I thought I would brush up on my e-Learning Instructional Design skills so I took the ATSD e-Learning Instructional Design cbd products course taught by the wonderful Ethan Edwards of Allen Interactions. One of the reasons I wanted to take it was I know Allen Interactions has some very great ideas about how e-Learning should be more engaging and participative for the learner. I also wanted to learn more about “Leaving ADDIE for SAM” which is their Successful Approximation Model was of Instructional Design project management. I had a wonderful time and below are my notes:
Successful e-Learning
Less is more, but don’t over simplify
Overwhelming negative feeling about e-Learning
Give the user control over the screen (i.e. Check screen with pop-ups is more efficient than several linear pages describing the content)
Learners want to finish as soon as possible
Design must focus on the learner, not the organization
A great learning environment should be experimental
Interactions designed for learning versus interactions designed for testing
Interactions designed for problem solving
Safety—Making mistakes
Individualization—how do I create an environment that listens to the learner?
Success = the right people to do the right thing at the right time
Practice, practice, practice to remember
3 Success Factors
- Enhance the learner’s Motivation to learn
- Focus learners on Behavior-enhancing tasks
- Create Meaningful and Memorable experiences
You don’t learn until you know you need to learn about it
Let people figure out the interactive experience vice telling them all about it
100% assessment is good—achieve mastery
Make assessments active interactions that “do”
Chunking is good
5 Components of e-Learning
- Learner Motivation
- Learner Interface
- Content Structure and Sequencing
- Navigation
- Instructional Interactivity
Boring is bad
Instructional Interactivity
Interactivity that actively stimulates the learner’s mind to do those things that improve ability and readiness to perform effectively
Define the expectations
4 Essential Elements of Instructional Activity—Create a Higher Expectation
- Context
- Challenge
- Activity (Action)
- Feedback
Make your learners DO things
Give contextual feedback, not just “correct/incorrect”
It’s not about getting it right, it’s about learning (working through the process)
Tell a story
Just putting words on a screen sucks
Just putting a video on the screen is NOT Instructional Interactivity
Just putting an animation on the screen is NOT Instructional Interactivity
Just clicking a button to open a dialogue box is NOT Instructional Interactivity
Paint a picture visually of the work to be done
Take reading away as the main activity
Sometimes the Activity is the easiest place to start
Read Feedback aloud to see if it makes sense
Memory Map—repetition, repetition, repetition
Linear thinking is not necessarily the best way to think
Why Doesn’t Our Industry Focus on Instructional Activity?
E-Learning is NOT a TECNOLOGY solution
Instruction remains a teaching and design problem, regardless of the medium
The money is in selling the software, not in using the software
Telling is easier than doing
Just SAY less
It’s about performance outcomes, not presenting content
We are not trying to create experts, just people minimally competent
10-20-70 Aim for the 10
Do NOT turn off next button until narration is not done—do not take away choice
Work from Hard-To-Easy, not scaffolding, go for the 10%
Content-centered: Tell & Test
Learner-centered: Test & Tell
Programming Tools:
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Other Tools:
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Development Tools:
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Productivity Tool:
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Need complete graphic control
Graphics: I do it, acquire the images, contract out for it
Need variables
Learner Motivation
Motivation is more important than content
7 Magic Keys to Motivating e-Learning
- Anticipated outcomes (WIFM)—How it could impact the learner. What really matters about the objective? Address the objective without formally stating it as a LO.
- Pay
- Power
- Self-esteem
- Freedom
- Success
- Risk—Set of consequences to what the learner does
- Challenge: not too much, not too little
- Flow: not too hard, not too easy
- Content—select ONLY the content that only has REAL value (Meaningful & New)
- Context—Use an appealing context
- Relevant
- Novel
- Suspenseful
- Attractive
- So much of good e-Learning is theater…look behind the curtain
- Tasks—Make them actually DO something!
- Multiple step tasks better, single step bad
- Feedback
- Extrinsic feedback bad: external to the activity (correct/incorrect good job/try again)
- Intrinsic feedback good: learners see for themselves the consequences—helps in transfer
- Judgment—you are done with the exercise
- Immediate is bad (except rote memorization)
- Delayed is good
What is the KEY experience the learner needs?
Deconstruct Interactions
Media use—have a purpose for every piece of media (Excess noise gets in the way)
Narration: easy to ignore. Do NOT narrate the exact text. Do not put the transcript on the screen. Except, possibly ESL. Give a choice between audio and/or text.
If there is a reason to have narration, inject emotion
Learner-centric is about learner Instructional Interaction and that does not lend itself to narration
Good audio: supplements something visual
Senses can work simultaneously, but each sense can only process one thing at a time
Our pace of reading changes to better process the content
“Have you set aside the time to do this lesson?” “Have you turned off your phone for this lesson?” “Need a cup of coffee before this lesson starts?” Be a good host to the learner.
Getting There Through Successive Approximation
No e-Learning is ever PERFECT
Prototypes are better than storyboards
Quick and Dirty is Beautiful
Savvy Start is most important
What does the learner need to DO?