Tell Show Do Review: A Useful Tool for Trainers and Instructors
My sister once worked for a Holiday Inn franchise and was sent to a management training. Her take-away was that training should encompass four processes: Tell, Show, Do, Review. It was easy to remember and years later, when I had the opportunity to teach for a Massage Therapy Certification program, I used these principles to fill out the sparse lesson plans I was given by the organization operating the school. Now, in looking at principles of Instructional Design and presentation skills, I am remembering them again and wondering if they apply as a guideline both to my goal of creating short instructional videos for my massage association colleagues and for my new work in Information Science.
Although the four processes are fairly self-explanatory, here is a brief description of what they mean to me and how they may fit in a presentation design:
Tell. This is the primary step, the introduction to the topic, the presenter and the goals and objectives for the session. As a part of the introduction, this is also the time to “hook” the audience. A good video on this is from Jason Teteak’s Youtube channel Rule the Room; https://youtu.be/dEDcc0aCjaA.
Show. To show or demonstrate is the next step. Step by step description of the process or idea that the audience is there to learn. It is important here to be clear and concise (Best Practices for Presentation Software). Keep it interesting and engaging. Audience involvement can be encouraged by asking questions and/or some type of practice exercises.
Do. Now, test the process by asking the attendees to perform the task, explain the concept or in some other way practice the skill being taught. This may seem straight forward but can be tricky. I can remember developing a carefully thought out walk through of the heart and the circulatory process only to have the class descend into complete chaos but it was fun and they did learn something! Jason Teteak also talks about Demonstrations.
Review. The review is the opportunity to recap and answer any questions. This is also an opportunity to let the participants demonstrate what they have learned. Participants might discuss or demonstrate what they thought most valuable in the presentation. Return to the goals and objectives, review the steps in the process, the skills or the concepts and ideas presented. It may be good to watch another video from Jason Teteak on answering questions.
So where does ‘Tell, Show, Do, Review’ fit in Instructional design? First, I see it as an outline for a presentation or training session, it does not replace a solid upfront design. There are several approaches to Instructional Design. Generally, they all take into account the need for evaluating the audience, having a solid goal and detailed learning objectives tailored to the audience, then creating a plan to get to those objectives. Some, like the ARCS model also look at motivation (Keller, 2013: http://www.arcsmodel.com/). The ARCS model looks at four categories:
Attention.
Relevance
Confidence
Satisfaction
Each of these the author has divided into subcategories that also help explain the concepts.
I would argue that any good presentation would include these concepts without having to tease them each out precisely and perhaps these concepts are better applied to the over all design of a comprehensive training program. In the videos and articles in this module on presentation design, knowing your audience, telling them why this presentation is important to them, then showing them why and allowing them an experience of success is a good design. Tell, Show, Do Review is an easy guideline to use and perhaps keeping a model such as ARCS in mind is useful as well.
So now I will get to work on my presentations and we will see if I am able to use these models and guidelines! Till next time. Arlene