What You Need to Know About Encouraging Your Learners to Pay Attention
You’re in a meeting with some stakeholders discussing a new e-learning course on a really dull topic. Obviously, you have questions for them and ideas to share, but you quickly realize that all they want you to do is to take a Subject Matter Expert’s 200-slide PowerPoint and put it on the LMS. No attempt to pare down the content or align it with the training goal. No reimagining the source material to add interest or engagement. You want to object to this approach because you know it’s dull and pointless. Learners aren’t going to pay attention to, let alone learn from, four hours of auto-advance lecture material. So maybe, in the interest of gaining more control and creative leeway, this is a good time to share the rather shocking claim that human attention spans are rapidly decreasing, down from twelve seconds in the year 2000 to just eight seconds today. That means our attention spans are even shorter than that of a goldfish! Holy cow! Well, now you have everyone’s attention. While I’m no expert on brain science or attention span, this claim has always struck me as being a little … pardon the pun … fishy. And sure enough, a few minutes of internet sleuthing confirms that not only is human attention span not fully understood—neither are goldfish attention spans! So it seems the oft-cited claim that humans only have an eight-second attention span isn’t actually backed up by evidence. It’s a myth, and it’s one that learning professionals have relied upon for years, usually with the honorable intent of winning the battle against dull e-learning. Unfortunately, perpetuating this hyperbolic claim—one that drips of confirmation bias and oversimplifies some pretty complex topics—can also paint you and your training team into a credibility corner over time, as your organization realizes that: 1) they drove themselves to work in an hour of traffic today, so they must have more than an eight-second attention span, and 2) simply making something shorter doesn’t mean people will pay attention to it or learn anything from it. So that leaves us with two big questions: What can you say to your stakeholders? And what are some credible, evidence-backed techniques you can use to help your learners pay attention? I decided to pose these questions to an expert in this area, so I sat down with Julie Dirksen, founder of Usable Learning and author of Design for How People Learn and Talk to the Elephant. The rest of this article is the highlights reel of our decidedly nerdy conversation. On the Topic of Attention Spans Me: Obviously, we can’t really process or recall information we haven’t paid attention to, therefore attention must be important for learning. Can you talk a little more about that? Julie: Attention is an important factor for many kinds of learning—but not all. Take learning to play the guitar, for instance. It involves skill-based practice and you need to focus while you are first learning a skill, but your mind can wander while you’re doing ongoing practice—for example, scales—to build your muscle memory. People can learn certain tasks through repetition, automating their behaviors and movements so they become unconscious. But at first, you need to pay close attention. After a while, you’re good. Me: So if there are different kinds of learning, does that also mean there are different degrees of attention? Julie: Patti Shank has written some really useful articles on attention, and she points out that there are five different kinds of attention spans, each requiring a different level of effort. Focused attention is involuntary—like reacting to a loud noise or a touch—so it’s a no-brainer. But as willpower becomes a bigger factor, the level of effort increases. Once you’re asking learners to pay attention to two things at once (i.e., divided attention), the level of effort becomes more difficult. On the Topic of Immediacy Me: I know there are lots of ways to get people’s attention, but which ones work the best? Julie: One of the most powerful ways to get people to pay attention is to create a sense of immediacy. So, if I ask how interested you are in watching a five-minute video about printer repair right now, your interest is probably zero. But if I asked you that same question when your printer is broken and it’s 5 o’clock on a Friday and you need to print out your timesheet and turn it in before you can leave work, you’re going to be much more interested in watching that printer repair video. That’s because it’s relevant to your current situation and there’s a sense of urgency to it. People don’t pay attention to the video because it’s flashier—they pay attention because it’s immediately useful. Me: So how can I create that same sense of urgency in a typical e-learning course? Julie: Well, one thing you can do is give people a scenario they need to solve by using the information you’re giving them. This creates an immediate need for that information. On Interest and Engagement Me: Okay, so I get how needing to solve something would make paying attention to that information feel more urgent. But the topic of printer repair brings up another important factor for me: interest. Julie: Yeah, it may seem ridiculously obvious to say this, but it’s just a whole lot easier to pay attention to things that are interesting. And if you’re interested in something, your capacity to pay attention to it is almost unlimited, Me: But what about when the content you’re sharing is really boring? Julie: People can force themselves to pay attention to things that aren’t interesting. But I don’t think it’s an accident that we put attention into monetary terms—paying attention. Basically, when you’re asking people to spend their willpower on something boring, that comes at a price. Most of the limits we talk about aren’t about how long people can pay attention, but that’s probably almost unlimited. The limits are more about how long people will force themselves to pay attention to something they don’t find interesting. I wouldn’t bet on that being longer than twenty minutes, and it might only be a minute or even a few seconds. If your training is always about delivering information—rattling off dos and don’ts or dictating policies and procedures—rather than giving folks a chance to get hands-on, make decisions, and practice their skills—there’s nothing interesting about that. You’re missing out on an opportunity to engage them. Engagement with your material helps people pay attention. On Importance Me: When I think about training that tends to lack engagement, I also think about things like compliance training that’s designed to address “what if” scenarios—things that could put the operation at great risk but happen relatively rarely. These types of courses are important for many reasons, but that sense of immediacy and interest isn’t really there. Julie: A lot of folks work in orgs where they’re told that everything they’re given is important. This course is mission-critical. Understanding this information over here is vital. Fatigue just settles in and people eventually find none of it worth their attention. Think about ways we can signal importance. Social proof—what others in the organization are doing with the information you’ve given them, how it’s made them better at their job—things like that definitely grab people’s attention and demonstrate that the information you’re sharing is important. However, text-heavy screens lacking visual