This year as vice-chair of the E-learning Network I thought it only natural to volunteer as a judge for the annual E-learning Awards organised by E-learning Age magazine. In 2012 I played an active role in two winning projects so I was keen to see behind the scenes and get an appreciation of what it’s like to be an award judge. Having made it onto the judging panel at the beginning of August I was allocated two categories Best e-learning project: Private sector and also Best LMS Implementation. I was chair for the LMS category which means I was responsible for collating results and guiding discussions on the final short list. There were a lot of entries this year, over 250 in all, with 20 entries in Category C (Best e-learning project - PrivateSector) and 12 entries in Category O (Best LMS implementation). Our initial task was to review each entry and award marks across a range of key attributes and then to use this marking scheme to arrive at our short list. Generally the submissions were excellent but there were large variations in how clearly the organisations described the work they had done. This lack of consistency made judging tricky but it is immensely rewarding and enlightening to see how people are using e-learning in all sorts of interesting ways. Once we had arrived at our short lists we had to dig a little deeper and this is where the short listed companies presented their projects to us either at the two day face to face event at the Oval Conference Centre in London or alternatively online via Adobe Connect. A key focus of the judging is an evaluation of effectiveness of the e-learning project. This is always tricky and traditionally L&D can sometimes be weak at measuring effectiveness beyond Kirkpatrick’s Level 1 (Reaction - the happy sheet). E-learning often benefits from a check of understanding via a multiple choice quiz so technically it makes to to Kirkpatrick’s Level 2 (Learning), but evaluating effectiveness at Level 3 (Behaviour) and Level 4 (Results) is much harder and many entrants struggled to find reliable evidence at these levels. Following the presentations and some additional deliberating amongst the judges we selected three award winners (Gold, Silver and Bronze) from each category. Keeping these winners secret has been pretty easy for me (my mum thinks I should have worked for MI6 because I tell her so little) but on the evening of Thursday 6th November the results will be revealed to all at the awards dinner in London. I’m looking forward seeing the smiles on the winners faces and hope that those that missed out will also take comfort from the fact that simply making it onto the short list was an achievement in itself! Interested in being a judge next year? Judging is open to all - the only qualification you need is to be passionate about e-learning! Now where is my dinner jacket? The post Judging the E-Learning Awards 2014 appeared first on Designed For Learning.

Here are the top ten tools I use for personal learning in 2014. They include tools for social media management, reading eBooks and organizing information.Post from: The eLearning CoachMy Top 10 Tools For Personal Learning in 2014

A great evening was had by all at the 2014 E-learning Awards Gala Dinner in London on 6th November. Sponge UK took the E-learning Development Company of the year award on their 10th anniversary which was really great to see. For all the other winners see E-Learning Age magazine (the award organisers). Entries for the 2015 awards open from February 2015. Now what project could I enter I wonder? All the winners here: E-Learning Age list of winners  The post E-Learning Award Winners 2014 appeared first on Designed For Learning.

If you're interested in learning games or gamification, you'll like this insightful interview with the author of Playful Design, John Ferrera.Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 018: Designing Awesome Game Experiences

Articulate excel when it comes to product support. In the early days of Articulate Presenter the tool was fairly basic and there were a number of competitors with similar feature sets so the guys at Articulate realised early on that if they were to stand out in the marketplace then they needed to help customers use it effectively. This support extended way beyond simply using the tool (the button pressing) and really helped those new to e-learning explore how great e-learning gets made. Today Tom Kuhlmann, Jeanette Brooks and David Anderson are stars in their own right because they have helped elevate Articulate and Storyline 2, to be the authoring tool of choice. When it comes to learning as content marketing Articulate are practitioners par excellence. And now they have launched a great new e-book: ‘5 Highly Effective Strategies for Creating Engaging E-Learning‘ a great guide for those just getting started with developing e-learning or for those who already have some experience under their belt. It’s broken down into five  key sections (obviously) along the following lines: How to Build a Compelling Visual ExperienceA great introduction to the basics of good graphic design. How to add Meaningful InteractionsA really useful overview of what constitutes a proper learning interaction How to let Learners Pull ContentA wonderful exposition of the ‘in at the deep’ end approach with a great defence of the ‘don’t lock navigation’ ideology. How to Engage more Senses with VideoJust some really useful practical stuff on making and incorporating video and screencasts. How to Add Fun Gaming ElementsA useful (but quite short) section on gamification. Download the FREE e-book here: 5 Highly Effective Strategies for Creating Engaging E-Learning The post Great E-Learning Design Book from Articulate appeared first on Designed For Learning.

