eLearning Games In Compliance Training Compliance may be the last area of eLearning that you expect to see a game, but using serious games as part of a compliance programme can reach learners in ways that a more traditional approach can’t. Too many staff think compliance training is dull and boring and are ready to dismiss it as a check-box exercise. Incorporating a new style of learning can shake up any course and that’s something compliance training needs. Why eLearning games? Elearning games are fun, that’s why people choose to play them. ELearning isn’t always fun, and that can put people off. The more elements like interactivity and enhanced gameplay you incorporate into your eLearning the more engagement you’ll see. But more importantly, eLearning games have characteristics that make them more suitable for certain types of training, including compliance training. Some staff may dismiss an eLearning game as a gimmick, until they actually play one that’s designed properly and helps them to learn new skills. Elearning games don’t replace the rest of the learning, but they can achieve things that are difficult to replicate with a conventional approach. What goes on when you play an eLearning game? In eLearning games, you can take risks, you don’t worry about consequences, you learn from mistakes. You can start to see how this can be applied to training like compliance. We are all natural problem solvers; give someone a goal and some rules and they will find their way to the solution. A well-designed eLearning game will allow you to fail and learn from your decision. You can move on and try again until you get the right answer, and when you do you’ll retain that information. Why compliance games? Compliance is about rules, eLearning games are designed to teach you rules through trial, error and repetition without you even knowing you’re learning them. If I asked you to tell me the rules of Tetris the chances are you’d have a pretty complete list, certainly enough to allow me to play it straight away. Have you ever read the Tetris instruction manual? How many assessments have you taken on Tetris? When you play an eLearning game you try out different tactics to see how you can achieve the goal, there’s no fear of failure because you’ve got another life. A lot of the focus in compliance training is on completion, making sure that all staff required to take a course have finished it. One of the trademarks of well-designed eLearning games is replayability. Design an effective eLearning game and your staff will not only want to complete it, they will want to replay it over and over. Games improve high speed decision making, which can be important in many compliance scenarios like health and safety.  Some compliance situations would benefit greatly from fast response times and any practice you can give your staff will help when they need it in real life. An eLearning designer will be offering feedback to the learner whenever possible, within an eLearning game environment they get immediate and constant feedback on their actions. Giving the learner the opportunity to see how they are progressing throughout the process is invaluable in learning. Who’s using eLearning games? You don’t have to look far to find examples of serious games being used to educate and train everyone from schoolchildren to professionals. Government agencies The FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) approve certain flight simulators for logging time against pilot training. This kind of simulation is the perfect example of a game-type environment being a better place to learn and make mistakes than in real life. Games in eLearning give you the chance to experience extraordinary or hazardous events and see how you would react to them.  A highly competitive industry with a lot of regulation, the aviation sector is a good example of how eLearning games like simulations are used to reduce costs. Retail business Baby goods retailer, Mothercare is using game elements as part of its Staying Safe at Work programme, allowing learners to explore the real life scenarios that they could encounter in a warehouse or shop floor without fear of failure. IT services companies IBM developed the City One game as part of their smarter planet initiative. It served two purposes, engaging potential clients who are interested in their services and showing people the reality behind running a city. Getting people interested in the decisions that are made when managing a city’s resources and people is a hard task and a game is one way that IBM have been able to do it successfully. Microsoft are using Minecraft to teach kids how to code, and you can try it out on line. It shows how a game can be used to train people on underlying principles that aren’t always obvious. Programming involves following rules and logic to produce the right result so, like with compliance, eLearning games are a natural way to teach these skills. All of these examples show that by providing your staff with the tools to explore and learn about the issues through experience you can reap the rewards.  Whatever your compliance needs it’s worth considering an eLearning game as part of the solution you offer to your learners. This post was first published on eLearning Industry.

