Scenario-Based Learning Experiences Podcast Interview - Experiencing eLearning
Blog posts
DDX - 1023 - Streamlining Branching Scenario Planning and Design_Trim from The Learning Guild on Vimeo
Recording of my session at DevLearn 2020
Pose - Easy Character Guidelines by Gal Shir
App for creating poses for characters. These are just outlines, which you'd have to illustrate yourself in another app. Kevin Thorn demonstrated this as a way to create custom characters for scenarios, which you can pose in exactly the way you need. This is a browser-based app, currently $19.
How to Use Plain Language to Improve Learning Outcomes | Scissortail Creative Services, LLC
We all probably know we should use easier to understand language in instructional writing, but this article provides more specifics on how to actually do that. The before and after writing example shows what a significant difference it can make.
Identify your superpower and learn to leverage it - Chris Lema
What are the things you're good at, but take other people a lot of time and effort? What do people compliment you on, but you downplay it because it feels so easy to you? What can you do well that surprises other people? Chris Lema shares questions to reflect on your skills to identify your special strengths. This isn't about instructional design, but it seems relevant to our field where there's a wide range of skills under the general umbrella. Within that broad scope of L&D, what's your superpower? This is also another way to think about identifying a niche for freelancers and consulting businesses.
The 57 Best Project Management Software in 2020
An extensive list of project management software options, many of which have a free tier. Note that the list was compiled by nTask, who conveniently put their own tool on the top of the list. The feature comparisons and pricing summaries are still useful though.
How to Price Your Online Course (Complete Guide to Course Pricing)
Lengthy guide about considerations for pricing online courses from Thinkific. This is aimed at experts who are selling courses, but that also applies to many of us in the L&D field who are branching out into selling course products ourselves.
Plagiarized article
Stolen from my blog post on branching scenario layouts
Why Does a Design Look Good?
While these examples are all websites, the design principles apply to elearning too.
<strong>Summary:</strong> Visually aesthetic designs use consistent typography, establish a clear hierarchy, utilize a refined color palette, and align to a grid.
Scenario Writing: Top 5 Pitfalls | Scissortail Creative Services, LLC
Common mistakes and pitfalls for writing scenario-based learning.
- Not tying the story to the learning objectives.
- Getting preachy.
- Avoiding the gray areas.
- Writing robotic speech.
- Disguising info dumps as conversations.
How to Use RSS Feeds
Helen Blunden explains how to use RSS to subscribe to specific feeds, including filtering for specific topics on a blog or subscribing to a YouTube channel. While following folks on social media can be a good way to discover new things and to interact with others, RSS gives you control and customization over what you see. If you feel like there's too much noise on social media and want a way to focus on reading just what you're interested in, RSS helps you do that.
If you’re relying on social networks to serve you up the content you want to read – you’re not in control.
To many people, I’m may be a bit of an old fashioned kook because I still use them religiously but the truth is, I wouldn’t be finding great content and sharing it to you if I was just relying on my social networks such as Twitter and LinkedIn to serve this content up to me. After all, my networks are reading similar content, retweeting and sharing the same stuff. An RSS Reader allows me to control what is coming to me but also is flexible enough for me to add to or delete feeds as my interests change.
How Long Does It Take to Develop Training? New Question, New Answers.
Updated ATD research on the time to develop training
Does anyone design for an hour of training? Not really. The chart below shows how the 264 respondents identified which types of training products they develop and the minimum, maximum, and average times it took to create each.
The State and Future of Learning & Development in 2021: See What the Experts Think!
Jeffrey Dalto collected responses from a number of L&D professionals for insights on how COVID-19 has affected L&D and how this affects the future trends for the field.
We’d like to thank all of the contributors for sharing their time, knowledge, and insight. They include Connie Malamed, Arun Pradhan, Patti Shank, Cara North, Clark Quinn, Stella Lee, Zsolt Olah, Julie Dirksen, Mike Taylor, Jacinta Penn, Guy Wallace, Emily Wood, Kassy Laborie, Alexander Salas, Michelle Ockers, Shannon Tipton, Christy Tucker, Linda Berberich, and Richard (Dick) Clark.