design, learning objectives that are written in instructional design jargon—these are ways of signaling that the information you’re sharing isn’t important or useful. People instinctively know that if it was really important and useful, you would’ve made some effort to make it easier, more professional-looking, more relevant and personal. If something is genuinely useful or interesting, people probably won’t have to struggle to pay attention to it. Summary For those of you who’ve read Julie’s book or attended her sessions at industry events, you might be familiar with one of her favorite catchphrases, “One of the primary responsibilities of instructional design is the ruthless management of cognitive load.” It strikes me that encouraging your learners to pay attention requires some pretty ruthless management. Not only does the content you’re sharing and how you’re sharing it need to respect the demands on your learner’s time and attention, but that content also needs to be useful and engaging in a way that signals its importance. If you enjoyed this topic, there are lots of industry pros in addition to Julie who are talking about the science behind attention span, memory, and so much more. Check out folks like Clark Quinnand Patti Shank, to name two. You can alsolearn more about the backstory behind the goldfish/attention span myth in this videofrom Julie or by visiting her site,Designbetterlearning.com. What are you doing to encourage your learners to pay attention? Share your thoughts with me in a comment, below. I’d love to hear what’s working for you! New to e-learning? Sign up for our E-Learning 101 email course, a series of expertly-curated articles that'll get you up to speed with course development.5 Ways to Use Animated GIFs in Your E-Learning
Animated GIFs—or image files that act like a short video that loops endlessly—are everywhere these days, on social media, in blogs, and even in e-learning courses! That’s right, instructional designers are using these eye-catching multimedia assets to grab their learners’ attention—and you can too. Check out these ideas to get inspiration on how to incorporate animated GIFs in your courses. 1. As Course Header Images If your learners have a ton of courses in their dashboard and you want yours to stand out, try using an animated GIF in the course header, like in this example: Mars Curiosity Rover. It’s a surefire way to get your course noticed. 2. As Attention Getters GIFs are eye-catching. Have you noticed how hard it is to look away even when you’ve already seen the same animation loop 10 times over? That’s what’s so great about them. Their movement naturally draws your learners in and incites them to pay attention. Not convinced? Take a look at this Rise 360 course: Space Travel–Themed Interactive Infographic See how the GIFs draw you in and make you want to click on the interactive parts? I thought so. 3. To Illustrate Key Messages But GIFs can do more than just catch your learners’ eye. They can actually help learners better understand the concepts you’re teaching them. Check out the GIFs in this course, for example: An American’s Guide to Driving in France. See how the GIFs support the key messages? 4. To Lay Out the Steps in a Process If you’re creating a how-to course, you might be tempted to make a video. And that’s definitely one way of doing it! But if people need to replicate the steps one by one, they might need to rewind each step and watch it over and over again. What a pain! Instead of creating a lengthy video or screencast, why not create a GIF of each step, making it easy for people to rewatch the steps as needed, like in this article on how to make coffee? 5. For Comic Relief If the topic of your course is particularly dry, it might be a good idea to work in some humor to make sure your learners don’t fall asleep. GIFs are a great way to do that! However, be careful to not overdo it. A humorous GIF here and there is one thing; peppering every section of your course with them is another.Here's an example that uses humorous GIFs effectively. Another thing to keep in mind with humor is that it’s subjective. Test your course out on a trusted coworker or two and make sure they find the GIFs to be both work-appropriate and funny. The Bottom Line As with anything, it’s important to keep in mind that too much of a good thing is bad. When using animated GIFs, make sure they’re helping and not hindering the learning process. After all, the goal is to get your learners to focus on the content and retain the key messages. If you’re sold on using animated GIFs in your courses but aren’t sure how to go about creating your own, check out this tutorial. Like this article? Subscribe to our newsletter to get the latest e-learning inspiration and insights directly in your inbox. You can also find us on LinkedIn and X (Formerly Twitter).Basic Elements of an E-Learning Course
When something’s new, it can feel complex and difficult. And when you’re first getting into e-learning and you view a finalized course, it’s hard to imagine what all the moving pieces are. However, when you pull back the curtain and look at the most basic elements of an e-learning course, you’ll realize that most courses are made up of the same fundamental components. If you’ve taken or designed at least one online course, you should recognize most of these course building blocks. While there’s no rule saying you must include these components in every course, it’s helpful for new e-learning designers to be familiar with the basic elements and where they fit into the overall course structure. Course Welcome or Opening This is the first thing your learners see when they open your course. In addition to welcoming learners visually, it usually provides options for navigating the different sections of the course. Remember that the welcome content sets the tone for your course, so it’s important to start off strong! Here’s an example of a welcome screen created in Rise: Here’s an example of a Content Library welcome template you can insert into your Storyline 360 project: Instructions Depending on the type of course you’re creating, you may want to include instructions to help learners understand how to navigate through the course. If you’ve built your own custom navigation using a slide-based authoring app, you could use arrows, callouts, and text to point out the important features of the course player. Noteworthy features include navigation buttons, resource tabs, a transcript menu, and help buttons. If you’re using the built-in course player that comes with your authoring app, you may not need to go into that level of detail. But even if you’re using standard navigation, it’s still helpful to let your learners know if they need to turn on their speakers, whether there’ll be a quiz at the end, and how much time they should set aside to complete the course. If you’re using a web-based app, like Rise, it might look something like this: If you’re using a slide-based app like Storyline, a simple instructions slide could look more like this, for example: Learning Objectives Objectives give learners an overview of the course goals. Usually presented in bullet point format, the list shows actionable tasks the learner should be able to do after completing the course. However, objectives don’t have to be listed in bullet point format. Often, it’s the client, business partner, or organizational style guide that requires objectives to be presented that way. There’s a trend in the