Tips To Create An Amazing Online Training Course On A Tight eLearning Budget The old saying goes that you "pay for what you get". However, there are a variety of ways that you can create amazing and engaging online training courses on a tight eLearning budget. By using the right tools and capitalizing on your experience, skills, and talents, you can offer your corporate learners an unforgettable experience. Developing online training courses doesn’t have to cost a small fortune, especially if you use these money-saving eLearning tips. Narrow the scope of your online content. One of the quickest ways to go over budget is trying to cover too much subject matter in a single online training course or module. This is why it’s essential to narrow the scope of your online content before you even start the design and development process. Sit down with the Subject Matter Expert to figure out what you should cover and what can be left out. Whether you are creating the online training course yourself or enlisting the help of another Instructional Designer, this approach will save you money and time. It will also benefit your audience, as they won’t have to sift through an abundance of online content to find the information they absolutely need. Determining the objectives and goals of the online training course goes hand in hand with this. Otherwise, you run the risk of wasting resources on topics that don’t even belong in your clear and concise online materials. Repurpose existing online training materials. If you have any online materials already on hand, such as interactive interactive scenarios, online text, or images, you can cut costs by repurposing these elements. Even if you need to make minor modifications to the current online content, it will still save you a great deal by not having to create it from scratch. It may even be wise to store all of your images, text blocks, background music, and any other resources in one centralized location. This will serve as your own personal eLearning library moving forward, which can reduce costs on all future eLearning projects. For this very reason, it’s wise to select a LMS that can store all of your important online materials safely, and allow you to quickly and conveniently integrate them to other online training deliverables. Find the perfect eLearning tools. It’s a common misconception that authoring tools are too costly for tight eLearning budgets, especially when more advanced software with a variety of features is concerned. However, there is a wide selection of eLearning tools that are affordable, or even free, that you can use to design your budget-savvy online training course. An example of this is Google Apps in eLearning, which is an entire suite of tools that can help you develop surveys, eLearning assessments, and online presentations for free. Just make sure that you choose an online tool that is ideally suited for the talents, skills, and experience level of your eLearning team. The goal is to go with a solution that offers the perfect balance of usability and features. Rely on eLearning templates and online media libraries. Many eLearning tools integrate a great variety of pre-designed eLearning templates to choose from. You simply input your information, images, and any other online resources that are necessary, for deploying the online training course. Rather than having to build your online training experiences from the ground up, eLearning templates give you the chance to design amazing and effective online training courses in a fraction of the time. There are even some solutions that allow you to integrate your branding and color scheme into the layout of the online course. If you need to include photos, music, and images, look for eLearning tools that include online media libraries. These online libraries often have hundreds, if not thousands, of multimedia elements , interactions, and graphics that you can use in your eLearning course design. Create bite-sized online training experiences. Instead of creating one lengthy online training course that covers all of the subject matter, you can also opt for several bite-sized modules that focus on a specific sub-topic. This not only reduces the risk of cognitive overload for your corporate learners, but allows you to create online training experiences more rapidly. Another perk is being able to quickly modify and update each individual module, rather than having to edit and revise the entire online training course over time. For example, if you discover that one of your bite-sized corporate eLearning experiences is not as effective as it could be, you can simply modify that particular element to improve its weaknesses. Invest in needs analysis and audience research. Audience research, performance assessments, and needs analysis may all seem like items that don’t belong on your expense sheet. However, they can all offer you the chance to create more effective online training courses for less. This is primarily due to the fact that they reduce the likelihood of several revision rounds and ensure that you are meeting the needs of your audience. Conduct surveys, interviews, and focus groups to figure out the goals and preferences of your online learners, as well as the expectations of the organization with respect to online training courses. Doing so will also allow you to pinpoint which training needs to be covered, and which pieces of information can be omitted. If you pair this with Subject Matter Expert input, you can develop a streamlined, cohesive online training course on a tight eLearning budget. With these tips on hand, you have the power to create visually stunning and highly effective online training courses for your corporate learners, without breaking the bank. Using the appropriate online tools and a bit of creativity, you can develop meaningful online training experiences for a fraction of the eLearning cost. Now that you know how to design top notch online training courses on a tight eLearning budget, take a moment to read the article 5 eLearning Costs That May Put At Risk Your eLearning Budget to discover the 5 eLearning costs that may put your eLearning budget at risk. This post was first published on eLearning Industry.

