Using Pinterest to Increase Your #CPLP Knowledge Exam Competence & Confidence

Leverage the latest advances in neuroscience ("brain research") to your success on the CPLP Knowledge Exam...

Most CPLP candidates need to improve their thinking to increase the effectiveness of their study prep - and ULTIMATELY! - their CPLP Knowledge Exam performance!

Reading 700+ pages of dense subject matter in a PDF file can be mind numbing - I know! - and used alone is not the most effective way to review or revisit material when preparing for a rigorous exam.

I'm sure you're familiar with one of the common symptoms -- 

Have you found yourself re-reading and re-reading and re-reading the same paragraph over and over again in the ATD Learning System - and it still doesn't "stick"?

Been there, done that. :(

The good news is  - you have options - easy ways to give your brain a break and your exam performance a boost!

According to neuroscientist John Medina, we can improve our thinking (and study practice!) through visuals, memory, repetition, exploration, and sensory integration.

Apply these principles to your CPLP Knowledge Exam success by reviewing ATD Competency Model content and CPLP study prep subject matter in vivid visual living colour on my Pinterest board dedicated solely to CPLP study preparation!

Pinterest board dedicated solely to all things CPLP

What other advice does neuroscientist John Medina give for high performance thinking - necessary for improving your CPLP Knowledge Exam results?

See the list below. :-)

12 Principles for High Performance Thinking:

1.     Survival: The human brain evolved too.
2.     Memory: Repeat to remember.
3.     Exercise: Exercise to boost brain power.
4.     Sensory Integration: Stimulate more of the senses.
5.     Sleep: Sleep well, think well.
6.     Vision: Vision trumps all other senses.
7.     Stress: Stressed brains don't learn the same way.
8.     Music: Study or listen to boost cognition.
9.     Wiring: Every brain is wired differently.
10.     Gender: Male and female brains are different.
11.     Attention: We don't pay attention to boring things.
12.     Exploration: We are powerful and natural explorers.

- List from "Brain Rules," by John Medina, PhD

As you invest your time, money & effort in preparing for the CPLP Knowledge Exam, make sure you leverage ALL the CPLP related resources you have access to, to support your CPLP exam competence & confidence!

Visit my ---- CPLP related pins on Pinterest now!

To your success!

~ trish

P.S. Need more positive brain buzz?

'Repeat to remember' using our CPLP practice tests and flash cards | Stimulate more of your senses with our online games and word puzzles | Explore attention getting activities designed for how your brain is wired --

Click here to take one of our online CPLP practice tests right now!


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~ Trish Uhl, PMP, CPLP

Founder, Owl's Ledge LLC - the CPLP Certification Experts!
Creator, CPLP Mastery Series online courses, in-country workshops, and self-directed resources at CPLPCOACH.com
Author, "Mastering the CPLP: How to Successfully Prepare for - and PASS! - the CPLP Knowledge Exam" available on Amazon . com

You're Studying Wrong | How to Fix It [CPLP Knowledge Exam]

Ever feel like you're reading the same paragraph over and over again in the ATD Learning System and none of it seems to "stick"?

Or you read a whole chapter, then quiz yourself with a CPLP practice test or flash cards, and you can't seem to recall one key concept?

You're not alone.

Many of us around the world learned how to study and take notes in a very passive way - we take notes by listening to what's being said (or what we're reading) and jot down notes on what we want to remember.

The latest research shows that taking that kind of passive, unstructured approach does not support retention or recall.

That's bad when you need both retention and recall for success on an exam...!

As friend, colleague, and scientific learning researcher extraordinaire Dr. Will Thallheimer notes:

"Realize that your learners [you!] will forget. Do everything in your power to help them [yourself!] forget as little as possible. Also, do everything in your power to help them [you!] remember in the contexts in which it is most important for them [you!] to remember [ie. you need to remember and APPLY while taking an exam]."

So - what do you do?