e-learning industry to find creative alternatives to the bulleted format. For example, you could create an accordion interaction in Rise so your learners can explore the different objectives at their own pace, like in the screenshot below: Or, if you’re using a slide-based tool like Storyline, you can create a stylized objectives layout to catch your learner’s eye: Here are some additional resources and discussions on making bullet points more engaging: Convert Your Bullet Points to Interactive E-Learning with Video Five Surefire Ways to Get Rid of Bullet Points Ideas on Getting Rid of Bullet Points to State Course Objectives Reducing Bullet Points and On-Screen Text Animating Bullet Points — Is It Possible to Animate More Than One? Content This section is the meat of your course, where all the learning happens. Here you can include text, images, charts, tabs or timeline interactions, scenarios, screencasts, videos, and much more. There are many different ways to present your content, but here are a couple of ideas to get you started. Text and Images Example created in Rise Content Library template available in Storyline 360 Scenarios Example created in Rise Content Library template available in Storyline 360 Timeline Interactions Example created in Rise Content Library template available in Storyline 360 Depending on your content and course objectives, your course could include just one or two of these elements, or all of the above and much more! Let your objectives guide you through the creation process and help you decide how to best present your content to help your learners reach their target. Practice Activities The purpose of practice activities is to help learners strengthen their skills and knowledge. As such, they should include content presented earlier in the module so learners can apply what they just learned. Here’s an example of a practice activity you can create in Rise: And here’s another example created in Storyline 360: Knowledge Checks & Assessments Knowledge checks and assessments are quizzes at the end of each topic, module, or course, where learners can test their progress during a module. The main difference between the two types of quizzes is that knowledge checks do not generally count toward the final score, while assessments do. They might look like typical quizzes (i.e., true/false, multiple choice, etc.), or take on a more casual format, such as a scenario in which learners must make decisions about what to do in a real-life situation. Check out this example of a quiz question created in Rise: And this one created in Storyline 360 : Summary At the end of each topic, module, and course you’ll often find a summary of the key points from that section. They can include links to additional resources to help highly motivated learners take their knowledge to the next level. In Rise, that could look something like this, for example: Or if you’re working in Storyline or another slide-based app, you could create a slide like this one: Contact Info & Resources At the end of each course you’ll usually find contact information for the trainer or subject matter expert (SME) as well as some additional resources to help support learners as they apply the skills they’ve learned in the course to their jobs. Typically they include one or more of the following: Contact information: People to contact for help or questions about the course Continued learning: Additional resources beyond what was in the course Job aids: Handouts from the course that can be used as performance support In Rise, you could create something that looks like this, for example: Or you could build a slide like this in Storyline or another slide-based app: Final Thoughts As a course designer, you have unlimited options for combining e-learning elements in your courses. Your experience level, combined with expectations for your course and learners, will influence many of your choices. If you’re a new e-learning designer, try covering these common elements to start. Good luck! Leave a comment or post in the forums if you have any other questions about these e-learning elements or want to share ideas for combining them in unique ways. Follow us on Twitterand come back to E-Learning Heroes regularly for more helpful advice on everything related to e-learning.When Is Blended Learning the Right Strategy?
I’ve been taking a LinkedIn Learning course to develop my creative writing skills. The course consists of a series of short video lessons followed by exercises that let me practice what I’ve just learned. It’s self-directed, convenient, and, well, just plain fun. I’ve enjoyed the course so much that it got me thinking: Why shouldn’t every learning experience be like this? Why would anyone drag themselves into a classroom setting with a droning instructor when they could sit at home in their stretchy pants and Star Wars tee learning at their own pace how to be an amazing writer? This is learning done right! But then a visit to my dental hygienist made me rethink my ideas. As she scraped away at my gums, she told me about a course she’s taking to get certified in new torture laser technology and techniques. To pass the course, she’s completing several hours of e-learning and attending hands-on clinics. She must also pass a written exam and get certified by an instructor who will observe her technique while she’s using the device. As a patient, I have to say I feel a whole lot better knowing that she gets lots of training and practice before she starts poking around in my mouth with a lightsaber. But just imagine if she’d told meshe's learning how to use this new laser technology by simply watching a few videos—no practice, no feedback from an expert? Just her winging it … with a laser … in my mouth. That’s a big ol’ nope! Blended Learning Considerations The beauty of using a simple, self-directed approach to learn creative writing is clear: It’s empowering to tackle topics when and where I want to learn them. No one is supervising me or checking up on my work. The self-directed approach works for this topic because the consequences of screwing up a creative writing assignment are pretty low. But if I’d been trying to learn a higher-risk skill like, say, how to laser people’s gums, relying entirely on a self-directed approach, without any guidance or feedback from an instructor or peers, probably would’ve left me feeling frustrated, intimidated, and unsupported, even with a good foundation of prior knowledge. That’s where my dental hygienist’s blended learning strategy makes much more sense. By using independent study activities (like e-learning) she’s empowered to learn at her own pace. And the hands-on clinics give her opportunities to practice and get feedback on her actual performance, making her feel supported. It’s that combo of empowerment and support that can make blended learning a winning strategy for driving learningAND performance outcomes. So, how can you tell if a blended strategy is the right way to go? Here are a few things to consider: Are you addressing a critical performance gap? Let’s say your factory was just fined for safety violations after an employee was injured in a preventable forklift accident. Not only do you have a high-risk, high-profile safety concern, you’ve got a critical performance gap you need to address—pronto. Taking a blended approach to this challenge might look like a mixture of videos or e-learning to increase awareness; hands-on practice and targeted feedback to help