For many businesses, eLearning is the future. In its most basic form, eLearning is a learning system that is based on elements of formal teaching but incorporates electronic resources to enhance the experience. As remote working and hybrid working models continue to be popular in the modern-day office, eLearning is helping all members of the team to stay informed, educated, and up to date. If you are an eLearning professional, responsible for creating content for eLearning educational programs, you likely feel quite daunted by the prospect. However, with these useful eLearning tips you’ll be equipped with the right insight you need to create an educational course that is enjoyable and informative for your learners.
10 Top Tips for Creating eLearning Content
Even if you’re new to the game of creating eLearning content, there are some handy tips and tricks you can employ to make it the most successful it can be. Here are just ten top tips to get you started…
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Know what the goal is.
The goal of the learning program is central to the whole program. This goal needs to be on a bigger perspective than simply the single course, there needs to be an overall goal as an organization that the course will help employees to work towards. Knowing the overall goal will help you as a creator to have a direction when creating the eLearning program while also helping you to be able to measure whether your efforts are working or not. This will help you to save time and money in the long run as well. Whatever your goal may be, knowing it, understanding it, and working towards it, will help you in your eLearning content creation.
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Create a content plan.
Before jumping head-on into the content creation process you need to make a plan that will outline all the basics of your strategy. Who is your target learner? What do they already know? What are the ideas that need to be included within the program? How will you help your learners reach their potential? Who is going to create the content and who will deliver it? What type of media will you use to deliver the material? Once you’ve had a good brainstorming session, you will be able to develop your ideas, collaborate with others, delegate tasks, and make the whole creation process a lot simpler and less stressful.
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Make a schedule.
With your targets in mind, in order to deliver efficient and effective training you need to create a detailed schedule to work with. This will streamline the process, prioritize tasks, and help you and the creation team stay motivated. Include dates in your schedule, such as the start date, end date, or any other important days to remember and work towards. Help every member of the team to stay on the same page by mocking them aware of the schedule and the dates to work towards.
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Understand the motivation.
Your learners need to do more than take in information – this information needs to motivate them to action. Learn more about the reasons why learners are taking your course and adapt your material and strategy to fit their needs. Discover what motivates them and create a training course that fills their need. When learners know how this course will help them personally, it will encourage them to keep working and learning.
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Put your ideas into a storyboard.
Bring your ideas to life by making your thoughts visual in the form of a storyboard. It’s a great way to visualize your ideas and organize them in an orderly way. You can use a clear storyboard to outline videos and slides to see how the course will work shot by shot. It can help you to take your ideas out of your head onto paper in a way that you can use to explain your vision to others while also refining your focus.
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Get rid of clutter and keep it simple.
Resist the urge to throw everything into your course creation because this can become confusing and overwhelming to learners. Focus on one or two pieces of media per module and limit the number of images you use to avoid distracting your learners. Instead of going overboard, keep things short and sweet in order to make the most of the reduced attention span that many people have. To make sure you’re hitting the sweet spot in duration time, test out a few different lesson lengths and see what the response is.
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Make it mobile-friendly.
A lot of learners opt for eLearning courses due to the flexibility and convenience that they bring so create the ultimate convenient experience by making the course suitable for use on mobile devices.
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Add some gamification.
Gamification uses video game designs and game elements in learning environments in order to increase the enjoyment and engagement of learners to help them stay motivated to keep moving and improving.
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Reward and incentivize.
Reward learners when they complete courses by awarding them certificates that give them a sense of achievement and help them to stay motivated. With incentives, such as being named learner of the month or receiving a discount, you can increase the engagement and motivation of learners whether they are employees or customers.
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Use feedback and data to keep improving.
Ask for feedback from your course learners and graduates to see how you can keep improving and progressing as a course developer and teacher. The data you gather from these courses can be invaluable as you make changes and improvements. You will gain useful insights into what areas of the course went well, which aspects were a struggle for certain learners, and take on board recommendations to make eLearning courses even better.
Evidently, there is much to learn about eLearning, but with the right help and support, and by following a few useful tips, you can create a course that is effective, engaging, and even entertaining!