session overview

Wednesday 25th January 2012

14:00 - 15:00 Track 4 Session 2

Content design and creation

All too often management and executives imagine that learning is about courses focused on knowledge transfer alone. We know that doesn't work. Good courses require engagement from learners, and an understanding of the importance of what they are learning. This session looks at two parts of this. In the first session, Andy Jones examines how to take a deep, heavy text and turn it into e-learning that both engages and gets the necessary information across. In the second, Noreen Wolfe describes how her e-learning materials at Whitbread succeed not because of flashy design but by carefully including the overall context of learning.

P1: Better content by design

Andy Jones, Head of Learning and Innovation, Sweet and Maxwell

It’s an all too familiar scenario: a manual lands on your desk with the question “Could you just turn that into an e-learning course?” When it has to be done, what is the best way of turning dry, dense text into training materials? In this session, Andy Jones describes proven ways of making information accessible and memorable using everything from animation and video to voiceovers. He will also describe how these approaches have been tested to show that they don’t just look good, they work.

The key: understanding your audience and its needs
Choosing the right formats for you
How to deliver dense information without being dull
Animation without cartoons, but with interest
Choosing your production values and the appropriate tools

P2: Designing context into your learning

Noreen Wolfe, eLearning Manager, Whitbread

What is the key to great learning? According to Noreen Wolfe, who has been managing e-learning at Whitbread for the past 9 years, it isn’t the tools, or the production values, alone. It is the context. In this presentation, Noreen examines some of the ways in which she has ensured that the materials she creates for her learners go beyond merely presenting information and give the bigger picture that helps the learning make sense. Drawing on a series of practical examples she will demonstrate how this approach lends her learning materials impact.