build skills; and ongoing coaching, refresher training, or other periodic interventions to foster a sustained focus on safety. Such a robust response could empower and support your learners and demonstrate renewed operational rigor to regulators. Are you trying to developyour learners in multiple areas and help them grow their skills over time? In today’s competitive employment environment, attracting and developing future leaders is a high priority for many organizations. But all of the nuanced behaviors that make someone a skilled, effective leader taketime todevelop. When you’re trying to support learners as they grow into new, more complex and demanding roles in the org, using a blended strategy is a natural fit. With blended learning, it’s about looking beyond individual training events and exploring a full range of complementary training options that give learners plenty of time and space to practice and learn from their mistakes. A blended strategy for future leaders might look like a carefully crafted combination of mentoring and job shadowing with current leaders, along with more structured interventions like online and instructor-led courses designed to build critical skills. Is it a topic you’ve already trained them on? Sometimes new training projects stem from an old training need that wasn’t fully understood or adequately addressed in the first place. Maybe you’ve given your sales team a robust e-learning curriculum on selling skills, but later analysis of key performance indicators (KPIs) points to them not being very good at actually closing the sale. This information could be your clue that using a blended approach like e-learning as pre-work to a facilitated classroom experience, along with incorporating more frequent spot-coaching from managers, might be a better way to close this performance gap—and increase sales. Summary At this point, it may sound like you should almost always use a blended strategy. But before you reinvent the training wheel, keep in mind that it’s a good instructional design rule of thumb to start with learning outcomes, rather than specific modalities or technologies. In other words, focus on getting a full understanding of the needs of the project, your organization’s goals, and the needs of the training audience, and then figure out what strategies will get you the desired outcomes. A solid needs analysis is the starting point for identifying effective strategies. To learn more tips for conducting an effective needs analysis, check out this article from Nicole Legault. And while you’re digging into the topic of training needs analysis, don’t miss this free, exhaustive list of needs analysis questions you can use for your next project. What are your experiences with blended learning? When and how did you know it was the right approach? Leave me a comment or post your story in our Building Better Courses forum to strike up a conversation with even more e-learning pros. Subscribe to our newsletter to get the latest e-learning inspiration and insights directly in your inbox. You can also find us on LinkedIn and X (formerly Twitter). And if you have questions, please share them in the comments.8 Business Use Cases for Microlearning
Are you excited to try out microlearning, but unsure when to use it? Below, we outline eight common workplace situations that benefit from a short-form course. Each situation includes a sample microlearning. At the end, learn how you can customize these templates for your own company and training needs. 1. Create Organizational Alignment To hit a business target, everyone needs to be moving in the same direction. Creating that alignment starts with clear, frequent communication of the shared mission, vision, and values. Microlearning can help. The following editable template shows how you can align employees through regular executive “micro” updates: Executive Update 2. Highlight HR Information, Notices, or Reminders Educating employees about annual events like open enrollment, tax season, and compliance training is a critical function of HR teams. The problem? Important announcements often get missed when they’re embedded in long paragraphs or endless emails. Grab the following templates to see how microlearning makes HR communications more digestible and engaging: A Quick Guide To Open Enrollment Internal Company Newsletter 3. Strengthen Company Culture and DEI Initiatives Fostering an inclusive company culture is a continuous process—not a one-time effort. A series of microlearnings can support your larger culture-building and DEI efforts. Check out the following examples for ideas on how to get started: Are You an Ally? Try Taking on These 5 Roles How To Identify and Stop Using Ableist Language Gossip-Proof Your Workplace 4. Streamline Business Processes You can also use microlearning to document and streamline business processes or workflows—such as employee onboarding or performance management. Notice how the following examples make it easy for employees to work through the steps of a process independently: New Hire Pre-Hire Checklist Performance Review and Feedback 5. Increase Security Awareness Most successful data breaches, phishing attacks, and other cybersecurity incidents are caused by human error. Adding refresher microlearnings throughout the year can fortify your defenses. See an example for safeguarding against phishing attacks below: Spot the Phish 6. Enhance Employee Wellness A successful business needs thriving employees. But employee wellness training often ends up buried under competing priorities. Microlearning makes it easy for employees to fit in short breaks for self-care throughout the workday. Check out these two wellness-related microlearning examples: 3 Desk Stretches to Instantly Improve Your Day 5 Tips for Better Naps 7. Provide Quick-Reference Guides Microlearning is the perfect resource for one-off training questions: Employees can quickly find the answers they need—when they need them. Below, we’ve created templates for product and software training. But you could easily create quick-reference guides for sales, customer service, and other teams. Get To Know [Name of Product] Software Training 8. Reinforce and Assess Key Takeaways Finally, who says you have to choose between a more sizable course and microlearning? Repetition aids retention. Consider following up longer training sessions with a microlearning quiz, scenario, or summary. The examples listed below demonstrate how you might do this: Can You Recover From a Workplace Mistake? Training Refresher Wrap-Up There’s no shortage of creative ways you can use microlearning to achieve your business training objectives. The examples above are just a starter list. You might also check out submissions to one of our weekly community challenges, 40+ Microlearning Examples Created in Rise 360 #407. Interested in customizing one of these examples for your team? If you’re an Articulate 360 subscriber or trialer, you can edit all of the examples linked throughout this post by choosing the course from our Rise 360 microlearning content templates. Here’s a short video showing how to do that: What’s the latest microlearning course you’ve created? Tell us about it in the comments—and feel free to ask any questions you might have! Like this article? Subscribe to our newsletter to get the latest e-learning inspiration and insights directly in your inbox. You can also find us on LinkedIn and Twitter.What's the PADDIE Model of Instructional Design?
