The job of an eLearning training program designer is not limited to just designing and developing the content, but to also keep their learners motivated throughout the course. With the disadvantage of them being not able to have a face to face interaction with the students, it is tougher to curate and build informative as well as engaging content for their programs.
The solution to this problem is given by Instructional Design Strategy Ideas. In this article we will get to know about different approaches and ideas of instructional design strategy, which not only help in enhancing any eLearning program’s content, but also make it easier for the learning lot to understand and retain in their memory.
APPROACH 1: To discover the basics of motivation
There have been various theories and models proposed by renowned scholars all over the world, but the most trusted of all has to be the ARCS model, proposed by psychologist John Keller, which includes four basic elements of learning motivation namely: Attention, Relevance, Confidence, and Satisfaction. It is considered to be a mandatory lesson to be at least scanned through before getting into the depth of learning and training motivation.
- ATTENTION: This is a vital step involved in the process of engaging and motivating the learners. In context with eLearning, to grasp attention of the audience, one must incorporate intriguing tricks like short video clips, animations and storytelling in their content and delivery.
- RELEVANCE: It has been observed that a lot of eLearning courses do not end up getting successful just because the audience is not aware of the relevance of what they are being taught and the content that they are provided with. Therefore, it is suggested to always educate students about the concerned eLearning course prior to its beginning, so that they have a direction towards the knowledge that they will be furnished with.
- CONFIDENCE: It is not certain if the motivation of all the learners will be high all through the course. Many might lose it to the thought of not achieving the set goals, and in this case, to boost up the confidence of the candidate, it is suggested to be up front and keep all the learners informed about how long they will take to complete the course, all through the eLearning training program.
- SATISFACTION: Every human being is a learner, and is always delighted if rewarded for some task. In the same way, here in eLearning training programs, if the learners are rewarded after reaching a particular milestone in their course, it automatically motivates them to perform better in reaching their goals.
APPROACH 2: To ponder upon the STRUCTURE
If an eLearning program is well structured, then it adds to the “C” (confidence) of the ARCS model which we have already learned about previously. It tends to increase the confidence of the learners towards finishing the whole eLearning course, as it gives them an opportunity to visualize the whole structure of what they are going to get taught. You can alter your conventional structure with the following tips to make it more intriguing and learner-friendly:
- Change perspective from generic to specific.
- Try to make your concepts practical and realistic than imaginary.
- Make it organized; make sure to have an introduction, a body and conclusion.
APPROACH 3: Visual content incorporation
It is well known to the world that anything can be made to grasp more attention by increasing its visual appeal. And the same goes with eLearning programs. These courses should be designed in such a way that they do not involve much of a text-based content, rather should have more of the visual content. Tricks like animations, photography, video clips and graphics should be added to the learning and training modules as it serves to be the solution in forming an emotional connect with the audience.
Other approaches like storytelling too add to the smart instructional strategy ideas that lead to the success of any eLearning program. Don’t forget to add these in your training programs!