the many decision points that a transport operator may face as well as providing a controlled setting that facilitates communications between operators, managers, users, clients and many other combinations.
A Scenario-Based Learning program with a branching scenario is very similar to a digital role-play that enables learners to apply knowledge in a realistic context and get meaningful feedback as a reaction from a virtual person.
Critical thinking skills training
There are two types of challenges at work: the routine tasks that require the same sequence of actions every time (e.g. filling out a customer profile in a CRM system or conducting a vehicle inspection) and the ones that require deeper analyses and understanding. This second type of challenge allow learners to adapt guidelines to diverse situations – e.g, navigating an aircraft through a tropical storm, communicating complex instructions with Air Traffic Control or following road rules and organisational policy when driving a heavy vehicle.
Situations such as equipment troubleshooting or finding out the reasons behind a KPI slump cannot be studied exclusively through theoretic reading and assessment using traditional quiz methods such as multiple-choice questions. Additionally, being taught and assessed using a traditional linear eLearning method will have a limited impact on real-life work decisions. In contrast, branching scenarios will assist students or employees in gaining industry-specific training that is focused not only on reaching the desired outcome but also on evaluating the situation and correct process of decision-making.
High-risk tasks training
In high risk occupations – e.g., the Military, police, pilots, aviation ground crew, heavy vehicle operators etc — the cost of a mistake can be very high. Some tasks are simply too dangerous to practice in the field, at least for the first time. Who would willingly fly with a pilot who’s going to practice a loop after only having learned it from a manual so far?
While no scenario-based eLearning program can replace the real experience, learners will be at least able to make some mistakes and learn from them in a controlled simulated environment without the risk of physical harm or other serious consequences.
When is Scenario-Based Learning not needed?
Scenario-based learning is an exciting methodology however it can be considered overkill in some cases. These cases are:
Procedural tasks
If your goal is to master a single correct sequence of actions or teach staff how to do routine step-by-step tasks, the traditional instructive approach, as well as job aids, may suffice.
One example is the correct completion of a form or report. The process of obtaining the correct form, stepping through the various fields and adequately writing detailed descriptions can be instructed using traditional, or linear, training methods. Each step can be covered with a lesson that should be learned in a specific sequence. Upon completion of the traditional training, students/employees can get the chance to practice their newly-gained skills on sample forms. The key aspect of this type of training is that there are not many options in the final result – that is, students either satisfactory complete the form or report or not. In this case, there’s no real need for a branching scenario.
Novice learners
If your learners/employees don’t have any prior knowledge or experience, their decision-making process will look more like a guessing game. Placing those learners in a simulated environment may prove to be a fun exercise, but for effective learning though, there should be a clear structure. While SBL based learning is a great flexible tool for practice, it does lack the structure that is required for basic-level training.
Putting this into a transport related context, there’s no sense in running a heavy vehicle driving simulation if a learner isn’t familiar with the basic parts of a heavy vehicle, road signs, and driving regulations.
What benefits does Scenario-Based Learning provide?
It’s engaging
Scenario-based learning is fun and interesting because it provides learners a sense of reality by immersing themselves in real work situations. At the same time, it provides a safe environment where mistakes form a part of the training process so learners don’t get discouraged by them.
It provides better retention
In scenario-based learning, students aren’t just passively absorbing information, they are encouraged to use all of their senses, and think and make decisions. All of these increase engagement, which is especially important for “dry” scenarios such as types of mandatory compliance training.
It shows cause-effect relation
Not all workplace decisions can be immediately seen as being similar to a “cut the red wire to deactivate the bomb” choice. Scenario-based training allows course designers to compress time and align actions with student decisions/choices, and in reality, those potential actions may show up at some stage in the future. As an example, learners in an SBL training program on diagnosing engine faults do not have to wait for their maintenance and installation work to be installed and finalised to find out if their original diagnosis was correct or not.
What is involved in creating a Scenario-Based Learning program?
There is more involved in creating an engaging an SBL program compared to developing traditional e-learning courseware. A successful SBL program needs a variety of skills and processes. These skills and processes include:
- the identification of a scenario (or a group or sequence of scenarios)
- storyboarding the scenario(s) (to assist in planning the structure(s) and pathways of the virtual environment)
- knowledge of game theory (to provide a scoring mechanism and pathway that realistically emulates the real world)
Identifying a scenario
Creating a good script or scenario is the most difficult part of the entire process. The scenario needs to be realistic and also be current to the operating environment. Keys aspects in identifying a scenario are:
1. Use a subject matter expert
Learners can immediately spot the courses created by an instructor who doesn’t know the specifics that they have to deal with every day. The challenge here is to make a scenario relevant and have virtual characters that sound like real people whether they are colleagues, passengers or operational personnel.
