Improve your designs by interviewing your learners and users. Steve Portigal shares best practices.Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 013: Best Practices For Interviewing Your Audience

Ideas to design enriching learning experiences.Post from: The eLearning CoachIdeas For Designing Non-linear eLearning

Lots of resources to help you get started with mobile performance support.Post from: The eLearning CoachUltimate Resource List For Mobile Performance App Design

A ‘conventional’ SCORM e-learning module (Articulate Storyline on iPad) There are many definitions of e-learning. Some limit its scope while others broaden it depending upon the needs of the definer. Its definition in education is quite different to its definition in the commercial world. In the commercial (non-education) world there is increasing pressure from clients to develop e-learning that is shorter and which can be delivered in bite sized chunks (see ‘Resources or Courses?’). This pressure is forcing many to redefine the very nature of e-learning and this is causing confusion amongst many who are new to it all.  I’ve always preferred a broad definition and one that encompasses a wide range of web based learning technologies and approaches. E-learning is a broadly inclusive term that describes educational technology that electronically or technologically supports learning and teaching. Wikipedia For me online learning and e-learning are synonymous but this isn’t the way e-learning is understood by many in the commercial world where efficiency and cost reduction is the key driver for its popularity. So in an attempt to clarify what most people mean when they talk about e-learning (what I often call conventional e-learning) here is my updated definition: E-learning is a packaged digital resource that helps someone learn something new. E-learning resources are normally called ‘modules’. A course may be a single module or a collection of modules which must be completed in a set order. E-learning is different to other learning resources in that it requires learner interaction. Learners must respond to questions, engage in activities and make decisions. Based on their choices they receive feedback and may be directed to different material. In this way the resource is adaptive and will be experienced differently by different learners.  In  E-learning the leaner is active not passive. Most e-learning modules will be produced as a SCORM package and delivered via a learning management system (LMS). Of course not all e-learning modules will meet these criteria - much of the early e-learning modules belonged to the ’page turning’ genre but most professional e-learning developers today will rarely build page-turners for their clients. E-learning authoring tools such as Articulate Storyline or Adobe Captivate are designed to develop these conventional SCORM packaged modules - ideally packed full of exciting learning interactions and activities. So applying this definition - a video (even a very cool explainer video), a beautifully designed PDF or infographic does not constitute e-learning even though they may be delivered digitally though a ‘learning platform’. The problem with conventional e-learning is that it lacks flexibility and is tied to the old teaching paradigm - it’s usually linear and needs to be completed from start to finish to work effectively. Although some e-learning modules offer a more flexible way to navigate through the material most clients and LMS’ prefer the ‘screen at a time and test at the end’ structure. The technologies on which most e-learning modules are built (Flash or HTML) are also less flexible that other web based formats such as video or PDF files. In particular the growth of mobile devices in their various form factors and operating systems has really challenged the role of conventional e-learning and many new online learning platforms (e.g. Udemy or iTunes U) have sidestepped SCORM altogether in favour of video and other mobile friendly content standards. The so-called successor to SCORM, Tin Can recognises this new online learning landscape and substantially broadens what constitutes learning on the web. Reading a blog, commenting in a forum, or watching a video are all learning activities in the world of Tin Can. They are all potential learning experiences which is why Tin Can has been re-badged as the Experience API. So does the conventional e-learning module have a future? In the short term the answer has to be a resounding yes. Most e-learning is still done on non mobile devices accessed via a conventional LMS, and tools such as Articulate Storyline are making it easier for everyone (not just the pros) to develop conventional e-learning modules. However even if, like the classroom, the conventional e-learning module may be with us for some time yet many in the industry are exploring new approaches to learning online and I’ll take a look at what those new approaches are in my next post. The post Defining e-learning in 2013 appeared first on Designed For Learning.

More innovative and creative ways to learn online.Post from: The eLearning Coach14 Ways to Learn in 2014

Source: NonProfitCollegesOnline.com The post Adventures in Online Learning Infographic appeared first on Designed For Learning.

Recorded conversation with Julie Dirksen about how to improve our eLearning designs through user testing and better usability.Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 014: Are you getting any better?