It’s Time To Switch To Responsive eLearning. There are many benefits to responsive eLearning. Not only that, but with the rise of BYOD (bring your own device) and an increasingly mobile workforce, responsive content is quickly moving from a "nice to have" to a "need to have." Overwhelmed by the idea of converting all your existing content, or starting from scratch on new responsive eLearning? Here are a few reasons you’ll be glad you switched: 1. Create once, access anywhere You could sit down, make a list of all the devices you think your learners might use to access training content, and then design a new version of your course for each device. Or you could design one responsive course that will adapt to whatever device screen size it’s displayed on. I don’t know about you, but I pick option 2. Up until recently, eLearning authoring tools hadn’t quite caught up to responsive web design methods. But now, you can easily create responsive eLearning right within some of your favorite authoring tools, like Lectora®. Responsive Course Design™ (RCD) in Lectora is unique because you only have to design once, in the desktop layout. Content in the desktop view is automatically positioned and sized for landscape and portrait views on tablets and phones. Using Lectora’s RCD is also more efficient and cost-effective than other responsive eLearning development options. 2. Second screen learning Perhaps your learners want to be able to take a course on their desktop computers while in the office, then later reference that content on their phones while out in the field. Creating responsive eLearning ensures that they’ll still be able to access that course on the go without losing important information. 3. Future proof The great thing about the way Lectora does responsive eLearning is that it does NOT use width-based breakpoints. John Blackmon, Trivantis CTO, says, "If you use a width-based breakpoint to define content for a tablet, what happens when the newest phone has a logical screen width that is the same as the tablet? The view you intended for a tablet is used on a phone, even if the screen on that phone is too small to render it properly. As technology progresses, this problem will occur more often." With Lectora’s RCD feature, you design for device type and orientation, instead of screen width, ensuring that your content will display well on all devices, even ones that haven’t been released yet. Try the new Responsive Course Design feature in Lectora for free! Download a free 30-day trial now, and you’ll never look back. This post was first published on eLearning Industry.

Creative Approaches In Instructional Design Within XY Learning Team we are trying to find answers to this challenge. To open our minds we are using Learning Battle Cards (LBC) and tools from this family. Designed approaches, however, could be used regardless of the tool; you can utilize post-its or other materials which will help you to bring such a routine of opening minds for new Training and Development approaches to the table. Beyond Routine  The following clip shows how you can use Learning Battle Cards to design better learning journeys within the team of Instructional Designers. Feel free to copy, mix, match, and alter this idea when you face such a challenge. Learning Battle Cards: Gamification Of Instructional Design If you don't know what Learning Battle Cards is you can check the next short clip. Simply speaking, it is our ambition to gamify the Instructional Design process with Learning Battle Cards. We will be working on new exercises and activities for educators utilizing the concept of Learning Battle Cards. We hope that they will help not only for designing better learning interventions, but also for deliberate self-development and better understanding of learning space. You can check our website (www.learningbattlecards.com) for more information about the concept, other tools, and other ideas how to foster creativity in day-to-day chores of educators. You can also place an order for you deck of Learning Battle Cards there. This post was first published on eLearning Industry.