"Write your notes in a way where you can test your retention and understanding. Many people write notes that do a great job summarizing their materials but their notes are not designed to promote learning, retention or diagnosis of their weaknesses." - Hooman Katirai, MIT graduate (who earned a double Masters from MIT in 2006)

Active note taking helps you make meaning from what you're studying, by helping your brain organize and pay attention to the information that matters -- and jettisoning the rest.

Not sure how to take active notes?

Try the following active note-taking method from Cornell University...

Cornell Notetaking Method

Get Active! Go here to learn this method now! --- Cornell Notetaking Method

The more you can integrate what you're studying into your existing frameworks and infuse it with emotion and meaning, the better your retention.

Start with structure (like the one presented in this notetaking method) to help your brain organize concepts and identify what's important; then paraphrase what you're studying in your own words to help you establish your own meaning.

The trick is to use multiple active study methods to make the material stick! 

To your success!

~ trish


P.S. Leverage more study tips like this so -- 

YOU can MASTER the CPLP Knowledge Exam --

... by getting your  

FREE Kindle copy of my book

"Mastering the CPLP: How to Successfully Prepare for - and PASS! - the CPLP Knowledge Exam."

CLICK HERE to CLAIM YOUR KINDLE COPY NOW!

 









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~ Trish Uhl, PMP, CPLP
2005 CPLP Pilot Pioneer
Founder, Owl's Ledge
Creator, CPLP Mastery Series and CPLPCOACH.com 

SUCCESS! Mastering the CPLP: How to Successfully Prepare for - and PASS! - the #CPLP Knowledge Exam Ranked #1 (and #2!)

The Kindle version of my book... 

"Mastering the CPLP: How to Successfully Prepare for - and PASS! - the #CPLP Knowledge Exam" 

... hit #1 in the Amazon.com "Training" ...

... and #2 in the Amazon.com "Education" categories today!

Amazon.com Rankings | "Mastering the CPLP" hits #1 and #2!

A BIG SHOUT OUT and THANK YOU to the CPLP delegates around the world who made it happen!

YAY CAKE!

To your success!

~ trish

P.S. You've put in the study time, now put in the PRACTICE that builds your CPLP Knowledge Exam COMPETENCE and COMPETENCE!
 
CLICK HERE to take a practice exam right now!


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~ Trish Uhl, PMP, CPLP
2005 CPLP Pilot Pioneer
Founder, Owl's Ledge
Creator, CPLP Mastery Series and CPLPCOACH.com 

What To Do If You Fail the ATD CPLP Practice Exam (pCPLP)

Hi all -
 
Email from a panicked candidate who "failed" the ATD pCPLP prompted me to write the following response to him in email.
 
Usually candidates who don't perform as well as they'd like on the ATD pCPLP are experiencing one or both of the following issues:

1. Wrong study methods
2. Poor exam performance
3. Both
 
Here’s how you diagnose and fix them:

1. Wrong study methods – how do you know? You keep reading the same material over and over again and it doesn’t stick. It’s not sinking in. Two options: 1) try interacting with the material in a new way (e.g. instead of just reading, create a mind map, or your own flash cards, etc), and/or 2) consider your information processing and learning styles – is your best reading something? Or do you need to see it? do it? hear it? apply it? talk it out? before you really grasp something.

2. Poor exam performance – EXACTLY what it sounds like. How well do you test? Are you a speed racer, racing through reading the questions and missing keywords? Do you stop at the first “correct” answer, or do you consider all of the possible options to determine the BEST answer? Try slowing down; really read the question. Force yourself to consider ALL the responses; read from bottom to top (D to A) instead of “normal” top to bottom (A to D). It feels uncomfortable, so it slows you down.

Testing well is also often a matter of Practice, Practice, Practice in addition to studying.

Studying gives you confidence on the exam; practice improves your exam competence. 

Building confidence and competence for taking the CPLP Knowledge Exam are skills, like any other.

  
Now, consider the disconnects in the materials you’re studying with.
 
What do I mean?

First, if you have an older version of the ATD Learning System (especially the books!), you need to look at the ATD Learning System Errata page to make corrections to your materials.
Second, you also need to look at the ATD Learning System Updates page to make updates to your materials.
 
