Is Storyline the future?

HI Bill,

I am not sure the technology side and the "instructional designers" communicate that well yet!

Instructional designers, with good skills, background, communication skills and business knowledge can design courses in many ways, in many media.

Take PowToon and Videoscribe for example - they are "rapid cartooning and animation", but they will not take away the people that hand-illustrate and build in After Effects, or other animation programmes.

There is a business case for both - and sometimes people just like what they are used to.

Many people I know HATE "rapid eLearning", not because of what it IS, but because how many people USE IT. I am guilty of this too - sometimes a client will absolutely insist on "electronic PowerPoint", because that's what they want - despite my protestations.

I think Storyline IS the future, however, it also now needs to reflect the fact that we live in a much more "visually bling" World - and add animation, visual manipulation and better video and social media handling/integration capabilities, to keep up with the other competing ways of learning that are rapidly coming on-stream.

I believe that Storyline is now competing with YouTube etc. as a "way of learning", and SaaS + flexible licensing options as a way of delivering the product - that is where the eLearning companies should be looking.

Just my 2p worth.

Bruce

Hi, Bill: Sort of depends on the company: some have a strong history with Captivate, some with Articulate, some with Lectora. Most companies will want experience with Captivate or Articulate, so that's where I'd spend my time.

However, in the end, and as you well know, education isn't about a particular tool (wouldn't it be nice if it were). I'm pretty good with Articulate products, but figuring out exactly what learners need to learn, how to assess that learning, and building engaging activities? That's where the real work is. So often we see some cool tech demo, and our first reaction is "wow, that's really cool." And then our second reaction: "but I'd probably never use it in a course."

But I digress...

As above - only use the tech when it adds to the learning, not just to the "experience".

Mostly...

Sometimes that is what the client wants - due to corporate culture and expectations. A couple of fizzy drinks companies I work for do NOT want things that look like PowerPoint, it has to be "blinged" to a certain level, rightly or wrongly.

Bruce

Is there a repository or site somewhere that demonstrates how both Articulate and Storyline can be used in creating e-learning for middle and high school students - a distinctly difference audience than your typical corporate customer? I guess I am trying to determine on where the best place is to begin building my e-learning software knowledge for what I am trying to do - Flash, Articulate, or Storyline.

Thanks for all of the feedback!

Hey Bill, 

It depends on the type of experience you want to create and the tasks and concepts that connect with that experience. What's your vision for the types of things you want to create for students? Where are the challenges? What kinds of things --stuff that blows folks socks off and really gets the job done-- do you want to try to emulate?

When you say "Flash, Articulate, or Storyline," do you mean "Flash, Captivate, or Storyline?"

I'll begin by saying I agree with what some of the previous posters have said. Regardless of the technology, you have to have the ID skills. Otherwise it's just "oh, that's cool" without any learning having occurred.  

But on to the technology. In my opinion, Flash involves an entirely different set of technical skills than do Captivate or Storyline. My impression is that Flash also has a steeper learning curve, so you might consider your own time and resources as well. My guess is the education industry would be a fan of rapid development models simply because they are cheaper and faster to turn around (funding presumably being a constraint).

You might consider opening a thread with a different title to reach out to some folks in that market. I feel like I've seen several threads around K-12 instructional design in the past, so you also might try searching to see what's out there already and which community members might also be in your area.

For content development, I was looking to create some "challenge" type games/activities to teach the science/math vocabulary and basic concepts that make up the more boring "memorization" part of those subject areas leaving my class time for project/critical thinking/application type activities. The branching capabilities would be a great plus to either re-mediate in areas where students struggle in the challenge or extend concepts to more detail. Ideally the "game" could either stand-alone or sit inside our LMS (Canvas) and be accessible via different devices. I am looking at it as an alternative in a flipped classroom model that is more active and engaging than just watching a video.

In looking at the gamification side of education, it seems that the "games" are either too rudimentary where the students would get easily bored after a few minutes or too "gamey", such as quest-type activities, where the game is too much the focus and it is difficult to weave the learning inside of it so it seems an actual part of the game and "slapped on". I am trying to find, or develop something that falls in between.

I will try to reach out to other K-12 people in these forums to see what their experiences have been.

Thanks again for all your feedback!