ATD TechKnowledge 2016 theme is "Reimagine Learning" Technology is disruptive. In a world where mobile devices outnumber people, technology is changing business and employee development in big ways. It makes learning accessible in ways never imagined. It’s time for you to reimagine what’s possible—and reignite the potential of how you develop and deliver learning. How can technology take your talent development efforts to the next level? ATD TechKnowledge 2016 is the place to learn about the latest technology trends. Hear from thought leaders and practitioners who are on the leading edge of this new frontier. Learn with us. Think forward. Join us in Las Vegas and come prepared to stretch your imagination. Why ATD TechKnowledge 2016? Meet, Learn, and Network With the Trendsetters. Our speakers, attendees, and exhibitors are at the forefront of the industry. They won’t just be presenting to you; they’ll be sitting next to you in sessions and having lunch with you. This is your opportunity to make new contacts, learn from the best and the brightest in the industry, and find out how to stay ahead of the curve. ATD TechKnowledge 2016 Tracks E-Learning Design / Development Emerging Technologies Management & Implementation Mobile Platforms & Tools Serious Games & Simulationssocial Social Virtual Classroom ATD TechKnowledge 2016Keynote Speakers David Rose is an instructor and researcher at the MIT Media Lab, and the author of the book Enchanted Objects: Design, Human Desire, and the Internet of Things. A serial entrepreneur, David is CEO of Ditto Labs and is the founder and former CEO of Vitality, a company that reinvented medication packaging that is now distributed by CVS and Walgreens. He also founded Ambient Devices, which embedded Internet information in objects such as lamps, mirrors, and umbrellas. Kate Matsudaira (Principal, Urban Influence) has spent her entire career leading brilliant teams, and is currently a principal at Urban Influence, an award-winning branding and interactive agency in Seattle, Washington. Previously, Kate was the founder and CEO of Popforms, which was acquired by Safari Books Online in 2015. She has also worked as the vice president of engineering and chief technology officer at Decide (acquired by Ebay), Moz, and Delve Networks (acquired by Limelight), and as a software engineer, tech lead, and manager at Amazon and Microsoft. Brian Wong is the co-founder and CEO of Kiip (pronounced keep), a mobile monetization network. He has been recognized with many awards for his accomplishments and leadership. Before starting Kiip, Brian led key publisher and tech partnerships at the social news website Digg.com, where he accelerated the company’s mobile presence by launching the Digg Android mobile app. After skipping four K-12 grades, he received a bachelor of commerce from the University of British Columbia at age 18, and shortly after became one of the youngest people to ever receive venture capital funding. ATD TechKnowledge 2016 will be held at the Caesars Palace (Las Veags, NV, US) on January 13 - 15, 2015.   This post was first published on eLearning Industry.

How To Transform Distance Learning Content  Isn’t it amazing how old distance learning is? According to some articles it’s been used to teach students for over 200 years! In the old days, students applied for a course with a university or other educational organization. They’d be posted their text-based distance learning course materials and maybe get some tutor support by mail and/or phone (when the phone was invented, of course). In recent years, many organizations may have extended their distance learning offering to provide more support by email and/or discussion boards. A learning platform may have arrived where more text heavy materials were added. But... and here is the big BUT. This is where some organizations remain stuck. Whether in paper format or online in PDF format, text heavy materials are given to students to wade through. In this day and age how effectively can students learn from this text heavy approach? Do distance learning organizations feel they have no choice but to adopt this approach because of the vast curriculum that has to be delivered? The good news is that it doesn’t have to be this way. The choice of learning technologies is endless. So the possibilities of creating digital learning content are also endless meaning organizations do have choices. Many choices. A distance learning course is the perfect learning product for using eLearning. There will be a specific curriculum which needs to be taught, so a large pool of content already exists. It’s not about starting from scratch. It’s about thinking creatively about how distance learning content is designed. Here are five suggestions on how to transform distance learning content into engaging digital learning content - all of which I have used or come across being used effectively. Give case studies an interactive scenario make over. Case studies are often used in distance learning content to illustrate a theoretical