One of the most frustrating aspects of designing an eLearning course is choosing the color palette. The color palette refers to the limited and predefined set of colors you use in a design. If we only had 100 color choices, choosing a palette might not be a problem. But many scientists agree that people can […]Post from: The eLearning Coach8 Ways To Choose A Color Palette For eLearning

Organisations often say that ‘people are their most important asset’ but most don’t behave as if this really is the case. This manifesto explores why human capital really needs to be taken more seriously. It’s meant as a focus for discussion and debate - please comment, share and adapt as appropriate. We believe that employees should no longer be considered as resources but as value contributor’s in their own right. Human Resources (HR) should accordingly be re-named Human Capital (HC) and like other forms of capital should be monitored and valued as part of the organisation’s total value. "Human capital is the stock of competencies, knowledge, social and personality attributes, including creativity, embodied in the ability to perform labour so as to produce economic value." Wikipedia Strategy We believe HC should sit at the board table and help set strategy. HC believe that people are the key drivers of value in any organisation. Developing people and developing the organisation go hand in hand. You can’t do one without the other. Commercial We believe HC have to be commercial. This means understanding how the organisation makes money and spends its money. It means understanding the key metrics that the organisation uses to measure financial success. And it means being able to recognise how HC strategies and tactics impact on those financial metrics. HC is a key element of an organisation’s intangible assets and is therefore a key determinant of an organisation’s market value. Customers All organisations must ultimately be accountable to their customers. We believe that HC should understand the nature of the customer experience and work to improve it through the organisation’s people whether they work in a direct customer facing role or in a back office function. Customer experience is about customer centricity and this is key to every service or product that we deliver to our customers. Systems Thinking HC must be connected, joined up and integrated. It must work across silos and see the organisation as a living interconnected system. Working with other functions (e.g. operations, marketing etc.) to improve the overall system is the ultimate goal of HC. "Systems thinking is the process of understanding how things influence one another within a whole. In organizations, systems consist of people, structures, and processes that work together to make an organization "healthy" or "unhealthy"." Wikipedia Autonomy The modern workplace has flatter structures resulting in more autonomous workers and these smart workers need smarter support from HC. People now want to take control of their own development. HC must switch from organising and delivering training courses to scaffolding a broad range of learning interventions that are open and accessible in the workflow. HC need to move from directing to orchestrating. Learning HC believe that the time has finally come for the learning organisation. We believe that learning in all its myriad forms (formal, informal and social) should be in the DNA of our organisations. Only by being a true learning organisation can we succeed in today’s global knowledge economy. "Organizations where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning to learn." Peter Senge Social We believe social media is a catalyst for change, changes to the ways we work and the ways we engage with our colleagues and customers. We believe that our organisations must have social in their DNA. Authenticity We believe that we should be true to our values and adopt an open and transparent approach to our interactions with colleagues, partners and customers. Creativity We believe that HC must look for creative and innovative solutions to business performance problems. HC must inspire and innovate and lead by example. Technology HC need to embrace technology and use it appropriately. We must be comfortable and adept at procuring and using technology to aid human performance improvements. We believe HC will have increasing ownership of technology and not defer all technology decisions to IT. Analytics We believe that evaluation and analytics are the best way to guide our development efforts. If it makes a difference we can measure it, evaluate it and review future strategy and tactics based on our measurements. What gets measured gets done. FLAT: to be on a level surface, not in a hierarchy ARMY: a large group of people who share similar aims or beliefs FLAT ARMY: an unobstructed flow of corporate commonality. Dan Pontefract’s Flat Army Download a PDF version of The Human Capital Manifesto The post The Human Capital Manifesto appeared first on Designed For Learning.

Before you send your eLearning on for a quality review, how well do you test it yourself? A self-check may seem like an obvious task, but some people pass on their eLearning courses for a quality check when the work is less than stellar. Within a few minutes, the reviewer or tester can tell it […]Post from: The eLearning CoachHow To Quality Check Your Own eLearning

Good Practice have published a really useful report on the 70:20:10 framework. It covers both the pros and cons and also looks at some of the competing (but very similar) approaches such as Dan Pontefract’s 3:33 from his book Flat Army. Definitely worth a download and a read (you have to tell them about yourself before you get your hands on the report but it’s worth doing). Next Friday 28th November we are running an E-learning Network event on ‘Social and Informal Learning‘ and will have a session on 70:20:10 from Charles Jennings and Charles Gould. Places still available at the ELN Web Site. Get the report here: New Perspectives on 70:20:10 The post Formal or Informal Learning? A fresh look at 70:20:10 appeared first on Designed For Learning.