Does NOT matter how new your materials are; at minimum, your books do NOT contain the Social Learning PDF on the Updates page - and the subject matter in that PDF is tested HEAVILY on the current version of the exam.
 
Third, the end-of-chapter questions in the books do NOT reflect what the exam is like; the questions are not written in the same format as the CPLP Knowledge Exam (all multiple choice) or at the same level (book questions are largely recall; exam is mostly application).
 
What you experienced on the ATD pCPLP is more in keeping with what your CPLP Knowledge Exam experience will be like.
 
Options –
 
LOTS of candidates on LinkedIn have posted details about resources they've used and found to be effective.
 
Some have benefited from the self study materials on CPLPCOACH.com (our Basic or Premium membership) or the facilitated online courses and in-classroom, in-country.
 
Several candidates hundred have downloaded the Kindle edition of my "Mastering the CPLP: How to Successfully Prepare for - and PASS! - the CPLP Knowledge Exam" book from Amazon.com.
 
Others have done well accessing local ATD Chapter resources (which are vastly different study prep offerings than what ATD National offers).
 
There are also candidate created materials out there.
 
Like I said, first thing to do is to update your Learning System and diagnose root cause(s) to your performance gaps.
 
Last, sometimes folks get into the program and discover they are not qualified, despite meeting eligibility requirements. 

"Qualified" means the candidate has the appropriate education, experience, and exposure to the critical competencies in the ATD Competency Model.
 
Some folks simply haven't got enough "under their belts" yet to truly be ready for CPLP certification.
 
Bottom Line: Conduct your own personal performance gap analysis and be honest with yourself about the gaps - and root cause(s) - you discover. Be realistic about what you need to close them to be successful in the CPLP certification process.
 
After that, you'll be in a MUCH better position to select the appropriate solution(s) to help you be successful on the CPLP Knowledge Exam - now or in the future!
 
To your success!
 
~ trish

2014 Employee Learning Week | Day 1 - First CPLP in South Africa Wins Top Honours for Translating Learning+Performance and People Development into Business Results

CONGRATULATIONS, ALWYN! YAY CAKE!

Alwyn Klein is the first CPLP in South Africa, one of the first to achieve CPLP certification on the continent of Africa, and one of the first to hold both the Certified Professional in Learning & Performance (CPLP) and International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI) Certified Performance Technologist (CPT) - worldwide.

Alwyn is responsible for getting the first corporate team on the continent of Africa both CPT and CPLP certified, and it was his vision, drive, and leadership in working with the ATD Certification Institute - over several years - that resulted in the establishment of the first CPLP exam center in Africa.

Alwyn was recently awarded TOP honours - recognized as the Winner of the 2014 Chief Learning & Development Officer (CLDO) Award! - primarily for transforming transactional training into strategic learning & performance and for his leadership in developing his team to make the transformation happen!

(Runners up were the CLOs from KPMG SA and Coca Cola SA)

With a focus on PERFORMANCE, a plege to provide TRAINING that MATTERS, and a COMMITMENT to his team, Alwyn is definitely one of our most notable role models and learning leaders in the CPLP community.

From Left to Right: Shaun Rozyn (executive director, Corporate Education, GIBS), Alwyn Klein (senior manager, Learning and Performance, MTN, 2014 CLO winner) Dean Retief (CLO, Nedbank, 2013 CLO winner), Wilhelm Crous (managing director, Knowledge Resources)

PerformanceXpress article: http://bit.ly/KLEIN_CLDO

 
Join me in CONGRATULATING one of our own on his recent success!

++++++++++++++++++++

It's Employee Learning Week!

What's YOUR 2015 Strategic Plan for your own development and career advancement?

What kind of learning LEADER do you aspire to be?

What IMPACT do you want to have?

What CONTRIBUTIONS do you want to make?

What are YOU going to do with your CPLP?

'Tis the season to be dreaming... and planning... :-D

To YOUR SUCCESS!

~ trish 

P.S. Many in the CPLP community are not only elevating themselves, they're also LEADING and CONTRIBUTING to the learning profession.