This is where subject matter experts play a pivotal role. They will fill you in on the context, share the most common mistakes, and make sure that your very wording is correct and your content doesn’t sound like a clueless course used for punishment.
2. Give characters names
Thinking about scenario characters as real people can make the whole training more effective. Treating your characters as “a common passenger” or “a generic manager” provides a “stale” or faceless environment to the student/employee. Instead, give each of your virtual characters realistic names and create the illusion that these characters are real people with real personalities.
3. Describe with actions, not adjectives
The most obvious way to reveal a situation is by describing what it looks like. Very often, it sounds unnatural, too wordy, and clumsy. Instead, course designers can make their pathway more cinematic by revealing the situation through direct speech.
This advice also applies to feedback. Even if the questions within the training program are great, generic feedback comments like “That’s right!” or “Incorrect, try again” will ruin the participation effect and lessen the realism. It is much better to show the payoff and use actual industry words – or jargon that is related to the presented environment.
4. Leave cues
Since the whole idea of scenario-based learning is based on learners using the best of their abilities to analyse situations and make decisions, course designers need to create enough cues (both helpful and distracting) so they actually have the information that they need to analyse.
When your scenario is focused on what learners have to do, you deliberately narrow the range of options you could create. Instead, try to concentrate on the reasons why the learners/employees aren’t doing what they’re expected to do. As a course designer, paying closer attention to the design of the virtual environment usually helps to generate interesting options. Designers can also provide backstory to generate emotional context which therefore allows for the creation of better and more realistic options.
5. Let your learners fail
Making mistakes and being able to safely experience different perspectives is what makes scenario-based training so exciting. To some extent, it a designer’s goal to create believable distractors and to make learners choose wrong answers to see what will happen. That’s why it always worth seeking and adding a “common mistake” option to ensure that the learners won’t do it in reality.
Storyboarding
This is an obvious process but one where many organisations fail. A movie is made from storyboards – the director basically maps out the whole movie from the script and uses these maps to construct their movie. An SBL based learning program is basically the same – but where a movie has a linear path, an SBL based program will include a multitude of pathways with each pathway representing a decision point.
These decision points and the respective follow-on activities all need to be mapped and plotted and any gaps or “holes” in the environment will need to be identified. Students in an SBL based program cannot fall into a loop or a hole as this will have detrimental effects on the learning process.
Game Theory
An SBL based e-learning program needs to provide students with a realistic “scoring” or feedback functionality. This increases engagement, keeps the program exciting and also provides a means for students in wanting to return and improve on their performance. Game theory provides this functionality.
Developers of SBL e-learning programs need to have a strong understanding in creating an environment that continually encourages students while at the same time provides a realistic feedback (and scoring) capability that is accurate and representative of the progression through the narrative.
Limitations of Scenario-Based Learning programs
A traditional online e-learning course may not require a high speed network connection in order to satisfactorily present the learning material. A multi-pathway based narrative of an SBL based program does demand a faster connection though and this is due to the higher use of media that is required to provide a realistic and “fluid” environment – and also to cater for the continuity of the training program.
SBL programs that are conducted in-house – that is, within the confines of a single physical workspace, can enjoy a virtual reality based interface to the training material. This is due to the ability of presenting the material through a higher capacity wired ethernet network. Students who are offsite, and are accessing the material remotely are limited by their physical internet connection which may not be adequate enough to manage a continuous virtual reality based environment.
Designers of SBL programs are aware of these issues and deliberately scale back the media interactions within their courses so as to allow for the students that may not have access to a high speed connection.
A further limitation of SBL programs is the inability to adequately pause and resume the narrative. Simply put, if students were able to pause the simulation, then they would lose all continuity in an environment which is meant to realistically emulate a real world experience. This would then affect the decision process for the student and therefore have an influence on the desired outcome. This limitation implies that a student traversing an SBL training component may need to set aside a larger period of time to complete the series of assessments – as opposed to one that is undertaking a traditional linear styled e-learning course (which allows for the easy pausing and resumption of reading material).
Conclusion
- Scenario-based learning (SBL) is a realistic digital training environment.
- With SBL, learners can practice communication and critical-thinking skills and safely rehearse a performance of high-risk tasks.
- The development of the action and the final outcome in an SBL training program depends purely on the learners’ choices and decisions.
- SBL might not be the best choice for novice training and mastering procedural routine tasks that don’t require any analysis.
- The relevancy of SBL strongly depends on the efficiency of collaboration between an instructional designer and SMEs.
- Making mistakes is a part of SBL. Create really good distractors.