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7 Technical Pitfalls to Avoid when Creating eLearning Content

Creating high end eLearning content is a time consuming process. Therefore, it’s important not to undermine the final results by making mistakes during the design and development phase. Some of the more easily avoidable mistakes are:

1. Omitting interactive eLearning elements

2. Under-utilising tables when organising information and text

3. Not designing a logical or intuitive navigational flow

4. Not providing learners with control over auditory elements

5. Overdoing the graphical content!

6. Not having a responsive design

7. Including obsolete resource links

Read the full article exploring each of technical mistakes listed above at http://elearningindustry.com/7-technical-pitfalls-can-ruin-elearning-experience.

Creating eLearning Content for the Online Reader

documentsThere’s a wealth of information on the Web providing advice about how to create eLearning content for the online reader. One of the best articles we’ve read recently, comes from SHIFT’s eLearning Blog.

Some of the practical tips to remember when creating content are listed below.

  • Some users can spend up to 69% of the time on the left side of the screen.
  • Less than 20% of content on an average web page is read!
  • It takes on average 2.6 seconds for web page visitors to form their first impressions of your content.
  • Dominant headlines capture attention faster.
  • Use graphics to reinforce text. We process visual information faster than text.
  • Use whitespace on a page generously.
  • Use a readable size and type of font.

And remember that we read online content more slowly than when reading articles or content on paper!

When you are next creating articles or content for online users, consider the points above. Rather than simply uploading paper based articles as online documents, why not edit the documents down, add graphics and make points of information succinct. Readers will remember more!

Interactive Design – What’s in Store for 2013

Instructional DesignIf you get a few minutes to spare, check out the Prophets Agency presentation on Slideshare.net titled “ID13: the 2013 trends in Interactive Design”. It presents some interesting facts, such as that 40 billion apps have been downloaded since 2008 (Apple Press Center.) But for those, like CramdenTECH, who are on the lookout for trends that are likely to impact on instructional design, it makes for very welcome reading! This quote from Richard Cracroft is a new favourite of ours:

“I have learned an important principle: simple things work, often to our dumbfounded surprise, for we tend to distrust the simple and strive for the complex.”

In CramdenTECH we’ve learned that in eLearning, the focus should be on delivering quality content with consistent service delivery, not on the technology that is used to provide the experience. Hence, we prefer the term “technology-enabled learning”. Or, to quote Jeff Bezos:

“People don’t want gadgets, they want services“