Tech4learning

Mobile First - Time to Rethink Learning Design?

One of the most thought-provoking events I've had over the last 12 months occurred when I was first piloting mobile learning.  Taking on board prototype feedback, I shaved one third off the length of the exemplar module.  Quite a challenge, but the end result proved that by stripping out superfluous elements and identifying and concentrating on the absolute core concepts, you could deliver a piece of learning that was both effective and efficient.  

My latest - and surprisingly successful - project of delivering short burst of learning to mobile devices in PDF format has again made me question whether we need to rethink everything we've done over the last decade or so.  With today's fast-paced business environment and the major change in how we consume information and knowledge today, outside of the workplace, I'm starting to think that short, sharp and to the point will the mantra for future development.  Maybe controversially, I wonder whether our future learners will have the time and appetite to always learn through traditional instructional design approaches.  Is it time to through away all those e-learning design books I've got?  In our attempts to replicate the best of the classroom in our on-line learning, are we now out of step with the modern learning scene?

So, when I spotted Mobile First, I was interested to see what its author had to say, given his view that web developers should now start with the mobile version of their site, before building its bigger brother.  His views seem to reflect mine.  Start with the mobile version, cut out all that extra "stuff" that sometimes gets in the way and really hone in on what the customer needs.

This is an easy-to-read book, packed full of colour examples that illustrate the points being made.  Although part of a series aimed at web developers, it's not a technical book. Aside from one or two references to specific coding, for which the author apologises, this is a great book for the lay person (me included) to really get to grips with the key issues that matter when designing a mobile website.  [It's important to stress that this book is not about mobile app development.]

Mobile First explores the many constraints that developing for mobiles impose, such as the screen size, overall performance and the influences of time and place on the user experience.  It then goes onto look at the sometimes unique capabilities that mobiles offer developers such as rotating browser views, location services and touch screens.

The chapter on Organisation explores the important requirement to re-think what a mobile website is all about and has only served to provoke me into examining the whole business of e-learning design.  I think the breakdown of interaction types into Lookup/Find, Explore/Play, Check In/Status and Edit/Create offers a great model for mobile learning. And this gives a powerful example of how easy it is to forget the "consumer" of our information.  This chapter also covers navigation and keeping the focus clear.

The next chapter looks at how the user interacts with the site in terms of user controls, by touch screen and via other means, with the following section exploring how to make entering information into the website (i.e. inputs) as straightforward as possible.  

The final chapter concentrates on the subject of layout and how some now-standard coding can help to create the best user experience on all manner of device types.

I mentioned that this book is easy to read.  But if you want more detail, then there are 67 shortened URLs (later stated in full in an appendix) that will take you to more detailed research into - or examples of - each point being made.  Very valuable.

If you're involved with mobile learning, I'd recommend this book.  Although that wasn't its intention, it's helped me to refine my thinking as to the shape of learning to come.

*** PLEASE NOTE *** The edition of this book on amazon.co.uk and amazon.com is the French language version.  It would appear you can only order the English version direct from the publisher, but delivery from the US was relatively inexpensive and very quick.

 

 

Spring into Rapid Development....for Free!

It's Learning Technologies week in the UK and amongst the flurry of press releases that have popped into my inbox, I spotted an announcement from iSpring Solutions promoting their new lite (and free) online quiz creation tool, Free Quizmaker by iSpring.

This tool allows you to create online quizzes and surveys that can be tracked via your regular LMS. As well as a standard selection of question types, you can add formulas, images, videos and audio and include free answer responses in survey questions.  I'm a big believer in using the power of questions to provide instruction and this free tool also allows you to include blank pages, into which you could include "tutorial" style content, creating a quiz-based e-learning module.

iSpring also offer a free lite rapid e-learning authoring tool - iSpring Free.  Similar to other solutions, this is a PowerPoint plug-in and is, in essence, a PowerPoint-to-Flash converter tool.  When you publish the file to Flash, it preserves most of the native PowerPoint features such as animations and embedded media.

In both cases, you will need to upgrade to their fully-featured products, iSpring QuizMaker and iSpring Pro, to take advantage of the extra features that are found in most of the products of this kind.  But you can achieve an awful lot with the two free/lite packages and for nothing!

Uncovering Articulate Studio '09

A while ago I reviewed a 900-plus page mega-work from Patti Shank that provided an extremely thorough guide to using the top-rating Articulate Studio '09 rapid e-learning authoring tool.  I commented at the time that having a book independently written about your software was a great endorsement for Articulate.