Get the CPLP prep resources YOU need to get on the right path:

http://bit.ly/CPLP-KE

~ Trish Uhl, PMP, CPLP
CEO and Founder, Owl's Ledge LLC
Creator, CPLP Mastery Series and CPLPCOACH. com
Author, "Mastering the CPLP: How to Successfully Prepare for - and PASS! - the CPLP Knowledge Exam"

CPLP Knowledge Exam - How to Deal with Confusing Questions which Don't Count Toward Your Score

Many CPLP candidates miss the fact that there are a number of items (questions) presented on the CPLP Knowledge Exam which do not contribute to their exam scores.

In this blog post, I cover what these unscored items are, where they are, why they are, and how to deal with them.

Unscored items…

• 25-30 questions on your exam will NOT count toward your score.
• These items are included in the exam to test the items, not the candidate.
• Standard exam practice. ATD CI uses the live exam as a means of validating new items for possible inclusion in future versions of the official CPLP Knowledge Exam.
• You won’t know which items are scored and which are not scored.

This means…

• You’ll encounter poorly written questions on the exam. They will be vague (like Q3) and could be unsettling.
• Expect them and prepare yourself for them.

Here's a good example of a vague question, sent to us by a CPLP candidate in China: 

Enter your response in the Comments below! What do you think is the correct answer?

  
How to deal with them?

• Come up with a plan for how you will emotionally and mentally deal with them when you see them.
• You don’t want to let them inhibit your exam performance by a) prompting an emotional reaction that gets you upset, and/or b) spending too much time on them.
• Prep your strategy ahead of time.
• For example, think the following through BEFORE your exam: When I encounter a vague question, I will… [take a deep breath, spend no more than 60 seconds on it, answer it and Mark for Review, etc].
• Think triage. I often coach candidates to emotionally dismiss confusing questions by smiling or laughing at them – and hurrying past them.

Bottom Line: Treat all confusing questions as if they are certainly unscored and move on. This will protect you emotionally and mentally and prevent you from diminishing your performance on the rest of the exam.

From my family to yours during this festive season - THANK YOU for reading!

Happy Thanksgiving!

To your success!

~ trish

~ Trish Uhl, PMP, CPLP
2005 CPLP Pilot Pioneer
CEO and Founder Owl's Ledge
Creator, CPLP Mastery Series and CPLPCOACH.com

P.S. You've put in the study time, now put in the PRACTICE that builds your CPLP Knowledge Exam COMPETENCE and COMPETENCE!

Take an absolutely free practice exam right now:

http://www.cplpcoach.com/public/146.cfm

How Did They Do It? CPLP Candidates ROCK! Exam Results from Earlier THIS Week

CPLP Practice Test

YES, it's possible to pass the CPLP Knowledge Exam...

...if you follow THIS simple plan:

Make sure you PRACTICE answering exam questions!

1. REMEMBER! CPLP Knowledge Exam is NOT about your day job.
2. To pass the CPLP exam, you MUST be able to translate your experience - what you know and what can do - into performing well on an application-level, computerized, multiple choice exam.
3. This is NOT the same as performing as a learning professional every day on-the-job at work.
4. Taking an exam is a practiced skill.
5. Most candidates find the CPLP Knowledge Exam to be unlike any they've experienced before - because it goes beyond "memorize content, then test" approach we learned at school.
   
6. Exam prep means PRACTICE, and practice means building COMPETENCE and CONFIDENCE by answering multiple choice questions similar to the ones you'll face on the computerized exam.
7. Use the ATD Practice Exam (pCPLP)* to start.
8. BUT - don't stop there! Either leverage additional practice questions from various resources**.

* Don't make these candidate MISTAKES when using the ATD Practice Exam (pCPLP):

• ASTD Practice Exam (pCPLP) questions are representative of question the official exam, but they are NOT the exam.
• Candidates will NOT see the pCPLP questions on the exam.
• pCPLP questions were RETIRED and REMOVED from the CPLP Knowledge Exam.
• pCPLP questions are used by ATD CI as examples only, but they are NOT the test.
• pCPLP is NOT scored the same as the actual CPLP Knowledge Exam.
• Take your pCPLP score as a general indication of how well you're performing on questions in a particular AOE, but NOT as an indication of CPLP Knowledge Exam success.
• pCPLP questions are static, meaning, every time you take it, you get the same 100 questions in the exact same order.
• pCPLP does not randomize questions or answer choices; it's the same every time.

