DICTATED PRODUCTION

IT IS an amazing fact that, all over the world, not only in Britain, training aids for craft skills have far more often been visual appliances than audio‐appliances. This is quite illogical. A trainee acquiring craft skills must have his eyes on the work area, most of the time on the workpiece itself — and more particularly on the point of contact of tool and workpiece. To put the trainee in a training situation in which he is constantly having to shift his field of vision from the workpiece to a chart or an instruction sheet is poor practice. It requires head movements and refocusing of the eyes and these are wasteful and exhausting when continued throughout the day. It certainly interrupts concentration in so far as it requires a repeated shift of attention. And while this over‐use of the eyes is taking place the audio channel is dormant or under‐exploited. One wonders, then, why so little use has been made of the audio‐channel for recorded instruction in craft skills. It is interesting to learn that the Radio Communications Division of GEC (Electronics) Ltd of Coventry, a member of the GEC Group, has been experimenting with this new method for about four years and it has accumulated a great amount of experience already.