Best Tips for eLearning Developers

There is no secret formula to develop powerful and effective tips for eLearning developers. It is almost impossible to create a list that contains all the essential elements that one must keep in mind when creating eLearning course as each course is unique in its own way.

Tips that you can follow to design an interactive eLearning course

Analyze your audience

Before you begin to develop an eLearning course, you must do an analysis of the audiences for whom you are developing the course. This provides you with a clear idea of what the learners are expecting to take away after going through your eLearning course and which skill sets or knowledge they need to acquire. To analyze your audience, you can conduct surveys, focus on specific groups or do one-on-one interviews through which you will gain invaluable information. You can then use this information to design the curriculum and plan the activities that you intend to use in the eLearning course.

Outline

Before you start your actual development of the eLearning course, the developers must create an outline that highlights the key objectives. This allows you to track the progress and ensures that learning goals and objectives are met.

Varied learning activities

This is one of the most important tips for an eLearning developer. Learners acquire information in different ways. While some understand it better when explained using scenarios and games, others understand better if the course is delivered using a presentation with audio or one with lot of graphics. So, it is always a good practice to include a variety of learning activities. Remember that not all learners will benefit from the same set of exercises or examples, so it is better to mix up things and include as many scenarios and examples that will most probably serve everyone who is taking the course.

Keep it simple

Cognitive overload is the enemy of all eLearning professionals. When this happens, information just cannot be absorbed and retained by the learners, and thus the eLearning course doesn’t offer any value. Hence it is essential that you keep the information as simple as possible. Do not use too much of graphics or images, but instead use bullet points to represent information and bold information to emphasis it.

Choose the right authoring tool

Before you start developing the course, analyze all the eLearning authoring tools that are available and identify how you can take the full advantage of them. The tool that you select should save you time and resources during the development process.

Be consistent

Tips for eLearning developers with very little experience often make the mistake of creating courses that have inconsistent color themes or patterns. Keep in mind not to change the theme every few slides as this makes them to loose focus. Consistency is the key while designing the eLearning course, and it is recommended to use a single color palette and guide learners towards the focal points of the course without distracting them with inconsistent design elements. Other design elements such as fonts and background are important too. A consistent design attracts the learners and motivates them to take up the course.