** Where can you get practice questions...written like what you'll experience on the CPLP Knowledge Exam?

Not from ASTD / ATD.

ASTD / ATD no longer sells flashcards or the practice questions CD.

ATD discontinued those study prep support tools...

...when they overhauled the ASTD Competency Model last year (2013)...

...and updated all of the exam content.

If you're part of an ASTD / ATD chapter study group, they often provide practice questions.

There's also benefit to writing your own questions and creating your own flashcards.

Otherwise, candidates interested in immediate access to online, computerized practice exams, flashcards, and other resources can find free and fee based ones here:

TAKE a PRACTICE EXAM NOW


These are the same resources candidates leveraged to their success earlier THIS week:

"Wow! I am SO RELIEVED! I passed the CPLP Knowledge Exam. While the exam is what I expected it to be, it was not easy. The test required me to know competencies and respond to real-life application questions. Despite the difficulty, I felt prepared for the exam because I studied consistently and determinedly using the materials available on CPLPCOACH.com. The products and services offered by Owl's Ledge are wonderful, and I know I could not have passed the Knowledge Exam without them." -- Cheryle in the USA | PASSED! Sept 15

Not just American candidates, but delegates overseas are having great SUCCESS too:

"I am pleased to share with you that I have passed the CPLP Knowledge Exam. I think the CPLPCOACH.com products are excellent. The games and flashcards proved very beneficial. Thank you for your continuous support throughout this process. Owl's Ledge is doing an awesome job." -- Shaikh Abdul Qayyum in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia | PASSED! Sept 15

TAKE a PRACTICE EXAM NOW


Regardless of what YOU decide to do...

...make sure you model after these two SUCCESSFUL candidates...

...be ACTIVE in your study prep; interact with the material.

Apply / reflect on it in your work.

PASSIVELY READING: Simply consuming content as a way to prep for the CPLP Knowledge Exam is DISASTER.

Use practice questions to build your...

...COMPETENCE and CONFIDENCE...

...in performing well on application-level multiple choice questions.

To your success!

~ trish

~ Trish Uhl, PMP, CPLP
2005 CPLP Pilot Pioneer
CEO and Founder Owl's Ledge
Creator, CPLP Mastery Series and CPLPCOACH.com

P.S. You've put in the study time, now put in the PRACTICE that builds your CPLP Knowledge Exam COMPETENCE and COMPETENCE!

Take an absolutely free practice exam right now:

http://www.cplpcoach.com/public/146.cfm

What's the Fastest Way to Fail the CPLP Knowledge Exam? Part II

In my last post, I talked about CPLP candidates making the oftentimes fatal mistake of diving straight into consuming content and mistakenly calling that "studying."

I explained that the consequences of "studying" this way often takes candidates off-course.

Instead of focusing on the core essentials of the ASTD Competency Model that provide the foundation for the CPLP Knowledge Exam, they get distracted by a bunch of random minutiae that robs them of their attention, time, energy, and effort (all precious resources in limited supply).

Worse, it causes what Dr. Ruth Clark - and other learning luminaries and psychologists - refer to as "cognitive overload" where the steady stream of irrelevant content so completely short-circuits short-term memory that nothing "sticks" - retention is limited (if at all); comprehension is virtually non-existent (which is terrible when preparing for an application-level exam); and, because what they're consuming doesn't transfer into long-term memory, candidates find they can't recall any of it when they appear for the exam.

At best, cognitive overload slows down your study progress, wears you down, and tires you out; at worst, it so completely overwhelms you that you find yourself sitting in the exam center on Exam Day anxious, exhausted, and ill-prepared for the task at hand --  unnecessarily challenged in your attempt to pass the CPLP Knowledge Exam.

I know - Old habits die hard.