perspective of a topic and give students questions to solve around the case. A suggested model answer is usually provided so students can compare it with their own answer. Transform these case studies into an interactive scenario. Make students the protagonist in the scenario giving them the opportunity to make decisions or apply concepts as they would in the real world. Build in feedback around the decisions a student has made, choices they have selected. After completing the scenario, students can then discuss it with other students to share their experience. Covert examples into a story. Expand on key examples used in course materials and convert them into a visual story. For example, in a recent animation project for a university I worked on, a key project management framework has five steps. In the course materials, each step has a different industry example explaining how the step can be applied. In the real world, students would be applying the framework from one perspective i.e. one industry example. With this in mind, one industry example was used for all steps and a story created telling students how the whole framework was used. The animation is a bite-sized piece of digital content; is audio driven, highly visual and has no student interaction as such. However, because of the media used, the animation allows students to step back from all the text heavy materials and learn about the topic from a different perspective. Using different approaches to teach, creates those "Aha" moments when a student says "I finally get it". This animated approach also benefited the teaching faculty hugely.  As subject matter experts, they were urged to think differently about the way they teach particular topics. Design show and tell content. The foundation for a subject like Accounting is built on numerical concepts and principles. Trying to learn the numerical concepts purely from text narrative can be challenging. Students struggling with these concepts may need to be shown in detail how to apply formulas and interpret numbers. Design worked through solutions which demonstrate how to solve such numerical problems step by step. Present the data, show formulas being applied, explain where numbers come from and illustrate the business impact of results. There are many software tools which you can use to create this kind of solution for distance learning delivery - such as whiteboard tutorial software, screen recording tools.  This approach can be used for many subjects. Develop interactive exam practice questions. For distance learning programs which are assessed by examination, students will typically go through past papers and model answers. Develop interactive resources around past exam questions which guide students through the key stages in answering questions. They can compare their answer to a model answer and see examples of different levels of answers; some low graded answers and some best practice answers. Provide hints and tips on answering exam questions for specific subjects and topics. Go 100% digital with all content. This is the bravest and boldest option. It means saying goodbye to most, if not all, paper based / text heavy materials and rethinking your course content strategy. It means investing in a future which is aligned to the ever growing digital world. It means embracing the many possibilities of learning technologies and delivering education for the next generation of distance learners. The College of Estate Management took this brave and bold step in 2014 and won the 2015 Bronze eLearning Award for Best online distance learning program. One Final Thought  Organizations offering distance learning programs need to change their game… and quickly. If they’re not already here now, the next generation of distance learners will be here very soon. They will not have the time or motivation to go through those text-heavy materials. They will demand variety of media in their learning and more importantly will be used to learning digitally. Make sure your distance learning organization is ready for them. This post was first published on eLearning Industry.

How To Use Puzzle Games In eLearning Puzzles are not just for action-adventure games and Sunday morning newspapers anymore. In fact, they can assess learner knowledge, motivate reluctant members of your audience, and take eLearning immersion to a whole new level. But how do you use puzzle games in eLearning effectively without diminishing the real world value of your eLearning course? They key is knowing which eLearning games to integrate, as well as how they should be used. Here are just a few puzzling tips that can help you infuse mystery and intrigue into your eLearning experiences. Puzzle piece rewards. The idea of using badges in eLearning is nothing new. However, when you transform those badges into puzzle pieces, you can take learner motivation to the next level. After your online learners successfully complete a module, ace an exam, or achieve a milestone, give them a puzzle piece that brings them one step closer to