About the challenge

Whether it makes sense or not, people with no instructional design background are being asked to create boatloads of eLearning.   College teachers generate learning objects and post them to learning management systems.  Human resource personnel use tools like Captivate and pump out content in support of one thing or another.  Technical writers are called upon to create interactive media.

I've had occasion to review a lot of college eLearning and recently I looked at eLearning resources produced in companies by people unschooled or inexperienced in interactive design.  The stuff was dreadful. 

On the flip side, I've worked for design companies that engaged writers, graphic designers, media producers and programmers in the production of eLearning.  The results were wonderful; the cost was dreadful.

Obviously, it is not always feasible to take every learning objective and turn it into a six figure project.  Sometimes we are called upon to produce a resource on a shoestring budget.  But it doesn't always have to be dreadful.  In fact we can learn a few things from the pros and make our eLearning interactive, engaging and, above all, effective.

Creating effective eLearning efficiently requires the right tool.  There is a host of tools in the marketplace that appeal to non programmers.  Examples are Captivate, Articulate and Lectora.  For my lesson, I'll choose the LodeStar eLearning authoring tool because I created it for just this purpose.  That is, rapid eLearning for non-programmers.  Notwithstanding, what I have to say applies to any of the rapid authoring tools.  

Clayton M. Christensen, author of Disrupting Class, has made a prediction.  In 10 years, computer-based, student-centric learning will account for 50 percent of the “seat miles” in U.S. schools. By 2024, roughly 80 percent of courses will be taught this way.    Recently, I was asked to design seven courses for a Fortune 500 company.  The courses were targeted to 30,000 students.

Whether or not it is engaging or effective, eLearning is being produced and consumed at an unprecedented rate.  Therefore, committing time to make it engaging and effective has a huge potential to convert tens of thousands of dreadful, boring, ineffective experiences into interesting, engaging and effective ones.  Learning about effective eLearning strategies is extremely relevant.

Much of my thinking about eLearning isn't original.  It comes from the writings of many observant and thoughtful people in this field.  But I have had the benefit of experience.  I have been producing computer based training for more than twenty years and I founded and directed a school where I observed young students interacting with eLearning.   I enjoyed that experience for 10 years. 

There are many prolific writers in the field of instructional design.  They range from researchers to the practitioners who can effectively apply the research.  In the former category, I have gained much from David Merrill, David Jonassen,  Robert Gagne, Benjamin Bloom, Patricia Smith and Tillman Regan. 

In the latter category, I have benefited from the writings and presentations of Dr. Michael Allen  (e.g.,  Michael Allen's Guide to eLearning)  and Sivasailam Thiagarajan, known affectionately and simply as Thiagi. 

But as B.F. Skinner once said to David Merrill, "Hell, do you think I believe everything I wrote?",  similarly too much reading can be a bad thing and we continuously need to observe where the rubber meets the road.  We need to observe our audience interacting with our designs and providing us with the inadvertent response - one of engagement or one of boredom.   It's tough to realize outcomes, when students are bored to death.

Sivasailam Thiagarajan (Thiagi) offers us a simple antidote to boring, passive learning.  He provides us with some laws of learning that if obeyed universally would transform the state of eLearning overnight.  Rather than reiterating the laws here, I offer a link to the marvelous words of Thiagi. 

http://www.thiagi.com/laws-of-learning.html

My contribution will be to focus on two of these 'laws' and demonstrate how I incorporated them in my rapidly produced eLearning lesson on Time Management.  I'll give an example of the Law of Relevance and the Law of Active Learning.

My challenge was to create a short unit on time management.  I know nothing about time management.  I borrowed some content shamelessly from the internet.  The point has nothing to do with content but some considerations when organizing the content and the strategies one can use to engage the learner.  This is a simple project - but one that instructors and technical writers and human resource folks can produce within their time constraints.  Again, it's not about content; it's about instructional strategies.

The tool that I'm using is the LodeStar eLearning authoring tool.  The LodeStar template that I am using is Brancher.

Thiagi's Laws of Learning

Law of relevance:  Effective learning is relevant to the learner’s
life and work.