What do experienced instructional designers think is important when practicing instructional design? 25 heuristics listed.Post from: The eLearning Coach25 Rules Of Thumb Deemed Important In Instructional Design

I contributed a video on ‘The e-Learning Revolution’ to Bitpod’s ‘In a Nutshell’ series. The script is shown below (it started out at 700 words but was trimmed to 300 to create just two minutes of video). To be successful in today’s knowledge economy we need new ways to learn, ways that don’t rely on us turning up in a classroom with the teacher. E-Learning has been around for a while but is often seen as the poor relation to learning delivered in the classroom. This view is rooted in the idea that ‘teacher knows best’ and without a teacher a class is incapable of learning. This position is misguided in two ways. Firstly the quality of the classroom experience depends almost entirely on the effectiveness of the teacher. If you have a great teacher the learning is effective. If you don’t it isn’t. Secondly it assumes that learners aren’t self motivated; that without a guide the learning won’t get done. In practice today’s learners are much more self-directed and they need a guide only occasionally. E-Learning, if it is well designed, can be just as effective as classroom learning but it does have different strengths. Undoubtedly the single biggest advantage of e-learning over the classroom is efficiency. If you need one thousand people in your organisation to learn something quickly, then e-learning is the only realistic solution. That’s why pretty much all basic compliance training is done online. E-Learning is also tremendously flexible - its available 24/7 and accessible pretty much anywhere - in the office, at home, or on the train to work. This always-on capability has fuelled the growth of e-learning and the demand for what is called just-in-time learning - learning that’s available at the moment of need. E-Learning is also cheap - an e-course is typically a quarter of the cost of a day in the classroom. That’s Buy One Get Three Free in the language of Tesco or Walmart. That’s a powerful driver for the e-approach. The post The e-Learning Revolution appeared first on Designed For Learning.

Reviews of some fascinating books to read this year.Post from: The eLearning CoachBooks For Learning Designers To Read In 2014

Ellen Wagner, Ph.D., demystifies big data and explains how it can help the learning and development function make better, smarter decisions.Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 015: Don’t Fear The Data

I’ve put my name forward for a position on the Board of the eLearning Network (ELN). I’ve always been an active member of the ELN and it has done a lot to promote e-learning in the UK especially in the corporate world. Not sure how much work is entailed if I get appointed/elected but hopefully it will be enjoyable! Here’s my 100 word manifesto (100 words is not very much): I’m passionate about e-learning because it combines two subjects I love - learning and technology. I’ve been in e-learning since the early days. Initially it was tough trying to get people to switch to new ways of learning - the classroom was seen as the only place where real learning took place. But things have changed. The web has revolutionised the way we do things and it’s now revolutionising the way we learn. This is a great time to be involved in e-learning and I’m keen to help spread the love as a board member of the ELN!   The post e-Learning Network Board Member appeared first on Designed For Learning.

As designers of learning experiences, we’re tasked with identifying the characteristics of the target audience. We discover their job responsibilities, prerequisite knowledge and interests. Our purpose is to understand them well enough to "connect" so that the learning experience we create is relevant and motivating. While recently coaching someone who was new to the field, […]Post from: The eLearning CoachBe The Learner

Thanks to everyone who voted I am now the Vice Chair of the E-Learning Network. We had our first Board meeting last week and there is lots to do in 2014 - not least increase the membership and ensure that the ELN plays as valuable a role in the e-learning industry in the next 10 years as it has in the last 10 years! The post Elected as Vice Chair of ELN appeared first on Designed For Learning.