completing the puzzle. You can make this even more immersive and entertaining by creating a puzzle that features a riddle or mystery image, or add a touch of humor by revealing a culturally appropriate joke. Interactive eLearning course objects. While there is a time and place for static eLearning course graphics, clickable images can make your eLearning course even more interactive and engaging. For example, you can create a door that learners must click in order to reveal the answer or have them choose from a variety of different keys that each unlocks a different eLearning lesson. This also makes learners feel as though they are in control of their eLearning experience, because they have a direct say in which eLearning modules they complete next. Collect and use items. This is a technique that is widely used in open world adventure games. Give your online learners the opportunity to collect various objects throughout the eLearning course that they can store in their virtual backpacks. You can also make this scenario-specific if you don’t want to turn your entire eLearning course into an educational scavenger hunt. Later in the eLearning course or scenario, include a locked object or another type of interactive graphic that pairs with a previously gathered item. Your online learners must then determine when and how to use the objects they have in order to advance to the next eLearning lesson or level. You can even make them combine items to build their problem solving and creative thinking skills. Navigate learning paths. Ask your online learners to choose a path that leads to a different eLearning lesson or topic. You can also add this eLearning strategy to your interactive scenarios or simulations to make them more mysterious and adventurous. Instead of displaying the usual outcomes, make it creative by incorporating a story into the eLearning activity. For example, your online learners can play the role of a medieval adventurer who is trying to slay a dragon, and every path leads them down another intriguing road. Just make sure that you align the eLearning activity with the goals and objectives of your eLearning course. Crossword puzzles. This is an ideal puzzle game for knowledge checks and eLearning assessments. Provide your online learners with a virtual crossword puzzle that they must solve by accessing previously learned knowledge. Give them the questions and ask them to fill in the blanks. Make certain to give them detailed instructions beforehand and allow them to reset the puzzle in case they would like to self-test later on. It is also wise to give them a way to check their answers as they go along so that they can get immediate feedback, rather than having to wait until the very end to review all of their responses. Sequence of events. Sequencing puzzle games in eLearning are great for task mastery. You provide your online learner with a series of events that are out of order and ask them to put the events in the correct sequence. You can also combine task sequencing with  eLearning scenarios to make the online activity more immersive and realistic. Again, be sure to offer them feedback as soon as possible so that they can improve their performance and master the correct sequence. A simplified version of this might be a series of images that depict specific steps which the learner must arrange in the right order. Conversation-based eLearning scenarios. A conversation-based puzzle game or scenario in eLearning is ideally suited for performance management. The learner must interact with a virtual character who asks questions or displays certain traits, such as a dissatisfied customer who is trying to make a return. The learner must then engage in dialogue with the character to solve the problem and avoid conflict. You can even include non-verbal cues in the conversation, such as slouching or shoulder shrugging, to encourage your online learners to become more observant. Do your audience research beforehand to learn as much as possible about how your online learners speak, such as the terms they use on a regular basis, and what situations they encounter in the workplace. Incorporating puzzle games in eLearning can make your next eLearning course more interactive, memorable, and entertaining. Use these 7 tips to ensure that your eLearning strategy serves the learning goals and draws your audience into the eLearning experience, without distracting them from the core objectives. Also, keep in mind that puzzle games in eLearning should always have a purpose. If you are simply including a puzzle for the sake or entertainment, then this isn’t offering any real value to your learners. Puzzles games are just one of the many eLearning games that you can add to your eLearning experiences. Read this article Gamification vs Game-Based eLearning: Can You Tell The Difference? to learn how to compare and contrast gamification vs game-based eLearning and discover useful tips on how to design an effective eLearning strategy for each. This post was first published on eLearning Industry.

