Asking the right questions will allow you to determine if the custom content design of your elearning course is effective. The design is important because it is the main factor that affects the elearning experience of the learner. If you ask the wrong questions, you usually end up wasting precious time and money while failing to meet your goals in the online course.
By phrasing the right questions, you should be able to start your thought processes with the right frame of mind. If you take the correct first step, you will have no problems hitting the ground running as you efficiently fulfill your custom content initiatives.
Here are the 4 questions that will take your elearning content creation to the next level.
What content is the learner expecting?
Most of the time, elearning designers are focused on jamming all the content into the course. There are courses that are more difficult to create simply because of the huge data that has to be included. How do you filter what to include so you can provide the learners with what they need and when they need it? While filtering is necessary, it usually comes second to what you have to do. You need to, first and foremost, shift your focus to the learners. While you take into consideration the custom content that has to included in the course, you need to ask yourself if that is what the learners expect from this learning experience. By taking their perspective, you effectively create a course that is highly valuable since it is based on the needs of those who will access it.
What behavior do you want your learners to develop?
To take the first question to the next level, you should think about the behavior that you want the learners to develop when they go through your custom content. It is not enough that you give them what they need to know. What matters in the real world is what they can do. Don’t you realize that smart people does not necessarily succeed – well, at least, their success is limited. Those who really end up excelling are those who are “street smart” because they rely on experience and not just what they get from the books. Concentrate on observable behavior rather than statistics. That will give the results that your learners are expecting.
How can they relate to the custom content?
A popular mistake that elearning designers make is to let learners know what the course can offer them. While this is essentially correct, it is not enough. You do not tell them the trade off by enumerating what they will get from the money they will pay for the course. What you want to do is to create the course in such a way that makes it valuable to them. The key to that is by making it relatable. Cite instances that will make it easy for them to put themselves in the shoes of the characters you will use in the elearning course.
How can you make the course memorable?
Take note that this is not about memorization. Our brain can only memorize so much. If you notice, our best life memories are connected to strong emotions. If there is a strong emotion involved, you can be assured that you will remember it. This is why you need to make an emotional connection with your learners. Use emotionally compelling situations so learners can associate concepts and ideas with the emotions they are feeling during that time. The more you let them react emotionally, the more you will leave a mark on your learners.
These questions will allow you to follow the right thought processes that will help you create the right elearning custom content. If you use these questions as your guide, it will help you produce an effective online course for learners.
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