We all know that courses must be meaningful and motivational to learners, but, unfortunately, not all Instructional designers know how to engage adult learners. When adults are required to take courses that they have no interest in, or find irrelevant to their needs, their level of motivation and consequently their retention level will be low. Instructional designers need to work hard to come up with motivational strategies for adult learners. In this blog post, we will go over some of the motivational techniques that work. Create real life experiences. Make the course meaningful to your learners by creating scenarios, role-plays, games, and demonstrations that resemble learners’ everyday work environments. This can be easily achieved by asking SMEs to provide realistic examples and anecdotes from their experiences. Then, use your creativity to turn their stories into meaningful interactions. Provide downloadable resources and job aids. It is unrealistic to … [Read more...] about 6 Motivational Techniques for Adult Learners
Instructional Design and ELearning
5 Things Every ELearning Designer Should Pay Attention To When Proofreading And Editing ELearning Courses
Proofreading and editing your eLearning courses can sometimes feel a little awkward, to say the least. However, both proofreading and editing are the essential components of the eLearning development process. One of the best ways to catch mistakes is to create and follow a style guide. While things that will be included in that style guide will vary from project to project, there are certain things that should be applied to every project. Always check punctuation as misplaced comas may confuse learners. Incorrect punctuation may also cause learners to misinterpret content. Check subject-verb agreement to ensure consistency. Oftentimes, in addition to subject-verb disagreement, writers make errors with pronoun-antecedent agreements. If not corrected, these errors can cause a lot of confusion. Do not trust your spell checker. Even though spell checker can be a great tool, it does not catch all the errors. Therefore, if there are words that sound the same, but have different … [Read more...] about 5 Things Every ELearning Designer Should Pay Attention To When Proofreading And Editing ELearning Courses
Is It Possible to Accommodate All Types of Learners?
All eLearning professionals are well aware of the three main learning styles: auditory, visual, and kinesthetic. Some of the effective strategies to engage auditory learners include recording lectures and making them available for future use. To accommodate these learners, instructional designers may also consider podcasts and mnemonic devices. As opposed to auditory learners, visual learners must be able to draw a mental picture before they can process the information. To accommodate visual learners, instructional designers can use diagrams, drawings, videos, PowerPoint presentations and other visual aids such as infographics. Kinesthetic learners are those that struggle the most in a distance-learning format. Although it is much harder to accommodate kinesthetic than auditory or visual learners, it is not impossible to do so. Some of the ways to make eLearning materials more hands on include giving learners the opportunity to participate in discussions via chats or discussion … [Read more...] about Is It Possible to Accommodate All Types of Learners?
What is the Role of Webinars in ELearning?
Even though webinars have been around for a while now, many organizations still find them intimidating. However, with proper planning, even a non-technical person should be able to conduct effective webinars. Webinars can be used for just about anything starting from teaching people how to use a tool to lecturing or providing information on the topic of importance. Webinars can have a single presenter who speaks to the audience, demonstrates slides or steps needed to do something, and answers questions from the audience. Webinars can also take a form of an interview where two people talk to each other or multiple people can speak and answer questions with a facilitator moderating the discussion. While, all three formats are appropriate, the last two are much more interactive in nature. Just like eLearning, webinars rely heavily on audio-visual presentation of the material. Therefore, it is important to have attractive slides and clear audio. Many facilitators create an … [Read more...] about What is the Role of Webinars in ELearning?
3 Ways To Obtain Information From Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) That Never Fail
Working with Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) is a challenging yet important part of successful course design. Instructional designers often have to find creative ways to obtain all the required information from their SME. Here are some suggestions that you may find helpful when dealing with Subject Matter Experts. Involve SMEs from the beginning – When SMEs are involved in a project from the very beginning, they feel needed and are more willing to share their knowledge with you. Whenever possible, ask the SME why the course is needed and what should happen as a result of the course. You should also ask your SMEs to help you brainstorm the information required for the training. Then, create a prototype and ask the SME to follow and correct it, if necessary. Always ask the SME why they feel the information is important and whether or not this information is required to achieve the objective. Ask the SME to categorize information – When your SME presents you with the content, ask … [Read more...] about 3 Ways To Obtain Information From Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) That Never Fail
4 Localization Issues That Come Up When Translating ELearning Courses
In one of my previous posts, I discussed translating eLearning modules into other languages. Since then, I have completed a project that needed to be translated into Spanish. As I was working on my translation, I came across some localization issues, which I would like to share with other eLearning professionals responsible for translating their courses into other languages. Graphics and images – When you translate your course, keep in mind that in addition to linguistic differences, there are also social and cultural differences. When we deal with cultural differences, we should pay close attention to graphic and images, as they instill different feelings and reactions in people from other cultural backgrounds. Therefore, changing existing images to more neutral or culturally appropriate ones may be another responsibility of someone translating the course. Audio-visual Elements – If the course that you are trying to localize includes video, you may think that dubbing would do it, … [Read more...] about 4 Localization Issues That Come Up When Translating ELearning Courses