You just landed a consulting job helping a company ramp up their new-hire training. You’ll be the one-stop shop for creating onboarding materials. How exciting! It’s a big-name client and you’re eager to start. You sit down to begin your needs analysis and you freeze—not only are you missing a project budget, but there’s no timeline or list of stakeholders. You don’t even have a style guide, much less contact information for someone in the marketing department to get one. Where did you go wrong? You’re positive the analysis stage of ADDIE is the right place to start. But if that’s right, why are you missing key information? If you’ve ever reached for the ADDIE model and found it’s not enough, you know the scenario I described intimately. Although it’s a tried-and-true method, the ADDIE model is lacking a core piece of any project—planning. Enter PADDIE, the ADDIE model with planning! But why PADDIE? And what are some of the key things that should happen in the planning stage? This article will discuss just that. Why PADDIE I’ve always thought ADDIE was the weak link in an otherwise robust group of instructional design methodologies. Over the course of my career I’ve found its linear stages restrictive and its lack of planning frustrating. I’ve never been able to successfully launch a project straight from the analysis phase. At a minimum, you need to know what you’re analyzing and your basic project parameters before kicking off! As a new instructional designer, there were a few times I ended up in hot water because I didn’t realize how crucial planning was. No one told me to do a deeper dive into the project background before starting the analysis. Learn from my mistakes and include a robust planning stage up front. What to Include in the Planning Stage When you first kick off a project, there are certain things you need in order to be successful. Without this information, you’ll miss project milestones, blow your budget, and probably frustrate your stakeholders. Let’s take a look at key items to nail down in the planning stages of your project to ensure everything goes smoothly. Agree on a project timeline and deliverables. Once you get your deadline from the client and agree on key delivery dates, you’ll commit to what will be delivered on those dates and who to send the deliverables to. You can also use this to solicit buy-in from subject matter experts and get everyone involved to commit to the timeline. Review your project budget and plan accordingly. Compare the amount of money the client can spend to the time it’ll take to complete the project. If the hours to complete the project exceed their budget, go back to the client and negotiate course features—such as length. Looking at this up front is a great way to ensure the project is feasible. Talk to your stakeholders or reviewers and agree on a chain of command. It’s not always clear who should review your project deliverables —like scripts and storyboards—or in what order. By defining the order in which people will review—and who gets final say—you’ll save time in the review stages and ensure you prioritize the right feedback. Identify additional resources and where to get them. Do you need to use a course template the client provides? Is there a style guide to follow? Who provides this information? Knowing what additional information you need and requesting it from the right person is key to staying on track! While these are all great considerations for the planning stage, there are definitely other things to keep in mind. I’ve found the more I know, the smoother my project goes. So make sure to keep an eye out for additional information that can help you. Wrap-Up Hopefully you’re feeling confident about your course design process and see the value of including a planning phase up front! If you’d like additional information on ADDIE or other instructional design methodologies and theories, check out the links below: An Introduction to the ADDIE Model for Instructional Designers 26 E-Learning Examples to Help Course Designers Learn About the ADDIE Model An Introduction to SAM for Instructional Designers An Introduction to Bloom’s Taxonomy for Instructional Designers E-Learning Project Plan Subscribe to our newsletter to get the latest e-learning inspiration and insights directly in your inbox. You can also find us on LinkedIn and X (Formerly Twitter).What is Design Thinking and Why Does it Matter?
If you’ve ever attended a conference or workshop with any kind of a design focus—instructional, graphic, web design, etc.—you may have encountered the term “design thinking.” Sounds serious and important, doesn’t it? And in a field where so many of us have no formal design background, the idea of adding “design thinking” to your already full plate of responsibilities may sound like a nonstarter. But before you write off design thinking as yet another impossible task or dismiss it as a trendy buzzword, let’s give it a closer look to uncover what it is, why it matters for training, and how it works. (Spoiler alert: Design thinking may be something you’re already doing!) What is design thinking? In a nutshell, design thinking is a process for creative problem-solving. Using techniques like brainstorming, along with other collaborative activities, a project team puts themselves into the end user’s shoes—to experience problems from their perspective. By getting everyone to set aside their preconceived ideas and truly empathize with users, the design-thinking process paves the way for identifying creative solutions that actually address a user’s problems in a meaningful way. If that explanation feels a little squishy, here’s an explanation of design thinking that really struck a chord for me. It comes to us via Ideo CEO Tim Brown from his book Change by Design: “Design thinking taps into capacities we all have but that are overlooked by more conventional problem-solving practices. It is not only human-centered; it is deeply human in and of itself. Design thinking relies on our ability to be intuitive, to recognize patterns, to construct ideas that have emotional resonance as well as functionality, to express ourselves in media other than words or symbols …” What resonated with me is the idea that we all have the capacity to be design thinkers! In other words, you don’t need to be a degreed designer or a creative genius to embrace design thinking practices. If you care about solving a problem by using empathy and evidence to inform your decisions, and can embrace a spirit of collaboration and experimentation, you’ve got what it takes to be a design thinker! Why does design thinking matter for training? As we’ve just learned, design thinking is about applying a user-centric approach to the work of solving problems—which is also what course designers do when they create training. Think about it: most instructional designers spend their days analyzing the root of performance problems so they can focus on ways to creatively transform content in a way that leads to improved performance. So, as I see it, instructional design done well is a design-thinking process. How does design thinking work? As with any process, design thinking is broken down into phases. Here’s a quick overview of each of the seven phases placed in the context of a typical e-learning instructional design project. Define. You can’t tackle the problem until you give it a name, and in this phase the goal is to do just that—to articulate the problem you’re trying to solve. Research. Once you’ve defined the problem, you need to have a really good understanding of it. This involves doing your research