Well now, another book has hit the shelves and I'm equally as excited about this one.

E-learning Uncovered:  Articulate Studio '09 - in less than 300 pages and in a very visual style - provides both a great overview of Articulate's capabilities and clear step-by-step instructions on how to use every element of this software.

What I particularly liked about this book was the fact that it's three authors are clearly power-users of the tool and have supplemented the strict "how to" content with loads - and I mean loads - of personal hints and tips.  These are presented as "Bright Ideas", "Design Tips", "Power Tips", "Time Savers" and "Cautions".  In fact, content-wise, these must account for a very high percentage of the page space in this book.

The flow of content through the book - whilst at first leaving me a bit perplexed - soon turned out to make absolute sense.  After a quick overview of the elements that make up the Articulate Studio suite of products, you are taken through the important matter of creating your first template and setting the key parameters for your project.  Now although the vendor offers some great online support materials, this is one area I've always struggled with, as from within the software, it's not always clear what the impact will be of your various template setting decisions.  With this book, however, both through very clear instructions and some very valuable appendices, you can feel confident about any changes you make do the default settings.

There is also a really good section on how to get the most from PowerPoint, which - of course - is the backbone of most Articulate projects.

In addition to chapter on getting the most from your audio narration, there is also a good section on adding slide annotations, something I now feel much more comfortable doing.

A separate chapter on using Flash, movies and the video encoder has given me lots of new ideas for adding in more multimedia.

There then follows lots of good material on the different ways to publish your content, including timely material for me on exporting the audio as a podcast - and I never knew that Articulate would give you a podcast player for your website.  Supported by another appendix, there are also some excellent explanations of the various AICC and SCORM settings you might need to integrate your modules with your LMS.

The book concludes with chapters on developing the software's Engage Interactions and creating Quizmaker quizzes and questions. Again, some very clear graphics help to ensure you get the results you plan for when setting the various parameters for your quizzes, resulting in less reliance on simple trial and error.  In the section on creating specific question types, I was really delighted to learn about a time-line feature that enables you to control what and when content appears on each of your question slides.

This is a must-have book for anyone who uses Articulate - both novice and experienced users.  I've been using this software for 5 years now and for me, it's now taken on a whole new lease of life.  Oh....and I now really know how to create branching scenarios and have started to include these in all my latest modules.

QuickLessons for Rapid E-learning

Whether you're an individual practitioner, a business corporation or an academic institution, QuickLessons offers an online rapid e-learning content development platform.

Content creation is made easier with a wide range of templates and the results of your labours are exported in the popular Flash format.  A team of developers can collaborate easily throughout a project and content can easily be assembled into reusable learning objects.  As well as text and graphics, media and interactive quizzes can also be included in the final project.

A more complete feature list can be viewed here.

The examples in their Demo Center provide a good insight into the capabilities of the platform.

Learning and Teaching Online with WizIQ

The traditional learning management system has never faced more competition from alternative learning platforms.  Even the VLE variants have to keep an eye on the increasing range of free or low-cost new entrants.

WizIQ - in their own words - enables teachers and learners to collaborate through:

• Virtual classes - the platform offers a free virtual classroom, which is actually feature-rich.
• Online tests - using a simple quiz creation tool.  It only offers multiple choice or essay style question choices.
• Educational content - you can quickly upload a wide variety of document types into an online respository, which you can share with your learners or even use within the virtual classroom.
• Contact network - you can reach out to new learners via the so-called LearnerConnect network.

All of the above is free, with some limitations, which can be removed by upgrading to the Premium version.

I'll Show You in a Jing!

There is now seemingly no end to the number of free programs available on the web that allow you to create screen capture movies. 

But Jing, although free, comes from TechSmith, the provider of the popular tool, Camtasia.

You can quickly capture still images, or as is more likely, short video clips of on-screen activity, with up to five minutes of audio narration.  That duration limitation actually encourages you to keep things short and sweet, which I encourage.

You can also add annotations to your screen shots to help focus the viewer (learner) on the aspect you want them to observe.

When it comes to sharing your content, you can publish this to TechSmith's screencast.comsite - you get 2GB of space - or you can publish to your own website, blog or reach out to your audience via Twitter.

If you upgrade to the Proversion, you can add a video feed from your webcam too.  Video quality is also higher and you can compress the finished output to a more efficient size.  You can also share your content to a wider range of sharing websites, including YouTube, and your movies won't have to carry Jing's branding.

