A toolkit and guide for people who train volunteers

Formal training for volunteers has recently started to take on more importance, both because volunteering roles increasingly require specific sets of skills and because the prospect of learning new skills is one of the reasons people volunteer.

People who manage volunteers or are responsible for volunteer programs are not always experienced or qualified trainers but often find they need to be able to help volunteers learn.

Volunteering Australia, through the National Volunteer Skills Centre Project, has produced a new resource in two parts to help people working within volunteer-involving organisations learn about what's involved in training others.

A Guide to Training Volunteers (Part A) takes you through the principles of adult learning and training, and helps you understand the volunteer environment in relation to training.

A Toolkit for Training Volunteers (Part B) gives you a range of tools to use in identifying and meeting volunteers' learning needs and understanding how to work with national Training Packages.

Appendix to Part B, Notes on Certificate IV in Training and Assessment The competency standards in Certificate IV in Training and Assessment provide benchmarks for your professional practice as a trainer. As a trainer you may also be able to seek RPL in respect of the competencies used in this certificate .

If you are interested in RPL, don't forget to look at our RPL toolkit - this toolkit explains the process of RPL and shows you how to create compelling Portfolios of Evidence. It also has templates to help you organise your evidence.