Even if you are an old hand at designing or running eLearning courses, have you actually stopped to think what employees really think about your courses? Ask yourself if your courses tick all of the boxes on the eLearning development scale. Are your courses engaging, informative and intuitive? If the answer is no, then this is an area for you to focus on. All courses whether eLearning or the old traditional method of training requires a compelling element to them and it is so important to capture the attention of those who are signing up to your course so that they can develop their skills. Courses must also be informative but written in bite-sized chunks so that they are mentally digestible. They have to be intuitive because the last thing you will wish for is for employees to have trouble navigating or learning the information.
When you create a course, you have to also think with the mindset of an employee. Consider from all angles too. What if you have a learner who is not au fait with online learning modules or who knows little about the subject? Is your course perfect for all levels of eLearning development? Does it give scope for progression? Ideally courses and modules can blend beautifully and lead onto the next or provide the option to do so. It depends if you are writing courses for companies that only need a course on a specific topic and this might have limitations for expansion.
Depending on your remit, it is worth asking employees what they want for their eLearning development. You may be surprised at the answers. It is impossible to please everybody all of the time but you can at least take some of the points onboard. Some employees are glad of the time away from their workspace so that they can settle into the learning program but others will feel the opposite, and resent the time away from the job at hand so learning material has to appeal to both as much as possible. Some people will require in-depth information and others want only the essential details and you also have to take into account the learning styles of people. Some will require something tangible such as supporting documentation, others will rely on visual clues and others will benefit from audio. If you can include various learning tools that appeal naturally to people you will find that learners respond in a beneficial way.
When you are creating online eLearning development systems, you have to know the true purpose of the course and marry the needs of the company with the needs of the employees who will be using the systems. Some information can be hyperlinked allowing easy access to relevant information but this can be confusing if too many links are littered throughout, so it can be advisable to limit this and use it for add-on information only.
You must also map into the course the learning time required for completion and this means testing the course before it is finalized using a user acceptance testing environment where those users can provide feedback as to the practicality of the course, the time required and any suggestions for improvement.
Many learners will appreciate summaries of work learned, quizzes and mock tests before completing any module and these can be quirky tests to capture the imagination and to make the learner think or they can be serious academic style question and answers. Just remember that too much information too quickly can be disastrous for your eLearning development system and it has to be paced just right if you wish to engage those who would be using it. The tip for success is to plan the whole course and provide a tightly written structure before crafting the technical aspects.
Author Bio
David Miller is an educational researcher who has vast experience in the field of teaching, Online testing and training. He is associated with prestigious universities and many leading educational research organizations. He’s also an ed-tech veteran, currently pursuing research in new eLearning developments and contributing author with ProProfs.