The Importance Of High Quality Content In eLearning When undertaking a course, it can seem that it’s better to have too much information than too little. Some may say that it’s best to give the learner more information than they really need. However, when it comes to eLearning, it’s far better to be concise and keep content relevant to measurable learning objectives that ultimately benefit the learner. Here are 4 tips to help you create high quality content in eLearning: Keep content relevant to the learning objectives. To achieve this, we must first identify what the learning objectives of a course will be. When working with a client, we will ask what knowledge their learners need to be able to demonstrate at the end of their course. Using Bloom’s Taxonomy as a guide, we can then work out the best strategy to reach their educational goals. Once identified, any content must be relevant to these learning objectives otherwise the learner could simply end up learning the wrong thing. Keep content succinct and concise. The learner only needs to be taught what they need to pass the course. Identify the key topics or subject areas, and concentrate on what the learner needs to know in order to apply knowledge at the course’s end. As Shakespeare once said, "Brevity is the soul of wit". Conciseness provides the biggest impact when saying something funny or humorous, but another translation of it is simply "don’t waste my time"! When writing content, try to keep blocks of text to a minimum. Present information in short groups of four, and if possible simplified into bullet points for easy reading. Jargon and overly technical language should also be avoided. Engage the audience. In order to keep learners interested in your content, try to make it sound "human". If your content comes across as too technical, or as if it was being recited by a machine, then you risk immediately disengaging the audience. eLearning is meant to be an electronically enhanced version of what the teacher would deliver in person. Aim to be creative. Possibly tell a story, use game-based learning, or inject some humor into the course. However, don’t become sidetracked by trying to force too many gags into your content and forgetting the learning objectives! Also, use examples that are relevant to the industry or environment the learner is involved with so that learners can identify with the course. On a course about safety in the workplace, the case studies should naturally differ greatly between a construction company and a bank. Proofread. Poorly written or fact checked content can create several problems on an eLearning course. Content riddled with spelling mistakes, grammatical errors or incorrect facts can reflect badly on an organization, and lead to learners not being able to take the course seriously. Even worse, the learners could assume the incorrect content is true, and learn it anyway. The whole course would be rendered pointless and leave the learners in a poorer position than when they started. This post was first published on eLearning Industry.

Leading Questions In eLearning Leading questions, also known as "loaded" questions, are designed to influence and guide the learner. More often than not, leading questions contain subtle hints that elude to the correct answer. This form of questioning often has a negative connotation, due to the fact that it has the power to coerce a learner into thinking a certain way, instead of giving them the opportunity to find their solutions. However, when used properly, leading questions have the potential to trigger the thought process and encourage learners to reflect upon key concepts and ideas. 4 Types of Leading Questions Assumptive. As its name suggests, this type of question makes an assumption that guides the learner in a specific direction. "How much do you like the eLearning scenario?" would be an example of an assumptive question, as you are automatically assuming that the learner enjoyed the experience and are simply asking them to clarify how much they liked the scenario. Personal input. This type of leading question encourages the leaner to share a personal opinion or thought. It often requires a "yes" or "no" response. An example of a personal input question would be: "There seems to be a growing trend in mobile phone usage, don’t you think?" The question already implies that there is a trend and encourages the learner to offer their personal input. Implication. Implication questions center on the "cause and effect" principle, whereby one event will lead to a negative or positive consequence. "If you don’t follow this process during the simulation, how do you think it will affect the outcome?" would be an example of an implication questions. It prompts the learner to explore what might happen if they follow their current course of action, as well all other variables. Coercive. This is the least favorable type of leading question, as it forces your learner into thinking a certain way. "Don’t you think that the employee onboarding process is too long?" is an example of a coercive question. Learners aren’t likely to answer honestly, and you’ve already told them the answer you want to hear. 5 Tips On How To Use Leading Questions In eLearning Make it challenging. Craft leading questions that offer the ideal amount of difficulty for your learners by conducting audience research beforehand. Figure out what they know and what they expect to learn. If the question is too difficult, rephrase it in order to guide them in the right direction. The primary purpose of a leading question is to focus your learner’s attention so that they have the opportunity to arrive at their own conclusions. Craft leading questions carefully. The trick to creating effective leading questions is distinguishing between manipulation and guidance. It’s quite easy to blur the line between the two when formulating the leading questions for your eLearning experience, as it’s all a matter of phrasing and word choice. Examine each question to make sure that it isn’t coercive in any way, and that it doesn’t include your own personal thoughts or opinions. Let your learner think for themselves, without being pushed into your train of thought. Timing