I wanted the relevance of time management to strike a chord with learners immediately.  Because the challenge was to produce this unit within a few hours, I couldn't produce a motivational video but I could easily find one on YouTube, TeacherTube, Blip.TV or some other source.  It turned out that Blip.TV had just the thing learners needed:  a motivational talk by Lee Cockerell, which is shared under a Creative Commons license. Learners view the video and receive a clear expression of why time management is important.  Learners are, at least, told the message that they are in 'control' of their lives.  Learners are more successful when they assume the 'locus of control' versus blaming outside forces.

This is just a video snippet and not even a complete one.  There are many exceptional videos on the net that can truly inspire the viewer across all sorts of subject areas.

Through video, learners might recognize that the topic has relevance outside of the classroom - in the workforce, for example.   

Through video, learners might see the topic come alive in ways that are richer than text and still graphics. 

But video isn't the only way to establish relevance.   On the following page, I make a case why this topic is relevant from content produced by Dr. Donald Wetmore. 

Effective Time Management Can Change Your Life

Effective Time Management can convert a frustrating work environment into a productive rewarding environment.

There are many ways to ways to accomplish this and probably more effectively.  The point remains: learners must appreciate the relevance of the eLearning before they will engage.   As Thiagi writes, tell them what they will do that they couldn't do before.

Law of active learning:  Active responding produces more effective learning than passive listening or reading.

This is one of my favorite considerations and one that I wove into the fabric of the Time Management lesson. 

Active Learning Example 1

Here is how I did it. First I created some tiles that held statements about Time Management.  Some statements were true and others false.   The learner had to drag the statements to the True and Not True columns.  The point of the exercise was to engage students by requiring them to draw from their own experience and evaluate each statement.  I could have easily listed the facts.  Instead a little more effort produced an opportunity for active learning.

When the learners completed the exercise, they would receive simple feedback.  Either they were right or wrong.  I didn't disclose the errors.  The literature may disagree on this point, but my observations in computer labs showed that when the right answers were too easy to get, students tuned out.  In this case, the students could decide to move on without successfully completing the exercise.  They then learned the true facts about Time Management.   

One would hope that students would overcome the cognitive dissonance of getting the exercise wrong by paying attention to the true facts.  Cognitive dissonance generally refers to the discomfort students feel when they observe a discrepancy between what they know or believe and new information.

If the students find the learning relevant this might indeed be the case.  In any event, this is a point of control.  When do you reveal information? When do you simply state versus having the students infer?  What is the balance between cognitive dissonance and simple frustration?  These decisions and many more help to shape the design of your activity.    

Active Learning Example 2

In the next active learning example, I presented a scenario.  Again, I could have simply listed the behaviors of good time management.  Make a plan. Prioritize. Etc.  Students could passively receive this information and perhaps even create a mnemonic device to remember it for an exam.  PPP.  Plan, prioritize, proceed…whatever.  Instead, my hope was to activate their thinking by presenting a scenario - a slice from a restaurant manager's morning -- and challenge the learner to identify why each behavior was an example of time mismanagement.  Again, in active learning, you are not telling.  You are asking students to think for themselves.

The activity is followed by a section that reviews each behavior and offers an improved behavior that exercises an effective time management principle.  The instructor could then take this one step further and offer a similar scenario in an online or classroom discussion.  The students would comment on the behaviors and offer an alternative that makes use of their new learning.  

Active Learning Example 3

This is one of my favorites because fairly inexpensively instructors can provide an opportunity for students to apply their learning.  This is a decision game.  The students are given a scenario and asked to make decisions. 

 In my example, students are given a scenario snippet like the following:

You are an assistant manager of a Dairy Queen restaurant.  You arrive to work at 8:30 AM.  The restaurant opens at 11:00 AM for lunch.  You are the first to arrive.  Decide what you should do first.

Make a very detailed list of day's goals and under each goal list the objectives.

Make a quick planning to-do list.

Clean up a mess that was left over from yesterday's shift so that you can get a clean start on the day.

Based on their decision, the scenario goes down one path or another.   At the end, the student is awarded a gold, silver or bronze medal for time management decision making.Decision-making games enable instructors to present real-life scenarios and cause students to apply their new learning to these novel situations. 

Conclusion

Now students will never see this Time Management unit because it was never intended for students.  It was simply intended to demonstrate that one could take any topic and if within a few hours produce active versus passive content.   With some effort as well as the right tools and strategies, instructors have the opportunity of creating instructional activities that constitute a true learning experience.   

To view the lesson on time management, visit

 http://www.engagelearner.org/lodestar/Curriculum_First/TimeManagement/