How many stories did you tell today? One? Two? Twenty?
How many stories did you hear? Can you remember the image you had in your mind when you heard the story? Could you envision what the characters looked like even if you’ve never met them?
Have you ever met someone and thought “Oh, that’s not what I thought she’d look like”?
We are natural storytellers. We also naturally create a mental image to go along with the stories we hear or read. Those mental images stick with us and help us remember the details of the story long term.
And that is why training through storytelling is so effective.
Tell me 10 facts and I may not remember them. Tell me 10 stories about how those facts made an impact on your life and I will remember them forever.
A great example of successful storytelling in a training context is the FISH Philosophy. Tell me it’s important to have fun at work, and I’ll roll my eyes at you. SHOW me a real story of how working in a stinky fish market can be made fun, entertaining, and improve the customer experience, and I’ll remember it for years (for me it has been 11 years to be exact).
Storytelling can be particularly effective in critical thinking training too. Some people shy away from critical thinking training because it doesn’t sound fun. It sounds academic and philosophical. It doesn’t have to be.
By starting with an engaging story of effective thinking, you can create a mental image of how critical thinking works. Learners can connect with the characters and envision how they would have handled a similar situation.
That’s what Pearson TalentLens is doing with their new half-day training program THINK Now! Learners start by reading the Now You’re Thinking! book to connect with a heartwarming, heroic story of phenomenal thinking, problem solving and decision making. Then they take the My Thinking Styles assessment so they can learn which of the 7 Powerful Thinking Styles is their natural approach to thinking.
Next, the trainer connects the story of how Marines saved the life of a 2-year old girl to the 5 Steps to New Thinking and the Thinking Styles. To create an even stronger mental connection between the critical thinking model and the real-life story described in the Now You’re Thinking! book, the trainer shows video interviews of the Marines involved in saving Amenah’s life.
Participants walk away from the training with a strong understanding of a critical thinking model AND a real life example of how the use of that model has been successful in the past. Additionally, when they recall the individual differences of each thinking style, they will remember a character from the story that embodied the characteristics of that style.
It is that meaningful connection and mental image that will reinforce the lessons learned for months and years to come. Try telling a story with a life lesson today and see how long your employees remember it. You will be amazed by the results.
How do you train critical thinking in your organization?