In case you may have missed it e-learning, or online learning as I prefer to call it these days, has gone mainstream. From YouTube to Lynda, from iTunesU to MOOCs everyone is learning online. But one surprising aspect of this frenzy of online learning activity is the simple fact that almost none of it uses SCORM. If you don’t know what SCORM is this probably won’t bother you, but if you’ve been involved in designing, building or buying conventional e-learning then you will know that SCORM is key to making e-learning work. If you build an e-learning module in a tool like Articulate Storyline and want it to work on your LMS it had better be published as a SCORM package. So if SCORM is so important how are LMSs like iTunesU or Udemy ignoring it completely? To answer this we need to remind ourselves just what SCORM is. SCORM (Shareable Content Object Reference Model) was developed back in 2000 by the US Department of Defense as a way to standardise the way e-learning objects were built so that they could be shared on various platforms (LMS) and combined to create courses. Hence the shareable content object in the name. In practice, outside of very large organisations learning objects are rarely re-used. However the portability and interoperability was useful since there are many tools and ways to build e-learning and lots of LMS’ to put it on so what was particularly useful about SCORM was its role as a ‘connector’ technology. In practice this role is performed by the SCORM run time environment (RTE). Link: SCORM Run Time Environment (RTE) So why does the content need to connect or communicate with the LMS? Well there are two reasons. Firstly to track progress through the content and secondly to record a test score. The SCORM RTE uses JavaScript to handle this communication. So back to our video. Is this able to communicate progress? No. is there a score recorded? No. Video has none of this functionality built in. The other aspect of a typical SCORM e-learning module that is missing from video is learner interaction. Most e-learning is built using either Flash or HTML5 and is designed for interactivity. This isn’t a feature of SCORM but of Flash and HTML but it adds an extra dimension to content that isn’t available with video. Video is essentially a passive medium. As a learner you just watch it. So why are iTunesU, Udemy and most MOOC platforms going with video and not supporting SCORM? There are two reasons. Firstly SCORM adds complexity. Secondly, and probably more significantly, SCORM is much less likely to run on mobile devices. Actually it’s not the SCORM that’s the issue but the interaction environment. Mobile devices don’t support Flash and they don’t always support HTML5 reliably either. Videos on the other hand will happily run on pretty much any device. As a learning designer video’s lack of interactivity makes it a second rate choice compared to a SCORM module (what I call an iLesson these days). However if it’s combined with other learner activities such as assignments, discussions or quizzes then it can play a useful role within a course. And we are going to see a lot more innovation in video with interactivity already featuring on some platforms. So does this mean that the days of SCORM are numbered? Yes it does, but it will probably take a while to die and it will be replaced by another very different middleware technology known as the Experience API (formerly TinCan) but that’s a subject for another article.   The post Video or SCORM? appeared first on Designed For Learning.

If you’re looking for strategies to make learning more engaging and effective, you’ll want to listen to this interview with Dorian Peters. She is the author of Interface Design for Learning: Design Strategies for Learning Experiences and Positive Computing. Dorian is an eLearning interface design evangelist. She currently directs online strategy for the University of […]Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 016: Strategies That Improve The Interface To Learning

I’m no career counselor, but I do get many emails from people who are considering a career in instructional design. I realized it might be helpful to share these with those of you who have similar questions. I often qualify my responses with the fact that I offer only one opinion and to be sure […]Post from: The eLearning CoachAnswers To Instructional Design Career Questions

Is ignorance really bliss? An article in New Scientist back in the Summer (30 July) suggests that too much knowledge can be a bad thing. Almost anytime you are explaining an idea to a less informed person, a dash of ignorance will help you judge their knowledge and abilities more accurately. Why is this? Apparently a teacher is much more effective if they don’t know their subject too deeply. This reflects my own experience at school - my physics teacher had a PhD and was incapable of seeing things in the same way as his class of struggling A level students. But my chemistry teacher was fresh out of teacher training and was brilliant at making chemistry accessible. In addition to different levels of knowledge they both took a different approach to the science of teaching but my physics teacher’s depth of knowledge actually made it really hard for him to help us understand some of the basic concepts. When I meet with a new e-learning client one of the things I often get asked is ‘Do I know the subject matter?’. My stock answer is: ‘You are hiring me for my ability to design effective online learning not for my subject matter expertise.’ Now clearly it helps if we know a little about the subject already but the last thing we really need to be is an expert. In practice most e-learning is aimed at foundation level knowledge so the amount we need to know isn’t too onerous. Nevertheless, approaching a new subject with a fresh and open mind really helps when designing an initial learning experience. If we are working with a subject that is totally new to us then we do have to catch on pretty quickly if we are to design some useful learning within what is usually a pretty tight timescale. And that brings me to the key point of this article. When researching and learning about a new topic there comes that ‘Golden Moment’ where we know just enough to create an effective learning experience but not so much that we miss the tricky parts that learners might encounter. You’ll intuitively know that Golden Moment when it arrives - savour it because at some point down the line you’ll wonder why everyone is finding it all so hard! I think this playful definition sums up the situation nicely: What’s the definition of an ignoramus? Someone who doesn’t know something you learnt yesterday.   The post The Golden Moment appeared first on Designed For Learning.

