And a healthy dose of filler words!
Photo by ian dooley on Unsplash
For our third assignment for the the Provincial Instructor Diploma Program (PIDP) we were tasked with finding an article that covered some of the cognitive science around learning and offering a summary and evaluation in the form of a podcast or video.
Can you guess which one I chose?
Of course, I chose video! With my prior experience of being a famous YouTuber and worldwide influencer, it seemed only natural that I chose video.
The article I chose to review was called The Benefits of Retrieval Practice in Learning and can be found here. I'm not going to spoil my video by telling you all about it but I will tell you it doesn't
mention retrievers once! I guess this adorable photo is clickbait...
One of the pieces of feedback I received on this video was that a few filler words (ah, um, err) were noted and I should do my best to eradicate them so they do not become a habit. This is something that I'm aware of much more in my delivery when I'm training or facilitating, but it wasn't something I had noticed much in my speaking when making videos.
This could be because I was under strict instructions when it came to the length of the video, or because I was half reading from a script, but I counted 33 "er/erms"! It was actually quite painful to listen to and I was very surprised that I hit that many!
One piece of advice I offer to team members who suffer from excess filler words is to simply take a breath. Obviously, this is much easier said than done when there isn't a time restriction on your talking. So I shall have to take my own advice and slow down my speech. I might also recruit others to tally my "erms" so I can keep track of my progress.
Brief filler word segue aside, have a watch of the video and let me know your thoughts on retrieval practice!
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