If You Can Type, You Can Make Movies!

This is the strapline for a really interesting (and fun) solution from Xtranormal.

Their State software allows you to easily create a 3-D cartoon animation with automatic lip-syncing based on whatever you type.  You can choose from about 45 voices of all nationalities and accompany them with background soundtracks and effects and place the action in a variety of sets.  Your characters can move and point within the animations, show appropriate facial expressions and you can film them from different camera angles.

The final movies are exported in standard video formats, so could easily be embedded into an e-learning package or website.

A set of short tutorials will really show you this tool in action and there are plenty of examples of the resulting outputs.  You can even have a quick play yourself before deciding whether to download the software.  Even with simple trial and error, it was quick to put together a simple "piece to camera".

Experts on Your Desktop

I've posted about YouTube-like solutions before, but mostly where the idea is you make them yourself or choose from the efforts of others.

Instead Expert Lectures offer a bespoke video e-learning platform, offering material in the form of a hybrid between YouTube video-style and webinar.

They currently offer content in the following areas:

• Accountancy
• Business Skills
• Finance
• Human Resources
• Lifestyle
• Marketing
• Microsoft Dynamics AX
• Sales

The content is provided by a network of providers, currently numbering ten.

From their site you can browse their growing catalogue and review synopses of the different video-based sessions and watch a brief sample.  The videos are broken down into chapters for easier viewing. I got the impression that some were originally recorded live, but edited for this media aftewards.

The ones I previewed would have cost me between £25 and £75 to purchase and I'd have access to them for a year. This fee would also give me access to downloadable supporting materials.  Some of the sessions also offer optional tests to check understanding.

As well as buying access to individual sessions, you also choose from collections of videos brought together in packages.

Rapid Intake - Desktop and Web-based Rapid E-learning in Unison

A few months ago, I spent a while researching rapid e-learning authoring tools and found myself having to decide whether I wanted to go down the non-collaborative desktop software route - feature packed - or forego some of the functionality and choose a web-based collaborative authoring tool option.

I choose the former then, but am still longing for an online SaaS solutioin that is not only feature-rich but also affordable for those with modest budgets and smaller target audiences.

I'm still looking but was interested when I stumbled about Rapid Intake who offer two authoring tools in versions for the desktop and for the browser.

ProForm is the desktop version.  This enable non-Flash programmers to create rapid e-learning courses, with all the usual features.

Unison is the browser (web)-based version.  The colloborative element of this version is enhanced with access to Rapid Intake's third product, CleanCourse, which is a very useful online project management and tracking tool for e-learning developers.

Rapid Intake's website is also packed full of useful resources for all rapid e-learning developers, which also reinforces the high level of support options that are offered as standard to all their clients.

Learning Transfer - More Than A Cameo Role

I've written a few times about my interest in using technology to empower the learning transfer process.  Full-service learning follow-through tools such as Action Plan Mapper and Friday5s offer a powerful solution to the problem of how to ensure that learning is put into practice back in the workplace.

At a more simplistic level, many of us have used e-mail as a way to keep in touch with learners and to either remind them of key points from the training or encourage them to keep plugging away at their action plans.

Last week, I received my first demonstration in the UK of a new e-mail based tool that sends out short single-question scenario-based assessments that encourage each learner to reflect on the learning received and apply that to a specific situation, by responding to say three possible options.

The Cameo tool automatically bounces back an e-mail containing feedback based on the answer given by the learner and within that feedback you can include links to other related resources to provide reinforcement and additional learning opportunities

The easy-to-use interface allows the trainer to set up a series of questions to be automatically sequenced at regular user-defined intervals and sent out to each group based on a trigger date, most usually the date of the classroom course or e-learning module.  The system's database keeps a close eye on the responses received, can chase in a number of ways those that miss a message and reports the overall performance of the group, helping to provide evidence of the levels of participation and learning reinforcement.

A short demonstration helps to show the entire process.

And if, like me, you wondered if an e-mail based system would work given the bulging in-boxes most of us have, apparently one client - with similar concerns - reported an impressive 95% participation rate.

Launched in the US last autumn, a second version of the software is heading our way in a few weeks's time.  Future enhancements, I understand, may include the ability to integrate the tool into your own LMS.

I like the simplicity of the approach, which tackles the issues of retaining knowledge after a training event, the need for application of learning on the job and preparing learners to meet the challenges ahead through scenario-based questioning.  With Blackberries and iPhones in the pockets of some learners, then this platform also provides a form of m-learning.