Are your slides, screens and pages feeling tired these days? Do they need some visual caffeine? Then consider using ribbons, stickers and tags. These types of graphical elements were a hot trend on websites for awhile and many still use them as the background for titles, navigation bars and announcements. Although you don’t see them […]Post from: The eLearning CoachUsing Ribbons, Stickers and Tags In eLearning Design

Subscribe in iTunes Are you hearing buzz about the Tin Can API and wondering what it is and what it can do? Do you want to spread your wings and take advantage of modern technologies? In this episode, Megan Bowe demystifies the Tin Can API (a.k.a. Experience API or xAPI) and discusses its potential for […]Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 017: The Limitless Possibilities of xAPI (Tin Can)

I just completed two very long days at Learning Technologies at London’s Olympia. I wasn’t at the conference but spent a couple of hours on both days on the Elearning Network’s stand in my capacity as ELN Vice-chair. I also did an Ignite session on ‘Teaching Sells’ where my tech failed me completely but I did manage to recover after losing a precious minute. The lesson - practice with the tech before you rely on the tech! I also joined in the fringe event in the Beaconfield Pub on the Wednesday evening. I’m a sucker for anything fringey or anti-establishment - must be the Celt in me! The show seemed pretty busy and I had lots of good conversations on the ELN stand - primarily with those e-learning newbies struggling to make sense of the multitude of different approaches to learning online. I’ve been in e-learning a long time and have grown up with it all but anyone new to the scene can easily find themselves overwhelmed. Of course that’s where a group such as the ELN can help - guiding people through the various approaches, exploring the different tech solutions. My most used one-liner at the show was that ‘we are a self-help group for those just getting started in e-learning’. That seemed to strike a chord with most of the people I spoke with. Some other show highlights in no particular order: NimbleAuthor A new cloud based e-learning authoring tool from elearning 24/7 looked really user friendly. Had a great quick tour from Joe Jarlett (Tech Director) and looking forward to having a play myself (blog to follow). Sadly it doesn’t use responsive design principles so isn’t really mobile friendly but it will work just fine on tablets (I’m guessing it publishes to HTML5). Link: NimbleAuthor Responsive Authoring Tools This is an area of particular interest for me. I’m loosely involved in Adapt (the Kineo open source initiative) so am keen to see what approaches other companies are taking. GoMo (Epic) Epic have completely re-designed their GoMo tool and it now looks and works a lot better than Version 1 (M-Learning with GoMo). And to underline their commitment to the tool they have recruited Mike Alcock (of Atlantic Link fame) as GoMo MD. I’m on the Beta test programme so looking forward to having a play (blog to follow of course). Link: GoMo Linestream (Line) I watched a demo of this neat authoring environment where they made an app in 15 minutes (clearly they did some preps before they started in the best TV cookery tradition). Looking forward to comparing this with the GoMo tool. Link: Linestream The Death of the LMS One theme that seemed to weave its way around the show was the realisation finally that the LMS as we know it doesn’t really work for learners. I’ve always maintained that the LMS is designed primarily for managers not for learners. Little ‘L’ big ‘MS’ not big ‘L’ little ‘MS’. Toby Harris from Saffron started his talk on their Learning Experience Network with some interesting research from behavioural science and behavioural economics. The key point is that learners don’t learn in isolation and what they learn, or more importantly what they are motivated to learn, is shaped by the behaviour of others. A new manager will be more motivated to learn about a project management methodology if she sees that other managers have been doing the same thing. This of course is not how the world looks when you log-into an LMS as a learner. All you see if what you have been allocated to do by your manager or by HR. Other managers may also be doing the same stuff but you have no visibility of it - you are effectively learning in a silo of one. Anyway I don’t want to go too deep on this topic here but I am really keen to explore Saffron’s LEN which attempts to combine a socially mediated approach to learning with user generated content. Of course the death of the LMS may also result in the death of the conventional e-learning module, and even the instructional designer! Toby is clearly in the  Jeff Bezos camp in that to be really innovative you should  try and kill your existing business model! Sponge Cake and Champagne Sponge celebrated their 10th birthday with a sponge cake (naturally) and some champagne (happily). Julie Dirksen of ‘Design for How People Learn’ fame was the guest cake cutter. Julie Dirksen cutting Sponge cake! Julie Dirksen Had a nice chat with Julie while drinking champagne and eating sponge cake. She is considering a refresh of ‘Design for how People Learn’ but there is also the tantalising possibility of a second book on learning and behaviour change. You heard it here first (probably). Interactive Learning Maps One interesting new content authoring tool that I came across was Learning Map from Edynco (from wonderful Slovenia). This tool allows you to create a learning resource using a kind of mind mapping approach. It supports text, images, links, audio, video and even includes a question and feedback engine. It facilitates a much more exploratory approach to learning and is a refreshing change from ‘click or scroll to see the next  bit of content’. Link: Learning Map The LT14 Fringe  Martin Cousins organised the friendly intimate fringe event in the Beaconsfield Pub behind Olympia. A number of ‘conversation starters’ moved around tables stimulating conversation around different topics while we all drank free beer. Not a bad format for a Wednesday evening. My fave session was with David Kelly from Elearning Guild in the US where we talked wearable tech and all tried his Google Glass glasses. Me wearing Google Glass at the Fringe event in the pub. Ignite I contributed an Ignite talk on ‘Teaching Sells!’ I also enjoyed Dipesh Mistry’s’ talk on ‘The Value of Paper’. Videos to be uploaded soon! Overall a great show and a real buzz for the future of learning technologies! The post Learning Technologies 2014 appeared first on Designed For Learning.

