“Not everyone learns the same way”: What an adaptive experience really means

Adaptive learning... it's been talked about for years, but now, with AI, the time seems right to realize this momentous promise, which propels us toward an inclusive and universal learning approach. AI is certainly an enabler for creating truly adaptive training intervention models. But the question of how and what to adapt remains.  

Models that take into account "student preferences" based on learning styles, profile data, and educational history are most popular. We ask ourselves: is it enough to adapt by providing information about the user while maintaining the content structure? What are we adapting? Individualized dialogue through adaptive teaching strategies?  

This approach is certainly essential for a whole range of training situations (e.g., compliance, new skills, onboarding, etc.). However, there's still a lot that can be done on the road to adaptability. 

Imagine two colleagues, Marco and Giulia, undergoing the same training program on negotiation techniques. Giulia has ten years of experience in direct sales—she already knows the fundamentals, but struggles with high-conflict clients. Marco is new to the role and needs to build the foundation before tackling complex cases. 

From a training perspective, what can we adapt? The examples, the explanations? It's certainly an illustrative case, but these two individuals are completely different in terms of needs and backgrounds, which an adaptive system must understand and utilize. 

From a user's perspective, adaptability isn't perceived as technology: it's perceived as relevance. It's that feeling when content truly speaks to your situation, with challenges presented at the right distance from your comfort zone, challenging yet accessible.  

This relevance is not only manifested in the educational message, it is not limited to regulating the contents, examples and pace, but offers different modes of use, regulation systems and feedback that respect individual characteristics and different cognitive styles.

The challenge The key to adaptability lies in designing relevant, manageable experiences that truly adapt to individual learning needs in terms of content and form.  

We will talk about this in our workshop at the Innovation Training Summit on 27 March (11.3012.15) dedicated to “Adaptive learning: tailored learning, comparable assessments.” 

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