If you’re an instructional designer or a trainer working on a new learning event,Active Reviewing is a site you cannot miss. If you’re looking for a way to change or improve a program you‘ve done, you must check out this site.

The site’s name describes its focus. Roger Greenaway, the site’s owner, is well known in the use of reviewing strategies to enhance enjoyment and retention of training. I don’t know of any other site that’s so focused and so full of resources on this important topic.

What you’ll find
Resources, resources, and more resources on active and creative reviewing are prevalent on this niche Web site. Along the top, you’ll find links to the various sections of the site including:

  • Tips
  • Tools
  • Articles
  • Research
  • Active Reviewing and Creative Reviewing

Tips
The Tips section provides information on two free monthly ezines:

  • Active Reviewing Tips for Dynamic Experiential Learning
  • Adventure and Experiential Education SiteFinder Ezine

You can sign up for both of these ezines on the Web site. As a subscriber, you’ll find them useful and very focused on their content areas. Active Reviewing Tips provides new ideas for ways to get your learners actively involved in the learning (and reviewing) process, and SiteFinder highlights other helpful sites for trainers.

Tools
Clicking Tools brings up a huge list of practical tools for reviewing course material, evaluating training results, and more. This section is loaded with good stuff, including an article with 40 ways to do course evaluations. Don’t go there unless you have some time or are ready to place a bookmark.

Articles
Some of Greenaway’s articles will be useful in both your personal development and if you’re trying to learn more about reviewing techniques. There are six articles to choose from, three of which are available for you to download.

Research
The Research section provides a list of internal and external links along with a list of Greenaway’s research interests. Articles available for review include the research resources and summaries.

Active Reviewing and Creative Reviewing
Want more tools and specific techniques that you can apply immediately to your learning events? Check out the Active Reviewing and Creative Reviewing sections. I categorize them as a treasure trove of ideas to use directly or modify to meet your needs.

And more, to say the least
The site has more sections, navigable from both the right and left sides of the home page. These sections, primarily comprised of helpful online materials, move beyond the narrow focus of reviewing techniques to become more like a mini-portal for trainers and instructional designers.

As LearningWIRE stated in its Web site review, “Active Reviewing is well worth taking the time to work your way through the complex home page on this site. What lies behind it is a valuable source of ideas and practical tools for trainers who are particularly interested in the process of reviewing.”

Kevin’s final comments
As you can tell, I think there’s much value in this Web site. I like the focused mission of the site, which is always helpful when searching the Web. I highly recommend Active Reviewing to trainers, consultants, and instructional designers.

Personally, the site seems somewhat busy visually, and the design doesn’t completely match my tastes. The content clearly rises over my relatively small design quibbles. Bottom line: If you want to find new ways to improve retention of the skills and knowledge you teach, visit Active Reviewing today—you’ll surely get several new ideas you can implement.
If you’re responsible for reviewing training material, please visit this site and let us know what you think. Please post your comments below.

Kevin Eikenberry is president of the Discian Group , a learning consulting company in Indianapolis. If you would like to suggest other Web sites to review, please write to Kevin .