With the boom in distance learning, the training profession is reinventing itself. While some fundamentals remain, such as the ability to transmit energy, capture learners' attention and respect training time, distance learning is generating new pedagogical challenges for trainers running virtual classes. 

To prepare for this, it is essential for trainer-coaches to understand the issues and constraints created by the virtual classroom format, and to adopt various techniques and postures that will enable them to make these training moments a success.

In this article, we share with you 5 preparation techniques for successful virtual class facilitation.  

If you're a trainer, these tips will be of direct use to you in running your future distance learning courses. If you're a training manager, these tips will help you train your current and future trainers.

Delivering distance training at the right time for the right energy level

The success of a distance learning course depends on the energy of the trainer-coach. As a trainer-coach, it's therefore key to know yourself well, so you can identify the moments and situations when your energy is at its highest.

• When do I have the most energy during the day?
• How many breaks do I need during the day and between virtual classes to recharge my energy?
• What are the tasks I need to avoid before leading a remote training session so as not to drain my energy tank?
• What mental and physical preparation do I need to have the right level of energy when leading a training session?
• What is MY ideal frequency for running virtual classes?

Within the community of 50 NUMA coach-trainers, we have identified a number of interesting best practices for ensuring a good energy level when running a virtual classroom: 

• Space virtual classes as far apart as possible to conserve energy
• Regularly run virtual classes to maintain a rhythm, in other words, avoid going several weeks without running a distance learning session, at the risk of losing your good habits and rhythm. 
• Condense the virtual class activities over 2 or 3 days to leave time for other professional or personal activities that will help recharge your energy.

The most important thing is to get to know yourself, to know what recharges your energy and what drains it, so that you can adapt your personal and professional organization.

Preparing your virtual classroom: getting to know your learners

Facilitating virtual classes with a small group of learners requires the trainer-coach to know each participant well, but also to manage his or her facilitation time well, in order to deliver on the promise of a short, effective and dynamic training session.

That's why preparing your virtual classroom in advance is key, so that you can really focus on the learners and the quality of your animation at the time.

Here's a methodology you can follow to prepare effectively for your future virtual classroom. You can use this method a few hours before or the day before the virtual class you'll be leading.

1. Take 2 sheets and fill them in by hand, each sheet corresponding to a category. Sheet n°1 is dedicated to animation time and sheet n°2 is dedicated to the trainees in your virtual classroom.
2. On sheet no. 1, note down the highlights of your two-hour virtual classroom: when you finish the introduction, when you need to have finished part 1, part 2, etc., when you need to separate learners into sub-rooms, etc. This is an easy-to-read roadmap that you'll have in front of you for the duration of the animation. This is an easy-to-read roadmap that you'll have in front of you throughout the animation. The purpose of this roadmap is to ensure that you have covered all parts of your virtual classroom within the allotted time. If you go over time at any point, you can annotate the document during your virtual class, indicating how many minutes you've gone over, and therefore how many minutes you'll need to save for a future part of the virtual class.
3. On sheet n°2, note down the first and last names of each participant in your virtual class. And when you start your virtual class, annotate this sheet with :

1. Trainee presence: who's there / who's not
2. Learner participation: who participated, how many times and with which keywords
3. The trainees' level of commitment: who had or didn't have their camera on, for example. Taking note of this and acting on it throughout the course will help you boost or maintain the group dynamic.

Training managers remotely: creating proximity with participants

When the virtual classroom starts, the coach-trainer's challenge is to create a close relationship with the participants from the outset: to ensure that they feel comfortable speaking up, that they have confidence in the coach-trainer's quality and ability to help them acquire new skills, that they want to participate, and that they feel considered as individuals, while at the same time being part of a collective of learners. 

To create this close bond with learners and a good group dynamic, the first 5-10 minutes are key. The coach-trainer should therefore put as much energy as possible into creating this bond. Here are 3 techniques that NUMA coach-trainers use to build rapport right from the start of a virtual class:

• Use familiarity with learners: The subject can be brought up with learners either by using an opportunity that arises, or by asking the question directly to the first participant the coach-trainer questions. 
• Suggest that participants share a personal and/or offbeat anecdote during the introductory round table at the start of the virtual class, to avoid the classic "first name, last name, position". 

• Don't wait more than 5 minutes before starting the training sequence, to avoid creating a time-out from the outset and penalizing learners who arrive on time.

Beyond the first 5/10 minutes, there are practices and postures that coach-trainers can adopt to create a good group dynamic with learners:

• Use a relaxed tone: Self-deprecation and humor are good tools for lightening the mood when leading a virtual class. But be careful not to overdo it, or you'll lose your credibility. 

• Reiterate that there are no rules in team management: use it as a pedagogical tool to make learners feel more at ease when you ask them to share their experience or answer a quiz, for example. 
• Use real-life teaching methods, based on anecdotes and examples from professional experience, which you adapt to suit the group of learners, their companies and their professional challenges.
• Launch sub-group work sequences: read the case studies rather than telling participants "I'll let you read the case study" for better pedagogy, send alerts to participants about the time remaining in the sub-room, etc. The aim of this practice is not to leave your learners in the dark. On the other hand, we advise you not to be too intrusive, going so far as to visit the sub-room during the case studies. 

Energize learners to create a dynamic virtual classroom

We talked earlier about the importance of energy in the role of virtual classroom facilitator. Knowing how to recharge your energy is good. Knowing how to transmit energy to participants in a virtual class is even better. 

Empirically, at a distance, 50% of energy is lost between the limitations of non-verbal communication, the instability of connections and the impossibility of controlling the context in which each person will receive our words.

Don't be afraid to overdo it: be happy to see your guests (students, participants), welcome people who log on by quoting their names, use the camera to create a connection by asking what's the name of the cat that just passed behind Justine or where Matthieu is talking from with such a beautiful backlight.

Mark the start of the course with two sentences you've prepared, as if you were launching a radio program by announcing the day's theme. 

The question that comes up a lot in the coach-trainer community is: how do you get everyone to turn on their cameras? While it's impossible to force learners to turn on their cameras, a good practice in remote facilitation is to explain upstream to the group of learners that you'll be asking them to turn on their webcams for the sake of conviviality and to carry out exercises that require them to react to the screen. Knowing this beforehand will enable participants to choose which angle of their apartment (or virtual background) they will share in public, and avoid plunging views of a bathroom or bedroom that look like the day after a garage sale. 

Use your voice to set the pace for your distance learning course 

When you're running a virtual classroom, your voice is your most important tool. Varying intonation, pacing the speech, pausing at the right moments and using an engaging speaking style are far more important than having great lighting or a flawless hairstyle.

Your voice replaces your gaze: to make someone understand that you'd like them to intervene, you can't just suggest it with a nod of the head; you'll have to name them to pass the floor. This may seem uncomfortable at first, but it's a new role for a facilitator, and it involves rules that are more directive than implicit gestures or subtle suggestions.

Less visible, gestures still play an important role. Even if you're not fully visible, using your gestures is still the best way to pace your voice. If you can't follow yourself, you're probably too monotone. Having a clear voice from a distance is the equivalent of writing legibly on a blackboard. Having a bad sound is like using a dried-up felt-tip pen.

As you can see, the role of trainer is being reinvented with the rise of virtual classrooms. As we saw in this article, the key to successful distance learning is preparation. Whether you're talking about preparing your voice, the pace you'll set for your training or your knowledge of the participants, these different preparation techniques are important to make it an engaging and successful moment for your learners, all the more so at a distance where participants' attention can be (even) harder to capture and group dynamics more difficult to create. So systematically set aside a few minutes, or even an hour, before each virtual class to prepare for the event.

If you'd like to go further, you can download our checklist for successful distance learning, which includes tips for launching, running and closing a virtual classroom, as well as preparation tips.