This need to rush past planning and straight to "consuming content" is something many of us learned - and practiced - in our academic careers where we were often able to "cram" for school exams and rewarded for our ability to regurgitate content.

Perhaps that worked on tests that didn't assess you higher than basic recall / remembrance and required no more than rote memorization; but the research shows (here's what the American Psychological Association experts say) it does not work for application-level exams - like the CPLP.

HINT! CPLP Knowledge Exam primarily consists of  questions at the level of "Application"

So - what to do about it? 

How do you avoid cognitive overload and Exam Day disaster?

You assess your readiness and dial-in your focus.

How?

As I stated before, I've written and published a whole book, courses, and workshops on a collection of these comprehensive study prep strategies - but the one I want to share with you here is one of my favourites!

Quick, easy, insightful. :-D

Ready?
 
What you Need: 

A printed copy of the CPLP Certification Handbook, Part 2, Appendix F: Detailed Outline from the ATD CI Web site.

Have your copy handy?

Review the competencies in the first three Areas of Expertise listed in Appendix F:

1. Instructional Design
2. Training Delivery
3. Performance Improvement

Check off the items you feel most familiar with; leave the items you're unsure about unchecked.

Finished?

Good. Go back and look over those three AOEs. 

Based on the items checked and unchecked in each - in general (just off the top of your head) how would you rate your readiness in each? 

Informal "In General" Readiness Scale: 

• Ready (Green)
• Kinda Ready (Yellow)
• Not at All Ready (Red)

Rate yourself in each AOE like the examples below:

Here's the thing: Those three Areas of Expertise alone represent almost half (48%) of the CPLP Knowledge Exam.

What should this quick readiness assessment tell you?

If you have little to no experience or exposure in 1 out of the 3; you should know right from the start that you're at risk (before you even look at the other SEVEN areas) and will need to work extra hard to overcome that one major gap.

If you have little to no experience or exposure in 2 out of the 3, then it's like a three-legged stool - you're at HIGH RISK with barely a leg to stand on (and, again, you haven't even considered the other SEVEN areas yet). 

DISASTER!

Do you see how people miss conducting this type of upfront readiness assessment and fall into the "content consumption" and "cognitive overload" trap, spend months "studying," then go on to FAIL the exam? (According to ASTD CI, on average, 25% of candidates fail the exam - that's 1 person in every 4.)

Missing 2 out of 3 often requires an intervention out of scope for study prep - meaning, you're not ready for CPLP.

You need training or coaching in the missing Areas of Expertise - with some time devoted to putting them into practice before becoming a CPLP candidate.

Why?

CPLP is an assessment of your current competencies; it's not meant as an educational or enrichment program - and neither is study prep.

There is not a single study prep resource that can replace the breadth and depth of experience and exposure you are required to have - across the vast competencies in the ASTD Competency Model - before entering the CPLP program and attempting the exam.

(And let's say you ignore this, plunge ahead anyway, and pass the exam - how will you obviously demonstrate mastery of skills you do not have on Work Product? It's like showing up at DMV the day of your Road Test, but you've never actually driven a car. #justsayin)


Study preparation is review; it means you've seen / done it before - have experience putting the competencies into practice - and just need a refresher and some practice translating what you already can do on-the-job to your performance on an exam.

Yes - sometimes people are eligible to enter the program, but not qualified for CPLP success.


Be smart about where YOU are, what YOU need, and how YOU need to get there.

Be intentional. 

This part of what it means to think and act as a professional.

I hope you've enjoyed this blog series!

It is always my pleasure to demonstrate to you, my peers, strategies you can use for your  success!

The last CPLP Knowledge Exam test window is only a few months away, so after today, my attention needs to shift to addressing the needs of our candidates.

Like you, my summer break is over - and I must turn my attention to my commitments.

If you find that you're ready for CPLP, you're looking for more efficient and effective study preparation strategies and tools like this, and you'd like to work with me and my team --

Consider joining our upcoming -- CPLP Mastery Series: Knowledge Exam - Online Course

It's our last course offering to help candidates test and achieve CPLP Knowledge Exam success in 2014!

