Studies show that after three months, you will remember only ten percent of what you hear. If you hear it and see it, you will remember three times as much. If you hear it, see it, and experience it, you will remember up to six times as much. Interactive presentations incorporate all three modes, encouraging people to learn by doing.

In addition, some people learn best through seeing, others through hearing, and others through motion (such as note-takers). Interactive courses and presentations are able to appeal to all of these preferences.

Presentations can be designed to be leader-led or self-paced:

• In a leader-led format, the presenter provides the audio. The presentation serves to reinforce what the presenter is saying, complementing the presenter without taking over.
• A self-paced presentation is produced with a soundtrack and incorporates prompts to lead the user through the presentation.

Where needed, Duthie Associates can produce a presentation incorporating both leader-led and self-paced techniques. For instance, a leader-led course might be designed to train sales representatives how best to present a product, but a self-paced version of the course can be made available to employees unable to attend the classroom course.

A lot of training currently done in traditional classrooms is appropriate for self-paced learning. In these cases, self-paced learning customarily takes 50% less time than classroom-based training to achieve the same competency. The pace of classroom training is limited by the slowest learner in the group, whereas self-paced training can be accomplished at the learner’s own pace. Since employees are generally compensated for time spent in training, this time savings can translate into a significant reduction in costs.

Interactive courses are also completely consistent from session to session. Finally, interactive training can take advantage of simulations, interactive exercises, and other techniques that are harder to execute with traditional media.

Features of training presentations include: