Training Model Family

Introduction
As a Health educator a large part of your work will involve training of
people in your local community about health matters.
In health education program planning and
implementation process, training is one of the implementation tools.

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 Learning outcomes
At the end of this session you will be able to:-
1. Describe the characteristics learning/training
2. Explain principles of learning/training
3. Identify factors affecting learning/training
4. Conduct training for model families.

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1.1 What is learning?
The three key concepts words which share similar characteristics and
they are inter-dependent to each other.
Because, their common aim is the institutionalization of the theoretical
or the practical aspect of the subject matter

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Education refers to a general theoretical knowledge and this may or
may not involve learning how to do any specific practical work
(training), tasks or skills.
Learning refers to a process resulting in some modification, relatively
permanent, of the ways of thinking, feeling, and doing of the learner.
It includes both of the concepts ‘education’
and ‘training’.
.

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Training refers to a process of education in which a trainee is being
taught a particular skill and will be expected to practice it until the
required standard is reached

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1.2 characteristics Of Learning/Training/Educating
A. Learning can be unitary
The learner respond as a whole person‘ in a unified way to the whole
situation in a very simple and straightforward ways.
They respond intellectually, emotionally, physically and spiritually at
the same time.
For example, if you don‘t get bitten by a mosquito you won‘t catch
malaria

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B. Learning can be social
it takes place in response to the environment in which
there are other individuals as well as physical things
C. Learning can be a personal process (Self-active)
This principle embodies the idea that a learner learns
through their own activities, like listening, visualizing,
recalling, memorizing, reasoning, using his/her judgment
and thinking.

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D. Learning can be purposive-That means that learning is
moving toward a goal or end result.
E. Learning can be creative For each individual, learning is
not merely a summing up of previous knowledge and
experience, it is a creative putting together of all the knowledge
and experience of the learner
F. Learning can be transferable whatever is learned in one
context or situation will also apply in another context or
situation.
Example;-the knowledge about the utilization of
some (ANC) will also be applied to the utilization of other
health services as well

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Steps in learning

1. The first step is observation, (watching) very

carefully.
2. Next, they also try to use other sensing methods like
listening, touching or tasting.
3. They will start to ask ‗why?‘ ‗how?‘ when something
happens.
4. The next step is to imitate or copy the same action
saying, ‗Let me do it myself‘.

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Cont.…
5. Learning takes place by repeating the action again and again
6. Children as well as adults usually start to ask others to observe them
so they can show that they are able to do the activity they have just
learnt.
7. Perform the action for themselves, having learnt something

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1. 3 Principles of learning/training
A. Readiness
 Implies a degree of willingness and eagerness of an individual to
learn something new.
B. Exercises
Is the principle of application what the learners have been told and
shown.
Every time practice occurs, learning continues.

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Therefore, a health educator must repeat important
items of subject matter at reasonable intervals and
provide opportunities for the audience/learners to
practice while making sure that this process is directed
towards learning something new.

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C. Effect
The principle of effect is that learning is strengthened when
accompanied by a pleasant or satisfying feeling
(reinforcement)
 learning is weakened when associated with an unpleasant
feeling
 example, One of the important obligations of the
Health practitioner is to set up the learning situation in such a
manner that each person being taught will be able to see
evidence of their own progress and achieve some
degree of success

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D. Primacy the state of being first, often creates a strong impression which may
be very difficult to change.
Things learned first create a strong impression in the mind that is difficult to
erase.
Unteaching‘ or erasing from the mind incorrect first impressions is harder
than teaching them correctly in the first place.

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Cont.…

If, for example, a mother is taught a faulty technique about preparation of

replacement feeding (formula, instead of breastfeeding)

The learner‘s first experience should be positive, functional and

lay the foundation for all that is to follow.

As a health educator you should present your subject matter in a logical
order, step by step, making sure the audience has already learned and
understood the preceding step

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E. Recency
states that things most recently learned are best
remembered.
Conversely, the further a learner is removed time-wise
from a new fact or understanding, the more difficult
it is to remember.
example, it is easier for a mother to recall what children
were fed this morning than to remember what they were
fed three days ago.

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F. Intensity
states that a sharp, clear, dramatic, or exciting learning experience teaches
more than a routine or boring experience.
The principle of intensity implies that a learner will learn more from the real
thing than from a substitute.
i.e, The more immediate and dramatic the learning is to a real situation, the
more impressive the learning is upon the learner, Such as demonstrations
and role playing will do much to increase the learning
experience of your audience.
For example, a mother will learn more from demonstration of
bed net utilization which is shown to her in her own house than from
teaching her just by a talk at your Health Post

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G. Freedom
states that things freely learned are best learned.
Conversely, if the audience is
forced to learn something, the more difficult it is for
them to learn. For example, if you
force a family to construct a latrine in their compound,
they may not be interested to do thatbut, if you motivate
them to do that through proper education of the family,
they are more likely to construct the latrines and use
them properly

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1.4 Factors affecting learning/training
a. Physiological factors include
 How people feel,
 Their physical health, and
 their levels of fatigue at the time of learning,
 The quality of the food and
 drink they have consumed,
 their age, etc.
b..

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Psychological factors
 Mental ill-health or mental tension and conflict all
hamper learning. \
No learning can take place in the absence of motivation.
 In general, for motivation to take place in health education
sessions, encouragement and praise stimulate learning of
health-related skills.
You will need to encourage the people to whom you are
giving your health education messages

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c. Environmental factors—
states that learning is hampered by bad environmental conditions such as
distraction, noise, poor illumination, bad ventilation, overcrowding and
inconvenient seating arrangements.
The location (including the organizational set up) of the health education
setting, the internal set up, the accommodation, decoration and sanitary
conditions are all very important for efficient learning.
For example, if you are giving a health education session in your Health
Post, and if the room is very
overcrowded with healthy as well as sick individuals, some of them sitting
on the floor and others by the door, this would hamper the learning among
all of the attendants

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d. Teaching methodology and materials
your teaching methods and materials should be planned and organized in an
appropriate manner to address the way of life of the individual/ community.
For example, for uneducated members of the community, roleplay/drama with
posters and pictures would be appropriate methods and materials, respectively.
Whereas leaflets for example are good teaching materials for those community
members who can at least read. On the other hand, if you are teaching your
community about ITNs utilization, you need to use demonstrations.

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For example, if you want to teach a mother about proper position and attachment for
breastfeeding, it is good first to demonstrate the correct position to the mother.
You can then test whether she has learnt this correctly by asking her to demonstrate the proper
positioning and attachment back to you.
You should encourage her to practice it until she
gets it right.
This should continuously be accompanied by your comments and feedback
on her level of achievement.

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 Types of training

 Pre-service: involves the preparation in general of any trainee for qualifying

for a certain set of professional or specific job oriented roles.

 Orientation training: refers to a preparation for the specific job to be

performed in a particular position.
 In service training: It is a refresher course given with a view of updating
knowledge and skills of the workers in any department or organization

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Phases of training (arrange trainings in different phases

A. Preparation (pre-training) phase

This phase involves several activities to be carried out:
 Conducting training need assessment. This is to ask whether there is a
need gap for a certain kind of health workers to carry out some work
 Identify aims of the training program.
 State needs or problems that are expected to be solved
 Identification of the trainees. Recruiting and selecting learners is the
single most important step in any training program.

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Know who the trainees are. Their educational and training
background experiences they have with this problem, topic or
subject, their interests, and their social and cultural
background.
 Identify resources available- time, equipment, space,
trainers and teaching materials including posters, flipcharts,
leaflets…etc
 Determine the four important areas (domains) of training
going to be changed (knowledge, belief, attitude and skill)
 Determine the training methods to be used depending on
the targeted domain of learning.

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The methods include lecturing, lecture and discussions, demonstrations,
or roleplays/drama,..etc
 Arrange the logistic condition of the trainees and facilitators.
 Determine how the trainees and the program be evaluated. This
may include pre-test and post-test, feedback from the trainees at the
end, follow-up for the graduates

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b)Training phase
in the actual training phase, you need to give trainings based on the trainings
curriculum or guidelines for a model households or for any community health
development agents
 the training phase must insure the opportunities for learning by doing and also
creating necessary climate or environment in which learning can take place
effectively
.

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c) Post-training phase (follow-up component or evaluating the
training)
evaluation is a process of determining the degree or amount of success
with pre-determined training objective

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While you are evaluating your training, you should consider the following
points:
Input evaluation- examines what resources were used based on which we can
calculate the cost per graduate-efficiency.

Process evaluation- looks at what methods are used; see how trainees are
progressing, training run as per the schedule…

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 Output evaluation
Reviewing the quality and numbers of people trained to see if
they meet standards and the targets or objectives set during the
planning process.
This includes the knowledge and skill tests
 Outcome/Impact evaluation
Examines what the results or effects the graduates have
achieved in the work they are trained for.
This is performed using field assessment through observations
and surveys.

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1.5 Training model family
It is enabling and empowering selected family members
with certain healthy behaviors or with some important
health messages so that they can enable and teach the
rest of other community members.
Training model families is one of the Health
Extension practitioner‘s important strategies, and is
adapted from theories of mass communication/diffusion
of innovation

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Using criteria based on social and economic status with the
community, the Health Extension
practitioner selects individuals who are likely to be early
adopters of new behaviors.
The Health Extension practitioners train parents on health
behaviors such as hygiene and sanitation, accessing services
(e.g., early childhood immunization), family planning, infant
feeding practices, and nutrition.
The family uses these lessons to make changes to its home and
health care, and then it can graduate and become a model
family

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A Health Workers also work with communities to
communicate health messages.
He/She involve the community in different stages, from
planning to evaluation.
Also Workers rely on traditional and modern
associations to coordinate and organize the
implementation of community packages, e.g. idir,
mahber, ekub, schools, women and youth
associations.

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o The model family training package usually selects early adopters.
o Because they are considered as opinion leaders and can influence the
behavior of other community
members.
 For example, community leaders, religious leaders....etc

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Criteria to include in the trainings
a family should fulfill all or at least 50% of the criteria to be included in the
training:
a) Better access of education for the children
b) Involvement in agricultural extension package
c) Better exposure for the mass-media--good exposure for the international as
well as national information

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d) Better educational status :- at least can read and write
e) Credibility in the community:- influential or opinion leader
f) Better socio-economical status in the community
g) Willingness and eagerness to participate in health development
activities

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1.5.1 Implementation of the model family package using diffusion of
innovation theory

1. Preparation phase
1.5.1 identifying better performing households
Those family members who are active participants and those
who are models in the day today developmental activities will
be considered for the trainings.
Moreover, the training is given by a Health Extension
practitioner on all the packages, first to bring behavioral
change and then to enable model families to teach the rest of
the community members

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1.2 Pre-training phase
) Baseline survey on family size, sex, age, environmental and personal
hygiene, health status of the family through observation, water handling and
proper utilization...etc of the model family.

b) Health Extension practitioner and other kebele leaders should select and
arrange appropriate time and place of training for about 100-150
households and introduce them the overall activities
in Health Extension program and model family package
Finally receive feedbacks from the participants and come to the common
consensus or decisions

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