Find out how to design a learning environment to fulfill a specific need. These have the potential for providing a rich and broad learning experience.Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 019: Shifting To Learning Environments

I missed Donald Taylor’s hangout with Elliott Masie from 5 December 2014 in London but it’s all been recorded and it’s definitely worth a watch. Covers MOOCS, mobile learning, wearables, personalisation and more. The post Google Hangout on E-Learning with Elliott Masie appeared first on Designed For Learning.

How important is it to distinguish between hard and soft skills in the design of learning experiences? Many researchers think that it’s critical. The strategies needed to transfer hard skills, such as technical and procedural knowledge, can be quite different than the knowledge needed to develop soft skills, which involve interpersonal and intrapersonal (occurring within […]Post from: The eLearning CoacheLearning For Soft Skills: What works?

Augmented learning is an extension of eLearning, that takes locale, context and physical space into account.Post from: The eLearning CoachIs Augmented Learning In Your Future?

I’m currently reading ‘Telling not Training’ (review to follow) and came across this video from Charles Jennings which nicely sums up why learning is more complex than training. The post Training or Learning? appeared first on Designed For Learning.

Whether you fell into instructional design by accident or purposefully sought out a career designing learning experiences, you’ll enjoy this conversation with Cammy Bean. Cammy is the author of The Accidental Instructional Designer and Vice President of Learning Design at Kineo. Having taught many workshops, Cammy is in tune with the needs and questions that […]Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 020: How To Avoid Clicky-Clicky-Bling-Bling

A personal learning environment (PLE) is a solution for keeping up with the rapid pace of knowledge change. Some say it is a concept, while others say it is a technology. I think a good definition is this: a self-directed and evolving environment of tools, services and resources organized by a person seeking a way […]Post from: The eLearning CoachModels For Designing Your Personal Learning Environment

These are exciting times in the world of learning. Ubiquitous Internet access, shifts in workplace power structures and wider dissemination of cognitive research are some of the many factors contributing to the following trends to watch in the coming year. This can be a source of inspiration and fuel for creative solutions. 1. Design Thinking […]Post from: The eLearning Coach8 Learning Design Trends To Watch In 2015

At the start of every year, since 2010, I have listed new ways to learn online. I collect these sites throughout the year and save them just for this very moment. So here is a list of ways you can take advantage of the vast knowledge available online, allowing us to appreciate how willing people […]Post from: The eLearning Coach10 Easy Ways to Learn Online in 2015

Right now, before our very eyes, the world of workplace learning is shifting. We find ourselves in a convergence of technological, cultural and workplace transformations—a perfect storm. Constant innovation and disruption are the new normal and there are no signs that this is stopping anytime soon. Speed and Quantity There are two very obvious changes […]Post from: The eLearning CoachEmerging Roles Of The Learning Designer

Digital badges are bound to become increasingly important in the years to come. If you have a vague understanding of digital badges and are wondering how learners can benefit from them, you’ll want to listen to this episode. I interview Jon Aleckson, PhD, and Andy Hicken, PhD, from Web Courseworks. They have a good sense […]Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 022: All About Digital Badges

Originally, blended learning referred to adding an online component to instructor-led training or classroom education. But now that technology offers so many varied options, a blended approach has evolved to mean the use of more than one delivery method to provide and enhance training and support. This is the way of the future. Advantages of […]Post from: The eLearning CoachBest Practices In Blended Learning

If there is any career in which practitioners particularly love to learn, I’d put learning designers high on the list. It’s nearly a requirement for working as a learning designer, considering that we often work with content that others find dry. So, here goes my list of good books you may want to read in […]Post from: The eLearning Coach13 Books For Learning Professionals To Read

In this interview with Jane Bozarth, we discuss the benefits of showing or narrating your work to the individual, one's colleagues and the organization.Post from: The eLearning CoachELC 023: Why You Should Show Your Work

We often labor away using the same tools and techniques we've always used. This is one way to get in a rut. It's helpful to take a break and stop to see if there are better tools that will make our jobs easier, more fun, or provide inspiration.Post from: The eLearning Coach12 eLearning Related Tools You May Not Know