How To Remember Anything Forever-ish
An interactive comic explaining the Leitner method of spaced repetition to learn and remember information.
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.
VISIWIG | Visuals for busy designers
Online tool for creating quick patterns, textures, and icons. The images created with Visiwig are free for personal and commercial use.
VEED
This browser-based video editing tool is aimed at marketers for creating quick social media videos. They have a free account level which includes a watermark. This might be helpful to students or others looking for a way to create a quick sample for their portfolio without spending money.
Share everything you know - Chris Lema
Chris Lema writes about the benefits of blogging and sharing your knowledge generously. While this isn't explicitly about training or learning, it is a form of working out loud or showing your work. And while this is about blogging, the same concepts apply to any other method of sharing: videos, podcasts, etc.
Articulate Storyline to Create a Customized PDF on the Fly? – Rabbitoreg (Zsolt Olah)
How to create a PDF from Storyline variables using the PDFMake Javascript library
Storyline 360 - Generating a PDF Certificate using JavaScript - Articulate Storyline Discussions - E-Learning Heroes
Directions and sample file for creating a PDF certificate
REQ: Javascript Date Variable Help. - Articulate Storyline Discussions - E-Learning Heroes
Notes on Javascript date formatting and how to add 365 days to a date (e.g., for an expiration date on a training certificate)
Pulling first name from LMS - Articulate Storyline Discussions - E-Learning Heroes
Javascript snippets for pulling names from the LMS so they can be used in a Storyline module
How To Create A Printable Certificate Of Completion In Articulate Storyline
Video tutorial plus transcript and files for creating a printable certificate of completion in Storyline
Virtual Holiday Backgrounds | 21 best free background, holiday, light and christmas photos on Unsplash
Free backgrounds from Unsplash for Zoom or other virtual meetings
You're Hearing Voices: Episode 28 - Anu Gopu (e-Learning and Instructional Design)
Podcast interview by voice over artist Dan Hankiewicz with guest ID Anu Gopu. Anu talks about her journey into instructional design and how to condense info from wordy SMEs who want to include everything. Anu also talks about who she learns from in the field (including me).
CALC / Contract-Awarded Labor Category
See how much the GSA has paid in past awarded contracts for the US federal government. You can use the filters to see hourly rate comparisons by education, experience, role, keywords, etc. You can also export the data in CSV for further analysis.
How to Find Your Next 20 Clients Online in 63 Days
Specific tactics for finding new clients as a freelancer or consultant. This is broken into three phases: an initial phase to get your first 5 clients and learn what you like the best, a second phase of defining your ideal client, and a third phase of scaling by partnering with others and teaching new audiences. eLearning and instructional design freelancers may not even need the third phase (which includes a lot of building a large audience), but I like the targeted alternatives to cold emails here.
<p>If you don’t know who your ideal client is, answer these three questions:</p>
<ol>
<li>Who is doing work you respect?</li>
<li>Who would be fun to work with?</li>
<li>Who could give you additional exposure if you worked for them?</li></ol>
3 Best Laptops for Instructional Design – 7 Things to Know
Scott Winstead's recommendations for laptops for instructional designers. The Acer Aspire is #3 on his list. That's what my last 2 laptops have been, and both have lasted 5 years. I probably will switch brands for my next laptop, but they have been solid options for me in the past (although I did not have lower end options like Scott reviews).
Best Laptops for Instructional Designers in 2020
Devlin Peck walks through the important factors for picking a laptop for instructional design and elearning professionals. His top 3 recommendations are a Dell XPS 15, MacBook Pro, or Surface Pro, but he lists the recommended specs so you can find other brands that meet the requirements.
Interleaving: How Mixed Practice Can Boost Your Learning – Effectiviology
A non-technical explanation of interleaving, with an overview of the research and theory supporting it and ideas on how to implement it to improve learning.