Design Day and the ASTD Big Question for July

I left a comment on Tony Karrer's blog about creating a "Design Day" so that everyone in the blogosphere adds a comment about the importance of instructional design as opposed to focusing on technology.

And then Dennis Coxe over at Sailing by Sound picked up on my comment and posted an entry called "I Declare 'Design Day'". It is a great entry outlining 3 elements of good design.

Around the same time, the ASTD Learning Circuits Blog had the July "Big Question" which was "Choosing Tools" which is actually a series of questions:

• How does the eLearning design process need to change to accommodate such a wide variety of tools?
  
• How does the tool selection process need to change?
  
• What should learning professionals do to stay up-to-speed? Do they need to learn new tools constantly? Can they stick with a few tools?
  
• Will this trend continue? If so, then what does that imply for us?

So, once again, I noted that good design is independent of the technology. Meaning that regardless of the technology what really matters is design. So now that I established that point, the next question is "Can certain attributes of different media be leverage for learning?"

For example, you can leverage audio (MP3) for modeling the pronunciation of certain words as opposed to writing the correct pronunciation on a blog or a wiki without the corresponding audio track.

Or, you can use the motion aspects of technology like Adobe's Flash to show assembly of an item as opposed to static images accompanied by text or even audio.

So, to get to the "Big Question"

• How does the eLearning design process need to change to accommodate such a wide variety of tools?

The elearning design process (which is not dis-similar to the instructional design process) has always included an element of media selection. During the analysis phase of instructional design, one of the decision points is what media to use. The selection of the media is dependent upon the objectives you are attempting to teach. If you teach the concept of "change over time" a video can be effective...text might be a little less effective. If you want to reach the affective domain, use video or immersive 3D environments.

If you want to teach jargon or acronyms, choose a design that emphasizes repetition and rehearsal, maybe a simple game to encourage repetition.

• How does the tool selection process need to change?

I am not sure the overall tool selection process needs to change, tool selection shouldn't matter as much as attribute selection...use the attributes of video where it makes sense...because video can be used in a variety of technologies....blogs, wikis, elearning development tools and even PowerPoint. It is not a matter of choosing the right "tool" but choosing the right vehicle within the tool to provide the desired learning effect. Games to motivate, video for the affective domain, blogs for story telling by experts, wikis for teamwork, 3D worlds for immersive learning experiences.

The tools are less relevant, for example, I can show a slide in a 3D world to teach someone how to assemble a chair, but is that the best media for learning to assemble a chair...no. But a 3D world might be great for teaching a team of people how to cooperate together to respond to a chemical spill. As another example, if the only thing moving in a video is the person's lips...do you really need video or would audio work just as well.

Let's move the argument from "Choosing Tools" to choosing attributes.

• What should learning professionals do to stay up-to-speed? Do they need to learn new tools constantly? Can they stick with a few tools?

Learning professionals need an awareness of tools but it is the attributes that matter more. Go to conferences, attend webinars, read blogs and talk to fellow professionals to stay aware of what is going on but...don't get sucked up into the hype of a new tool, stick with what you know (or should know) about the attributes of media which best convey a message to the learners.

Finally:

• Will this trend continue? If so, then what does that imply for us?

Yes, of course it will continue. It implies that we must constantly be learning in the learning field...makes sense and is what makes this profession so interesting and exciting.

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