Tip Guy

It Doesn't Have To Be Boring!

2013-03-20T22:02:00.001-07:00

I have heard colleagues over the years proclaim some discontent when it comes to developing compliant related courses, such as Code of Conduct or Fraud related courses. The negativity usually centers on the belief that these types of courses are boring page-turners or information dumps, which when viewed this way certainly doesn't make it sound very fun to develop, does it?

Say what you will, but these are actually one of my favorite types of courses to build, and that's primarily because I don't view them as boring page-turners, or information dumps. Instead, I view them as awesome opportunities to develop fun, interactive, story-based masterpieces.

Now you may run across subject matter experts or managers who don't think fondly of creative and fun courses and prefer to play things safe, but don't let that deter you, go for it anyway. I discuss this a previous post titled 'Do Not Go Gentle Into That Goodnight', so check this post out if you need some inspiration to go against the grain a little here.

Check out this course I created called 'Social Engineering', which is a type of fraud scam and definitely falls into this 'compliant course' category. I could have just dumped a bunch of information on some pages, asked a few review questions along the way and called it a day, but that's just not my style!

Instead I decided work some creativity and fun into the course, which also made it a blast to develop. In this course you go on a spy caper, find clues and capture some bad guys, while all the time learning a thing or two about Social Engineering.

Consider this approach the next time you're faced with content that may seem boring at first. Avoid the information dump, mix in a character or two, and take your learner on a journey. They will thank you for it in the end!

A Funny Thing Happened At The Lectora User Conference!

2013-03-18T14:59:00.000-07:00

A funny thing happened at the 2012 Lectora user Conference. I found my new e-learning development software, and it's not Lectora!

So there I was at the 2012 Lectora user Conference, visiting all the exhibitors, which were new at this conference, and I stumble upon the good folks at 'E-Learning Uncovered', a totally unbiased vendor who writes how-to books on e-learning development software. During my conversation I candidly asked them their opinion on the new Lectora 11 that was being announced at the conference compared to the new Articulate Storyline product I had heard so much about.

Without droning on with all the details, the E-Learning Uncovered reps advised me that they were waiting with baited breath for the Lectora 11 feature announcement taking place later in the conference. If Lectora could pull a rabbit out of the hat and incorporate a timeline and audio syncing ability, in addition to some sort of screen capturing tool, they just might be included in the conversation with Articulate's new Storyline tool, which they heralded as a "Do-It-All Game Changer"!

So there I am, sitting at the much anticipated Lectora 11 presentation listening to all the new features, waiting and hoping for mention of a timeline, syncing, screen capture, something, but it never came. Now I like the folks at Lectora and they really do put on one heck of a conference, but all that really doesn't help me once I get home, and I was extremely disappointed that none of the features I was hoping for were announced.

When I arrived back home I immediately downloaded the Articulate Storyline trial and just as quickly fell in love with it. PowerPoint feel, easy to use, syncing, audio recording tools, timeline, screen recording,variables, layering, and more. Pretty much anything and everything you could ask for!

Like most times when I attend a conference of this nature I am required to give a presentation to the entire team regarding what I learned at the conference (gotta justify the investment right?), and you should have seen the look on everyone's faces when my Lectora User Conference presentation concludes with recommending we invest in Articulate Storyline as our new primary e-learning development tool. I'm glad to report that by bosses listened, and I am now the proud owner of a Storyline license, as is my development colleague.

Storyline has it all people, so if you're looking for a single stand-alone tool for all your e-learning development needs, there's not a better one out there than Articulate Storyline. Take this new kick-butt Storyline tool and package it up with the absolutely unrivaled support and forum's Tom Kuhlmann and team has put together, and you have a top-notch head of the class solution set!

By the way, I still have Lectora, but I use it only as a wrapper these days for things I develop in Captivate (Which I may not be using for very much longer either once I master the Storyline screen capturing tool).

DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT!

2012-02-07T16:14:00.000-07:00

This particular post isn't going to teach you much, or provide a ton of insight. This is a 'rant' and 'call-to-arms', fueled by recent events that forced me to change Verdana to Arial, change 'Biggest Strength' to 'Core Competency', and totally replace a fun scenario-driven interaction with a traditional and 'safer' information dump!

As e-learning developers we tend to be creative risk-taking creatures by nature, while our stakeholders/SMEs tend to be more compliant, play-it-safe, traditional, no-risk, detail-oriented, core-competency-focusing, inside-the-box, Arial-using robots. (Can you sense my frustration yet?)

These stakeholders usually win the battle when it comes to the final elements of the course, even though most wouldn't know a good e-learning course if it came up and bit em'.

What's worse is that when we (the developer and expert) disagree, express concern, or present push-back, we sometimes get the labels of being 'uncooperative', 'resistant to change', or 'difficult to work with'. Nobody wants these labels, so what I've witnessed is fellow e-learning developers simply giving up before even being heard! They crumble under the pressure of Corporate America heiarchy, and simply concede before even speaking up (not all mind you).