rather than relying on your assumptions about the problem or your gut instincts. To have true understanding, you need to uncover the root of the problem and that may mean digging in, firsthand, out in the field, working in the user’s environment. In instructional design terms, this phase is at the heart of the “A” (Analysis) in ADDIE. And just like any research, it takes time to gather and analyze all of that data. Problems, particularly performance problems, often have complex, intertwined roots in things like company culture, hiring practices, onboarding, equipment quality, operating conditions, work environment—the list goes on and on. You may not uncover them all in a few hours or even in a few weeks. The big takeaway: It pays not to skimp on this phase; otherwise you may end up devising a solution that’s creative but not effective. Ideate. You’ve defined the problem and you’ve done your research. Now what? If the research points to there being a learning-based component to the problem, it’s time to start coming up with ideas. This is the fun, brainstorming/creative part of your design work. This phase may also involve pulling in folks from other teams to help you spitball ideas and maintain a user focus. At the end of this phase, you should end up with one or two solutions you can move into prototype. Prototype. Once you’ve got a few ideas to focus on, it’s time to try them out—preferably on real users. For e-learning, prototyping can take the form of a simple sketch, an outline, a storyboard, or a functional alpha built with a tool like Articulate Storyline. Whatever prototyping approach you choose, the point is to see how your ideas hold up to reality. You want things to break or be wrong at this phase so you can learn from your mistakes and then adapt or iterate on your ideas to hopefully improve upon them in a future prototype. Choose. After you’ve prototyped and learned more about the strengths and weaknesses of your solution, it’s time to choose the best of your designs to implement. In other words, this is where stuff gets real! Implement. Once you’ve designed your learning solution and developed it, it’s time to roll that baby out to the masses. For training, this may take the form of instructor-led workshops, webinars, an internal marketing campaign, an e-learning course on your LMS or website—or all of the above. Learn. Just like the “E” (Evaluate) in ADDIE, this phase is all about evaluating outcomes—how well your solution addressed the user’s problem—and learning from those outcomes to inform your approach to future projects. For e-learning, this may involve activities like holding focus groups to gather learner feedback and evaluating key performance indicators to see if your solution had the desired business impact. It’s important to clarify that design thinking isn’t a linear process. It can get messy and repetitive as you iterate and refineideas. The process encourages experimentation and the exploration of ambiguity as a means of personal growth and innovation, but that doesn’t mean everyone will be comfortable with it. While you may find that some areas of design thinking come more easily to you than others, the important thing is to embrace the growth mindset at the core of the process. More Resources I just gave you the 10,000-foot view of design thinking, but there’s so much more to learn. If you’re looking for ways to unlock your design-thinking potential, check out these resources. 5 Habits of Effective Instructional Designers 10 Tips for Becoming a Better Designer 3 Ways to Embrace Constructive Failure in Your E-Learning Harvard Business Review: Design Thinking by Tim Brown What’s your take on design thinking? Jump into the conversation and share your ideas with us. And be sure to follow us on Twitter, where we post the latest and greatest e-learning news! Want to try something you learned here, but don't have Articulate software? Download a free trial, and come back to E-Learning Heroes regularly for more helpful advice on everything related to e-learning.Freelancing 101: How to Talk Money with Your Clients
Working as an instructional design freelancer can be both fun and financially rewarding. Coordinating with clients directly, being your own boss, and getting paid well are all big advantages of going this route. But some parts of freelancing can feel kind of high stakes—like negotiating with clients. If talking about money feels scary to you—don’t worry. In this article, I’ll walk you through some tips that’ll help you feel more comfortable with it so you can ensure you’re paid fairly. 1. Do Your Research Some clients will contact you about work and lead with an hourly rate they want to pay. This is actually super helpful because it lets you rule out work that doesn’t fall within your hourly rate rangefrom the get-go. But what if they don’t immediately share a number with you? In that case, do a little research on your own to see if you can find out what they usually pay. For example, you could try checking their company job board to see if they mention an hourly rate. LinkedIn and Glassdoor are also great places to check to find out what that client is paying people in similar roles. These websites have areas where companies can share what comparable positions are making. And Glassdoor even lets former and current employees and contractors report actual numbers—which is super helpful for you as a potential freelancer! While both Glassdoor and LinkedIn have areas to share hourly rates, salaries are a little more common. But if a position shows a salary instead of an hourly rate, you can easily convert it with some quick math. A standard work year consists of around 2,000 hours. So just take any salary and divide that by 2,000 to get the hourly rate. For example, here’s what that calculation would look like for a yearly salary of $80,000: 80,000/2,000=$40 per hour. If this seems low, that’s because it is! Salaried employees are usually paid less than freelancers since they have job security and other benefits, so I usually add 50% to the hourly rate. Going back to the example, if a company has comparable positions paying $80,000, you could reasonably ask for an hourly rate of $60 or more as a freelancer. If the client doesn’t share a number and you can’t find anything online, don’t worry! That’s where tip number two comes in. 2. Get the Client to Name a Number I don’t know about you, but my heart rate always kicks up a few notches when clients lead conversations with “what do you charge per hour.” If this happens, don’t panic—and don’t automatically share your hourly rate either. Try to get the client to share a number first, as this will put you in a better position to negotiate. Sometimes, you’ll be thinking of a number and the client will say something much higher. In that case, if you had already shared your lower number, you could be losing out on a big chunk of change. So next time a client asks what you charge per hour, counter with a question of your own instead of answering straight away. Here are some examples: Do you have a rate in mind we need to work within? What have you paid someone similarly qualified in the past? What’s your budget for this project? Hopefully, asking these questions will get the client to share the number they have in mind. Once you have that information, you can decide whether to counter with your own offer or accept what they’ve offered. 