Hello, How can I make my eLearning module more creative / exciting? The client wants an ILT training ppt turned into an eLearning module. I've taken some of the original ppt photos and created short videos. I've already taken some of the original ppt and added voice-over. The client wants an additional (54 photos) of construction equipment shown with voice-over. Honestly, the audio is boringly redundant and I fear loosing the audience. I've been browsing the hub today regarding motion graphics, but I do not think that would be applicable with all these photos.
The best courses are not about their content; they're about what learners should do with that content. With 54 photos of construction equipment, it sounds like your audience might be construction workers? What is the course intended to teach them to do?
After you figure out what your audience has to be able to do, you can design your course to give them practice doing those things. Since you are creating e-learning, you'll be creating situations in which learners have to apply the skills they are learning in order to solve realistic work-related challenges.
For example, suppose your audience consists of construction employees who drive and operate back hoes. Further, suppose that one of the skills you need to teach is "how to perform a visual safety inspection of your vehicle."
You'll want to put your learners in a realistic job site, so maybe take a photo of a job site that can fill a Storyline screen, and take a photo of a back hoe from each side (left, right, front, back) that you can place over the job site photo.
You could use Michael Allen's CCAF method (Context, Challenge, Activity, and Feedback) to design some learning interactions.
Context: Your job today is to dig a 3-foot wide, 3 foot deep trench from the South side of Building A in a straight line to the North side of Building B, so that a local networking company can lay fiber optic cable between the two buildings.
Challenge: Before you climb into the back hoe, you need to perform a visual safety inspection.
Activity: Click the Left View, Front View, Right View, and Back View buttons below the back hoe to examine it from all sides. If you see any safety concern, click it.
You can then either provide feedback about the learner's visual inspection results, or you can continue on (possibly with some safety issues not caught) to the next step in this job. Perhaps some safety issue the learner didn't notice during the inspection will cause an issue later, allowing the learner to learn the consequences of a lax safety inspection.
At the end of a series of these mini-challenges that amount to a reasonable portion of the job, you can provide feedback to the learner. Maybe an expert character comes on screen to highlight the learner's correct and incorrect actions, or maybe you provide feedback and review some other way.
The point is, instead of focusing on narrating ("telling"), focus on creating situations or scenarios that give the learner a chance to practice doing things correctly. You'll end up with a much more engaging, interactive, and effective course this way, and you are less likely to lose learners to the boredom of lengthy, boring narration.
Ray is correct, someone needs to start with the objective of the course, then filter the content against the objectives to identify any redundancy.
Once you've stripped back the content you can then look at ways of creating a course that helps learners achieve the objectives of the course. Until then I think the focus of the course will be too broad and you'll overwhelm your learners.
3 Replies
The best courses are not about their content; they're about what learners should do with that content. With 54 photos of construction equipment, it sounds like your audience might be construction workers? What is the course intended to teach them to do?
After you figure out what your audience has to be able to do, you can design your course to give them practice doing those things. Since you are creating e-learning, you'll be creating situations in which learners have to apply the skills they are learning in order to solve realistic work-related challenges.
For example, suppose your audience consists of construction employees who drive and operate back hoes. Further, suppose that one of the skills you need to teach is "how to perform a visual safety inspection of your vehicle."
You'll want to put your learners in a realistic job site, so maybe take a photo of a job site that can fill a Storyline screen, and take a photo of a back hoe from each side (left, right, front, back) that you can place over the job site photo.
You could use Michael Allen's CCAF method (Context, Challenge, Activity, and Feedback) to design some learning interactions.
Context: Your job today is to dig a 3-foot wide, 3 foot deep trench from the South side of Building A in a straight line to the North side of Building B, so that a local networking company can lay fiber optic cable between the two buildings.
Challenge: Before you climb into the back hoe, you need to perform a visual safety inspection.
Activity: Click the Left View, Front View, Right View, and Back View buttons below the back hoe to examine it from all sides. If you see any safety concern, click it.
You can then either provide feedback about the learner's visual inspection results, or you can continue on (possibly with some safety issues not caught) to the next step in this job. Perhaps some safety issue the learner didn't notice during the inspection will cause an issue later, allowing the learner to learn the consequences of a lax safety inspection.
At the end of a series of these mini-challenges that amount to a reasonable portion of the job, you can provide feedback to the learner. Maybe an expert character comes on screen to highlight the learner's correct and incorrect actions, or maybe you provide feedback and review some other way.
The point is, instead of focusing on narrating ("telling"), focus on creating situations or scenarios that give the learner a chance to practice doing things correctly. You'll end up with a much more engaging, interactive, and effective course this way, and you are less likely to lose learners to the boredom of lengthy, boring narration.
Good luck with the project!
Ray is correct, someone needs to start with the objective of the course, then filter the content against the objectives to identify any redundancy.
Once you've stripped back the content you can then look at ways of creating a course that helps learners achieve the objectives of the course. Until then I think the focus of the course will be too broad and you'll overwhelm your learners.
Ditto to Ray and David. I'd also add that sometimes storytelling and case studies are great when teaching procedures and/or policies.
Concentrate in demonstrating the use of the content, not just showing the content.
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