Performance support or job aids fill a gap at work that usually arises in the context of performing a task or prior to doing one.Post from: The eLearning CoachHow To Get Started With Performance Support

Last week saw the launch of the Serious eLearning Manifesto. Its themes are ones that I’m familiar with having been working at the e-learning coal face for the past 10 years. Its basic premise is that most e-learning is ineffective and rarely improves performance. To take e-learning to a new level we must do more (actually a lot more). This is a valid viewpoint but the manifesto is vague about the ways in which things should be improved on a practical level. Now part of me agrees wholeheartedly that e-learning is capable of much greater things and with the appropriate vision, budget and skills I believe we should all strive to push e-learning much further but there is a large group of people who are only just getting started with e-learning and for them a simpler (but hopefully still effective) approach is going to be just fine. Horses for courses as they say. Now I also understand where this e-learning snobbery comes from. A lot of e-learning isn’t brilliant and in my work in getting clients started with e-learning I sometimes come across the dreaded 100 slide page turner, but there are also a lot of people out there getting up to speed with tools like Articulate Storyline and who are exploring what is effective and what is possible as they begin to transition from classroom to online. But not every SCORM module can be a tour de force of deep behavioural performance improvement. Sometimes you just need 10 minutes on getting started with the company timesheet system. Deep learning it may not be but unlike a static web page or PDF file the e-learning option should at the very least give you a starter for 10 (literally). Some may argue that this isn’t e-learning at all but performance support but for me the application of basic instructional design to a defined learning need effectively moves us into the e-learning space. Of course e-learning is capable of much more than this and the growing raft of technologies at our disposal opens up innovative new ways to learn online. But doing things at the cutting edge requires more skills, more budget and invariably more risk so not every project will be a candidate for the high-end approach. Indeed one could argue that the manifesto is really describing the wider landscape of online learning rather than e-learning specifically but that’s a subject for another post (see Defining e-Learning in 2013). I’m serious about the future of e-learning but let’s be pragmatic about its application at all levels of need. Sometimes a five minute Storyline module will be enough - seriously. More comment here: Clive Shepherd on the Manifesto Donald Clark on the Manifesto Sam Taylor on the Manifesto   Sign-up to the Serious e-Learning Manifesto here: The Serious eLearning Manifesto     The post Serious about e-Learning? appeared first on Designed For Learning.

This case study demonstrates the challenges and opportunities of working with stories for learning, showing some rapid approaches due to a tight timeline.Post from: The eLearning CoachCase Study: Visual Stories for Learning