3. Get the Details First Another good practice is to make sure you have enough details about the project before giving a rate. You don’t want to jump into negotiations without understanding the specifics. Some examples of question to ask are: When do you need the project completed by? Will I be the only person working on this project, or will I be part of a team? Is the content already written, or will I be writing it and developing the e-learning course? How many hours per week would you like me to dedicate to this project? If during the course of this conversation the client still won’t share a specific number, at least you’ll be armed with all the information you need to come up with a rate that makes sense on your end. Wrap-Up Remember, all conversations around pay are a negotiation, and it doesn’t hurt to ask for more money. The worst thing they can say is no! And while negotiating with clients can feel intimidating at first, it’s a skill that gets easier with practice. By following the tips we covered in this article, you can be confident you’re in a good position to negotiate the best price for your work. For more information on freelancing or other career tips, check out the articles below. 5 Factors to Consider When Deciding on an Hourly Rate Rounding Up Resources for E-Learning Freelancers 5 Tips for Landing Your Next E-Learning Job Answering Your Top Questions on Becoming an Instructional Designer Subscribe to our newsletter to get the latest e-learning inspiration and insights directly in your inbox. You can also find us on LinkedIn and X (Formerly Twitter).How to Do a Task Analysis Like a Pro
Task analysis is one of the cornerstones of instructional design. But what is it, really? The name says a lot: you analyze a task, step by step, to document how that task is completed. At first glance, this seems like a straightforward thing. But even the easiest tasks can be quite complex. Things you do every day might seem simple when you first think about them. But what happens when you eliminate internalized or assumed knowledge? Take sending an email. Easy, right? Maybe four or five steps? Click the New Mail icon Enter a Recipient Enter a Subject Enter your email text Click Send But what about carbon copy or blind carbon copy recipients? What if you need to attach an invoice or picture? What app do you use to create the email in the first place (or are you sending from Gmail in your browser)? For that matter, from which device are you sending the email? Suddenly that “simple” task is a set of processes, organized by device, operating system, and application, with various subtasks along the way accounting for mailing list complexities and the purpose of your email. As I was writing this I came up with about a dozen different variations, all of which would need to be closely analyzed and broken down precisely. Even the most average task has a lot behind it. This is why understanding how to do a task analysis is so important to becoming a successful instructional designer. When instructional designers create training, they’re teaching the learner how to accomplish something. Task analysis helps you focus on what they’re going to do and how they’ll do it (don’t worry so much about the why; that comes later). The easiest way to illustrate the process is with an example. Let’s say you work at a midsize media company and your boss asks you to complete a task analysis on how the company’s social media manager does her job. They want this documented for training purposes for future hires. That means you’ll need to: Identify the task to analyze Break down the task into subtasks Identify steps in subtasks Let’s take a closer look at each of these steps. Step 1: Identify the Task to Analyze Tasks are the duties carried out by someone on the job. The social media manager carries out a lot of duties, so you need to be able to break them down into broad activities (aka tasks!) and focus on them one at a time. Don’t worry about all the little things that make up the task; we’ll get to that in a second. Here we’re looking to paint with broad strokes. One of the social media manager’s tasks is to add new content to social media sites every morning. Your tasks should describe what a person does on the job and must start with an action verb. So, in this case, the first task to analyze is “Add new content to social media.” Step 2: Break Down the Task into Subtasks Once you identify the task, you need to identify the subtasks, the smaller processes that make up the larger task. Remember in the email example above where I mentioned attachments and carbon-copying recipients? That’s the kind of thing you capture here. These should also be brief and start with an action verb. Continuing the social media manager example, you need to find out the subtasks of adding new content to social media. You can figure this out by talking to or observing the social media manager. Through this process, you discover that the subtasks for adding new content to social media are: Check the editorial calendar Add new content to Twitter You’re making good progress! You can now move on to Step 3. Step 3: Identify Steps in Subtasks Now it’s time to get into the nitty-gritty. You’ve identified the task and broken it down into subtasks. The final step, then, is to identify and list the steps for each subtask. Do this by breaking down all of the subtasks into specific step-by-step, chronological actions. The key here is to use a “Goldilocks” approach to detail: not too much and not too little. Use just the right amount so learners can follow the instructions easily. Again, as with tasks and subtasks, your steps need to start with an action verb. So, putting everything together from steps 1 and 2 and then breaking the subtasks into steps, your final task analysis would look like this; 1. Adding new content to social media 1.1 Check the editorial calendar 1.1.1 Navigate to the calendar webpage 1.1.2 Click today’s date 1.1.3 Click newest article title to open article 1.1.4 Click inside article URL bar 1.1.5 Copy URL for article to clipboard 1.1.6 Highlight title text of article 1.1.7 Copy the title text to clipboard 1.1.8 Close the calendar 1.2 Add new content to Twitter 1.2.1 Navigate to Twitter account 1.2.2 Log in to Twitter account 1.2.3 Click Tweet button 1.2.4 Paste article title from clipboard 1.2.5 Paste article URL from clipboard 1.2.6 Click Tweet button to publish There are several ways to approach task analysis. It’s a fine art deciding how far down the rabbit hole you need to go with detail. Instructional designers can debate for hours whether saying “log in” is enough or if that needs to be broken down further into “enter user name,” “enter password,” and “click the login button.” Again, it all comes down to figuring out how much detail is just right for your audience. Wrapping Up That’s it! As you can see, while creating a task analysis boils down to “just” three steps, there are a lot of nuanced decisions to make along the way. Remember the Goldilocks Rule and always consider your audience and the seriousness of the subject matter when deciding just how nitpicky you need your task analysis to be. After all, there’s a marked difference between how much detail a learner needs when they’re learning how to perform brain surgery versus filling out their timecard. Do you have any do’s and don’ts of your own for completing a successful task analysis? If you do, please leave a comment below. We love to hear your feedback! Follow us on Twitter and come back to E-learning Heroes regularly for more helpful advice on everything related to e-learning.10 Tips for Coping With Vague E-Learning Project Requests
