How to Build an Instructional Design Portfolio with Google Sites | Step-by-Step + Examples
Tim Slade's straightforward guide to creating a portfolio website with Google Sites, including tips and notes on what's important for portfolios
Talent Stacking For An Instructional Design Career
Connie Malamed explains the concept of talent stacking, or building competence in multiple skills that work well together. She provides some lists of competences for L&D roles as examples of the kinds of talent stacking that might work.
Quantify Your Impact for Your Resume — Day Learning Design
This is a list of specific "before and after" examples of resume improvements for teachers who are transitioning to instructional design.
The L&D Word Project | Useful Stuff
Glossary of learning and development terms and acronyms
L&D Shapers Mentorship
Free mentoring for people in the L&D field. This is actually mentoring, with an expectation of a 6-month relationship, not a one-off coaching call. Read the guidelines and set your goals before starting.
Career Tips All Women Should Know - Scissortail Creative Services, LLC
Kayleen Holt recaps the TLDC Women of L&D 2023 event with a summary of key points addressed in multiple sessions. Reading this article may help you determine how to prioritize which recordings from the event you want to watch.
Transitioning from education to instructional design
Melanie Knight has been doing some great posts sharing her notes and reflections as she learns about instructional design and transitions her career. This article is a reflection on her journey so far and the ways she has been learning and sharing. She also includes a list of resources that she has learned from.
Rumie Initiative | Volunteer
Volunteer opportunity for new learning designers and instructional designers. Commit to at least 3 hours per week and build a short module that you can use in your portfolio.
Transform Your Trashy Teacher Resume
A real life example of a former teacher's resume and how she revamped it to successfully get a job in instructional design. Great to see the before and after as well as the notes on the decisions behind the changes.
How to Become an Instructional Designer: The Ultimate Resource List - Scissortail Creative Services, LLC
An extensive list of curated resources for becoming an instructional designer, including blog posts, videos, books, and people to follow on Twitter. There's a section specifically for teachers looking to transition to an ID career too. (Yes, my ID careers posts are on the list, but there's a ton of other good stuff from other people too).
How much does it cost to start freelancing in instructional design?
Cara North breaks down the expenses to get started freelancing, using her actual costs plus a few alternatives. For setting up an LLC, website, hardware, software, and professional development, you can expect to spend a few thousand dollars in the first year.
So how much does it cost to start as a freelance instructional designer? My estimate is between $3000 and $5000.
How Instructional Design Is Operationalized in Various Industries for job-Seeking Learning Designers: Engaging the Talent Development Capability Model | SpringerLink
Research comparing job listings to the ATD capability model.
Using the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA) organizational framework as our method of reviewing job postings, we found that instructional design, talent delivery and facilitation, technology application, communication, and collaboration and leadership capabilities appeared the most frequently.
For corporate settings, more jobs than expected require bachelor’s degrees and fewer jobs than expected require a master’s degree or higher. On the contrary, for higher education settings, more jobs than expected required master’s degrees or higher and fewer jobs than expected required bachelor’s degrees. While this may not be surprising to some job seekers, it does indicate that job applicants with bachelor’s degrees already possess the educational requirements for a corporate role.
Instructional Design Hiring Manager Report 2021
Devlin Peck summarizes and analyzes responses from 101 hiring managers surveyed about what factors influence their decisions when evaluating instructional design and elearning candidates.
What is instructional design? Examples and online courses - Business Insider
Basic overview of ID for those interested in the field. This article highlights a few online programs for learning about instructional design, plus 3 bloggers to read: Connie Malamed, Cathy Moore, and me.
Finding Your Place In an Instructional Design Career
"Instructional design" is a big umbrella that can mean different things in different organizations. This post describes a number of options for the focus of instructional design and related roles.
How to Become an Instructional Designer: The Definitive Guide - Devlin Peck - Performance Consultant for Corporate Training Teams
This 10,000-word guide starts at the very beginning, explaining what instructional designers are and what they do for different types of organizations. There's a quick summary of theories and different tools, tips for creating a portfolio, and info on ways to learn more.
Go Design Something: Building Your Job-Winning Portfolio
Kristin Anthony's free course on building an instructional design portfolio
Instructional Design and Technology | edX
Instructional Design and Technology "MicroMasters" through edX and UMUC. 4 courses, 8 weeks each, 4-6 hours per week. Around Free to try, $800 for verified credits. While I'm not sure how much hands on experience this program gives, it might be a good option for formal education for people looking for something less than a full masters program.
The 60-minute masters | Onlignment
This was created in 2007 as a quick course in designing e-learning for SMEs. While the fully developed versions of the course seem to no longer be available, the scripts are here so you could create your own version. New instructional designers may benefit from reading the scripts and envisioning how they could create a course.
Where to Find Freelance Instructional Design Gigs - Ashley Chiasson, M.Ed
First hand experience from someone who has used multiple different sites and techniques to find freelance clients. I think the cold contacts really only works because she put in so much effort researching and targeting specific companies with customized messages; I doubt generic cold contacts would have done as much for her. Super fan-girling over here that @ChristyATucker linked to some of my posts! EEE! - Where to Find Freelance ID Gigs http://t.co/34hyGXDHz2
Skills you need as an Instructional Designer | Origin Learning – A Learning Solutions Blog
List of skills for instructional designers. This isn't as comprehensive as the competency lists from ibstipi or ATD, but it's not a bad overview for someone new to the field.
Why the Former Teacher May be Your Next Star Employee – Part II | James L. Simers
Comparing ATD's list of core competencies to the skills teachers already have. Teachers who want to switch careers might find this helpful for figuring out how to speak the language of business and explain how their skills transfer
KeelWorks - Learning to live: Living to Learn
KeelWorks is a non-profit that regularly engages ID interns. Right now it's a 12-14 week unpaid program for 5 hours a week. It's a good way for people to get some experience before their first ID job.
8 Books To Read Before Your Next eLearning Project
A different reading list than many I've seen, with several selections outside of the main learning field. I've only read one of these eight books.
Answers To Instructional Design Career Questions
Connie Malamed shares her answers to a number of ID career questions she's received from readers, including transitioning from teaching, getting a second master's degree or certificate, and getting a first job in ID.
Find Online Instructional Design Graduate Certificate Programs
Database of online instructional design graduate certificate programs. Compare cost, prerequisites, credits required, and more.
IDTopedia™
Glossary of instructional design and technology terms
eLearning Cyclops: Getting Started in eLearning
Jeff Goldman links to a free ebook on How to Get Started in eLearning, plus a few comments on getting into the field and links to training.
Designers for Learning | matching nonprofits with instructional design students in service-learning
ID students can volunteer their services for nonprofits and gain valuable experience
What to look for in an Instructional Design and Technology Master’s Degree Program « Dr. Ray Pastore's Instructional Technology Blog
Ray Pastore from UNCW provides a checklist of 10 things to consider for ID masters programs. He doesn't include creating a portfolio here, although he does talk about getting real experience. What's the point of real experience with a client if you don't have a portfolio to prove it?