is everything. In addition to the phrasing of your question, you also need to be careful about where you place it in your eLearning course. Make sure that you ask the question at a time when your learners have just enough information to answer it correctly, so that they are able to apply the knowledge and move it to their long term memory banks. If you ask a question too early, they simply won’t have enough previously learned knowledge to draw upon. On the other hand, asking the question too late in the learning process will take the challenge out of the eLearning activity, as well as reduce their ability to retain and recall the subject matter effectively. Never underestimate your learners’ intelligence. It’s perfectly acceptable to center a leading question on a more rudimentary subject matter. However, you should never craft leading questions that are so basic that they insult the intelligence of your learners. Asking them a question that anyone with a bit of common sense could answer correctly won’t add any real value to your eLearning course or encourage your learners to explore the topic. Makes sure that all of your leading questions are relevant and require some degree of skill or insight to answer. Leading questions ALWAYS have a correct answer. One of the distinguishing characteristics of a leading question is that it has a single correct answer. A question like "What does everyone think about this amazing image?" would not be an effective leading question, for example. Not only would each of your learners have their own unique response, but you are implying that they should think the image is amazing. To ensure that your leading question does have a single correct answer, carefully analyze the phrasing, word usage, and tone. If there is even the slightest possibility that a learner might be confused by the question or unsure about what response you are looking for, then reword it to provide more clarity. Lead your learners in the right direction and then give them the power to think for themselves. Use this article as a guide to design leading eLearning questions that engage and inspire your learners, without resorting to coercion. One of the most significant benefits of using leading questions is that they encourage the learner to think while guiding them in the right direction. The  article Direct Learners’ Attention: 5 Tips For eLearning Professionals features 5 additional tips you can use to direct your learners’ attention and improve their comprehension. This post was first published on eLearning Industry.

3 Key Steps To Help Gain Competitive Advantage Through Employee Development  Let’s face it: Globalization is making business a tougher game. Most companies are now competing in a global market rather than a local or national market; software can be competitively developed offshore, shopping can be ordered from virtually anywhere, and even one-on-one service-based businesses can practice remotely using online video conferencing tools. Playing on a bigger business field means it is critical for your organization to gain a competitive advantage through employee development, which is where effective corporate training comes in. Most high-performing organizations are taking a structured approach to skill development by maintaining a training calendar for new and existing employees. The more we train our employees, the greater the payoff. There’s data to back this up. HR Magazine reported that organizations investing $1,500 or more per employee per year on training average 24 percent higher profit margins than those with lower training budgets. There’s more: The American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) gathered training information from more than 2,500 organizations and found that those that offer comprehensive training have 218 percent higher income per employee than those with less comprehensive training. We will take you through 3 key steps PulseLearning uses to create customized, targeted training that will improve employee development and give you that sharp competitive edge that could increase your profit margins. Identify core skill requirements. Before launching in and training employees, your organization needs to identify the core skill requirements and any skill gaps so the right resources can be created for your audience. Conducting a training needs analysis (TNA) can help analyze your requirements and where existing training fits into the picture. From there, a plan is created for how to best extend the skill sets of new and existing employees. Develop appropriate training. When you know the core skill requirements you want to train your people on, an effective training solution can be developed. Consider what kind of solution will best suit the audience. It could include eLearning, face-to-face learning, or a blended solution of both. An online solution works best for geographically dispersed audiences, saving time and money associated with traditional classroom training. Having your training designed for use on mobile devices (mobile learning) such as iPads and smartphones will mean it can be accessed anywhere and anytime an Internet connection is present. Training can be designed to fit in with your employees’ schedules by producing bite-sized learning chunks for busy roles or downloadable resources where reading is required to reduce screen time. Evaluate the success of training. So you’re now investing in regular training for your people, improving employee development. What you’ll want to know is how effective it has been. Did it teach your employees what it intended to? Did it engage, motivate, and delight the audience, and importantly, did the training yield a return on your investment (ROI)? Evaluating the success of your training is the final step but is the most critical in the development lifecycle. Your approach to training should incorporate continuous improvement to keep it on point. Talk directly to your employees about their training experience and use their feedback to evolve your resources. Reference: Article: Not Investing in Employee Training Is Risky Business. The Huffington Post Australia, 12 October 2015. This post was first published on eLearning Industry.