The typical advice when you start a new e-learning project is to find out as much as possible about the problem you’re trying to solve, the audience you’re creating it for, and your stakeholders’ vision for the solution. And while this is a best practice for a reason, sometimes it doesn’t go as planned in the real world. Maybe new regulations require you to provide training on a topic but don’t specify much other than course length. Perhaps your only guidance is that doing anything new is better than what your company is doing now. Or you could be dealing with the problem our Articulate User Conference attendees faced in this Training Trailblazers activity—stakeholders who don’t know enough about training to understand what exactly they need. So, what should you do when you need to know a lot more about a project before you can move forward? Let’s look at some useful strategies community members suggest for digging up that information! 1. Start by outlining what you do know If you feel overwhelmed by project ambiguity, sometimes the simple act of summarizing everything shared with you so far in one document can give you a better sense of what to do next. Also, if all the project conversations and decisions up to this point have been fragmented across lots of meetings and teams, your stakeholders and subject matter experts (SMEs) may not realize how little has been settled. Rounding up the few facts you have and sharing them with those partners can make it easier for you to highlight critical project gaps. 2. Create a list of questions—and experts to answer them Another way to narrow down next steps is to list the big questions that come to mind as you consider the project. Once you’ve finished your initial list, consolidate what you want to ask, ensure you’re covering all your information gaps, and triage the items so you’re asking the most vital questions first. When you finish the list, review each question and identify the best person to answer them. Project stakeholders or SMEs are logical places to start. But also consider if there are others inside or outside your organization that could have helpful information to share. 3. Analyze the problem with the project requester One source for answers can be the person or group who first contacted you for assistance. Even if they’re not experts in the material, they may have insights into what problem they want this training to solve and what they want people to do differently after they take it. If the project requester doesn’t know the answer off the top of their head, it’s worth spending some time chatting with them to try and uncover the answer. After all, if the requester doesn’t know what performance gap the training needs to fill, you’ll be hard-pressed to make that happen. 4. Get to know your audience It’s hard to design training when you don’t know much about who you’re designing it for. Learning more about your target audience can answer lots of questions about what your project should cover and formats likely to work well for them. Not sure what information is most important to find out? This article on how to do an e-learning audience analysis can guide you along the way. Your audience is also a valuable resource when your stakeholders know the gist of what they want your training to address but are foggy on the specifics. Interviewing and surveying your audience members can fill in those content gaps and give you practical ideas for what training experiences would help them the most. Not only that, but their feedback can also point out aspects of the topic you can leave out because your audience already has them mastered. 5. Research common problems and solutions If the initial request is vague about what exactly your training should cover, try exploring the most frequent issues people have with the topic and best practices for overcoming them. That way you can uncover tried-and-true ideas for your course content. This approach may not work well for niche, company-specific content or challenges. But it’s a great starting point for more general training topics, like leadership, communication, or compliance training. 6. Dig into metrics If your stakeholders aren’t sure about the specific areas your audience is struggling with, data may paint a clearer picture for you. Performance metrics can give you direct information about learner strengths and gaps. And you can infer a lot by looking into what company goals they aren’t currently meeting. This approach also has a bonus—it gives you concrete numbers to compare pre- and post-training. That’s a handy way to show the impact of what you create. 7. Consult official documentation or regulations When designing compliance training—or any courses related to legal requirements—the regulations themselves can offer guidance on the content your project needs to cover and what behaviors need to change. While it may take some work to convert this information from legal theory to real-world application, that effort puts you in a much better position to craft learning experiences that effectively meet your compliance regulations and land well with your audience. 8. Review historic courses and related training Has this training topic been covered by your organization before? Digging into what’s been done in the past may give you inspiration for what to do in the future. Old or retired courses can point out what approaches click with your audience and which fall flat. And you may even discover that you don’t have to create your project from scratch after all, but can instead rework existing course materials to meet your new training needs. To keep your course content streamlined, try investigating related courses too. That way you can spot if there are subtopics you don’t need to touch on because they’re covered in other training your audience is taking. 9. Investigate what other organizations are doing in this space Chances are, other companies are tackling similar challenges to yours. And thankfully, we work in an industry where people tend to be generous about sharing their work. Webinars, white papers, conference sessions, podcast interviews, social media posts, and articles are some of the many places you can learn about the training approaches other organizations have used. But publicly available insights aren’t the only resources to check out. Consider reaching out to former colleagues and industry connections outside your company to chat one-on-one about what training they’ve created or seen on your topic. 10. Do a needs assessment Finally, if you’re not in an emergency time crunch, one of the best ways to get all the answers you need and more is to take a step back and do a full training needs analysis. This process helps you analyze the business problem or performance gap your stakeholders want to address and determine the best approach to help—sometimes even identifying when interventions other than training are better suited for the job. Wrap-Up Vague project requests can be stressful and confusing. But these approaches can help you cut through the ambiguity, giving you the details you need to make your e-learning a success. Want more practical tips for starting a project on the right foot? Try these articles: 6 Agenda Items for Your E-Learning Project Kickoff Meeting All About Training Needs Analysis The 7 Questions You’ll Want To Ask When Deciding What Kind of Training To Create And if you’re looking for even more ideas to make every stage of e-learning design and development easier and more effective, be sure to subscribe to our newsletter to get the latest e-learning inspiration and insights directly in your inbox. You can also find us on LinkedIn and X (formerly Twitter). And if you have questions, please share them in the comments.
