Overcoming Death By PowerPoint (CLO Media)

If you haven't heard of Death By Powerpoint, you probably shouldn't be doing any type of Instructional Design using Powerpoint!!

http://bit.ly/2cn3D

The Font Conference

If you haven't seen this hilarious video about the conference of fonts... you simply must!

http://bit.ly/6qiwU

Text With Audio In Your Presentations?

The debate has been going on for some time whether or not there truly are different "learning" styles. Then we went on to debate whether or not we should include text on screen with our audio: some say its distracting for the so-called auditory learners. I say text with audio is the right thing to do - if done right!

Jim Henson "got it". Watch this very old clip of Kermit the Frog and see what I mean.

MoodleMoot Oklahoma

I didn't get to attend MoodleMoot Oklahoma, but it looks like I really missed out on some good learning for myself and my organization. Thankfully some of the learning is still available as an archive, minus the human interaction that occurs at an event like this (which is where the real benefit is, in my opinion).

Activating Change Webinar

I attended this webinar back in June, 2008. Some interesting points about managing change in an organization. Of course they're trying to sell stuff as almost all webinars do, but there is still some good information contained in it.

» Here’s Why Unlocking Your Course Navigation Will Create Better Learning The Rapid eLearning Blog

» Here’s Why Unlocking Your Course Navigation Will Create Better Learning The Rapid eLearning Blog:

Most of our corporate compliance training rules are very loosely defined and vague - on purpose, giving us room for interpretation and implementation. A simple example is rules about HIPAA and data security/passwords. Ask 50 different hospitals what that means and how they implement it, and you’ll get 50 different answers.

Does this type of training have to be as boring and wasteful (of time) as it currently is in most organizations? NO! We can do better. One simple method is to allow your users to “test out” of the courses.

We are required to have annual “training” on certain core topics for compliance reasons. We allow users to go straight to the test. If they pass, there’s no need to force them to view the course at all. We are working on re-doing the course navigation to allow users to go to the sections where they are weak (I hope to automate this process).

One reason trainers and educators get a bad rap is that we waste people’s time - a lot! (Think about your most boring college professor who loved to lecture on and on about something you cared nothing for, but you were required to take the course! He probably felt very powerful preaching to his captive audience. Remember how you wanted to skip that class each week?)

We do it because it meets our need for power. “You absolutely MUST view every single slide and read every single paragraph and diagram, because I say so and ‘the law requires it.’”

Yeah right! We use that as an excuse to meet our own power agenda. If we align ourselves with the organization’s business goals we will see that many of our courses can become much more “Lean” (ever heard of Lean Management?) - including our statutory or compliance courses!

» The 3 Essential Questions Every Learner Wants Answered The Rapid eLearning Blog

» The 3 Essential Questions Every Learner Wants Answered The Rapid eLearning Blog

Another great blog from Tom Kuhlman at Articulate. My comments are quoted here:

... I almost always start with question #3: how will I prove what I know? This was one of the important points taught to me during my BS.Ed. courses on creating Evaluations and Assessments. It’s a Covey-ism “begin with the end in mind.” My dad called it “thinking like an engineer.” Bottom line: start with how you will assess the learning, then work backwards from there to design learning objectives which will allow the student to pass the assessment. Its a simple concept that can accommodate very complex learning situations.

Of course, good instructional design really doesn’t start with the assessment. It starts much earlier defining learning goals and aligning them with business goals, etc. But, assuming those are done and out of the way… when the rubber meets the road - you start with the assessment. Then you create multiple learning activities designed to help the student pass the assessment. This is, in a nutshell: Mastery Learning.

For corporate elearning, it's all about Mastery Learning, right? When would it not be about Mastery Learning? The only time I can think of is when one must comply with some statutory regulations which require an organization to document a certain amount of training annually or periodically. In those cases, just make the assessment the first thing you do in the course. If you fail the initial assessment, then you must take the course and complete a final assessment.