If not, I wish you well in your future endeavors and looking forward to running into you again at some future point in time. :)

To your success!

~ trish














 

What's the Fastest Way to Fail CPLP Knowledge Exam? Part I

Let's get straight to the heart of it:

Trying to study it all is the fastest way to fail the CPLP Knowledge Exam.

Many candidates who fail the exam make the mistake of equating "studying" to memorizing massive amounts of material (like a 700+ page PDF).

That's not studying; that's cognitive overload.

And cognitive overload marks the path to CPLP Knowledge Exam failure.

What is "cognitive overload"?

In a nutshell, "cognitive overload" happens when you flood your short-term memory (your working memory) with extraneous information that - gets "stuck" - and doesn't transfer to long-term memory.

This "non-relevant" extraneous information not only takes up critical "space" in your short-term memory (literally preventing additional study material from "getting in"), it also demands an exhaustive amount of mental processing to hang on to it - to keep it in memory.

(Because that's what temporary memory is for - temporary memory. If it won't transfer to long-term memory, it just sits in place, eating up your mental energy, and blocking meaningful information from getting in.)

It looks like this:

Most of us recognize this sensation as "feeling overwhelmed."

Feeling overwhelmed from cognitive overload is not the only problem caused by candidates trying to cram content (and calling it "studying").

Blindly trying to stuff more material into your head also:

• Distracts your focus. You study all the wrong things, instead of being focused on the right things (the things that matter).
• Zaps your energy (and motivation). Studying begins to weigh heavy on you, so you spend less and less time studying, which you know won't be to your advantage on the exam.
• Gives you a false sense of exam readiness. You think just because you read the material that you're ready for the exam. Wrong. How well does that approach work for your learners? (or your kids on their homework?)
• Wastes your time. You waste most (if not all) your time micro focused on the minute details, and not on the practical application of the essential concepts. You miss the Big Picture - which may be okay for an exam that's based on rote memorization and recall, but that's not the nature of the CPLP Knowledge Exam. The CPLP exam is based on real-world application, where you must filter what you know through your experience to arrive at the correct answer.

Trying to study everything is the path to exam disaster.

You know better; so do better!

Just because you read it doesn't mean you can apply it... and certainly doesn't mean you can put it into practice answering application-level (scenario-based) questions on an exam (like the CPLP).

Here's an example --

You may or may not get a question like this one - featuring one of the hundreds of obscure theories seemingly randomly referenced in the ATD materials --

but you will FOR SURE get questions (several, in fact) on the Kirkpatrick 4 Levels of Evaluation - like this one --

Get the answers! Visit: http://bit.ly/CPLPexam

Where do you want to spend your study time?

Trying to memorize obscure terms and definitions from 700+ pages of content in the ATD Learning System PDF?

Or --

FOCUS your study efforts on the CORE subject matter -- the material CENTRAL to the Competency Model and to the CPLP exam?

What's the path to success?

Triage. Prioritize. Pay attention to what's important.

Do this by developing a personal Study Plan that is:

Deliberate. Strategic. Targeted. Focused. Intentional.

How do you know what's CORE? What's CENTRAL to the exam?

It's easier than you think!

I've written a book, workshops, and online courses about it -- but 

-- I'll show you in my next blog post!

To your success!

~ trish 

Bored with your CPLP study preparation?

CPLP candidates often get several weeks into their CPLP Knowledge Exam study preparation and find their attention and energy waning from the reading materials they're trying to study.

Some people get downright frustrated.

If this is YOU --

It's time to give your brain a break!

Avoid the cognitive overload...

...get past the overwhelm...

...improve your CPLP study preparation retention, and...

...accelerate your study prep progress by...

...taking a break from 700+ pages of dry content and...

...switch to some visual stimulation -- 

to reinforce the models and frameworks featured in the ASTD Competency Model!

Visit my Pinterest CPLP study prep page, Now ------- http://bit.ly/CPLP_pins

Pinterest. Not just for recipes and wedding plans. :-D

Leave your comments below! How else can I be of service to you?


To your success!


~ trish