Now I understand that we all have to change things we don't want to, take the 'human' element out of our courses in place of more corporate speak, use the real-world business woman graphic when we wanted to use something more creative....I totally get it! But I'm not one who's going to surpress opinion or not leverage my creative e-learning awsomeness because of fear of repercussion, and I implore all of you to do the same.

In case you're wondering, I have a few of those 'Resistant to Change', 'Risk Taking', 'Sometimes Uncooperative' labels dangling on me! It may sound silly, but I kind of like them and wear those labels as badges.

I will continue to push the envelope! Continue to treat my audience as a real-person who hates hard to understand corporate speak as much as I do. Continue to try to make my courses fun, interactive and different. I will continue to buck tradition and 'usually' hate Arial font. And I will continue to believe that not every course must comply to some pre-structured 'Learning Model' or 'Taxonomy'.

I saw a commercial the other day that showed me everything I needed to know about a new car and the awesomeness it possesses, and I even knew where I could go locally to get one when the commercial was over. They didn't start that commercial with an 'Introduction', followed by 'Objectives', yet I was still able to glean what I needed. You don't need all that stuff in a course just because some learning model says so.

The best innovations of this world are not spawned from being traditional, following the crowd, and taking no risks. The best innovations come from those that think differently, buck tradition and take risks (Apple anyone?).

I feel like it's my job to speak up when I disagree, to continue to try to leverage new and interesting technologies, to NOT use Arial font because somebody says so, to try to convince my stakeholder that not every piece of information needs to be crammed into the course, and so on and so on.

I encourage all of you that read this to do the same. Don't just cave because you're afraid of getting a bad label. If you err on the side of caution, or don't do something because you're afraid of the very predictable resistance you will get, then you're doing yourself and your 'actual' e-learning audience an injustice.

We must work together with our stakeholders to convince them to take risks, be different and think different, which is a hard proposition considering they are hard-wired this way. Whatever you do though, don't go quietly into that good night, just because you're afraid of what others will think. If you truly believe it, then (as Rocky Balboa once said) "Go For It!".

Do not go gentle into that good night! Rage, rage against the dying of the light!

An image resource you might not have considered!

2011-05-24T23:55:00.000-07:00

I hesitate to share this little nugget of information in fear of over-exposure and the slight risk that exposing it may eliminate it as a resource, but I'm a bit of a risk taker by nature, so what the heck!

If you're not familiar with a little website called Icon Archive (iconarchive.com) you should put it on your radar immediately. This site has a ton of very cool and useful images.

Now simply pointing you to a site with cool images doesn't really warrant my big set up in the first paragraph does it? The real gem here is that although these icons are available for a price, I have been successful with legitimately acquiring some of the images royalty free. How you ask? Here's the scoop.

Many of the images on this site state that they are free for 'non-commercial' use. Now through a little research it turns out that there are varying opinions on the exact definition of 'non-commercial'. One said definition stated that as long as the user wasn't profiting from the usage of the images then it could be categorized as 'non-commercial'. Well, since most of the elearning I create is for internal employees, and we don't charge our employees to take our courses, I'm in compliance and free to use the images...right?

Now I wasn't totally convinced and still didn't feel totally confident using the images, so I went into sleuth mode and took it a step further. I emailed the creator of a particular icon set I was eye-balling and asked them if using their images in my e-learning courses for internal employees would violate the non-commercial tag, and I was very pleased when the creator emailed me back advising I could use their images in my e-learning courses free of charge. BINGO! (by the way, those blue emoticons in this post happen to be some I acquired.. I have 80 of these little dudes, all with different expressions).

So there you have it. Add iconarchive.com to your list of image resources, but I suggest you shoot over a quick email to the creator (which is easily identifiable on the site) and garner their green light first,

Need a Free PowerPoint Course Template? Come And Get It!

2011-05-21T22:09:00.002-07:00

I created this gray themed template in PowerPoint some time ago, and stumbled across it while cleaning up my archives recently. I used this to create two e-learning courses and my clients were happy as clams. (exactly how happy is a clam anyway?). (click here to download the template)

It has a neutral gray glossy theme. I was teaching myself how to make glossy effects in Photoshop and as a result created this. If you're interested I have a post available on how to create a glossy effect in Photoshop, so feel free to check it out.

I created it for use in Articulate, however it should work just fine in any PowerPoint to e-learning program (i.e. Snap!). Enjoy, and as always feel free to add comments and let me know what you think.

9 Things You Must Avoid in Your Courses.

2011-01-15T02:38:00.000-07:00

I was recently reviewing an elearning course (per the authors request) and some of things I saw is what inspired this post. Now I'll allow some latitude because the author only develops part-time and is somewhat of a newbee, but some of things I witnessed defied what I consider basic common sense. So without further ado I present to you 9 things that should be avoided in your e-learning course. Simply don't do these things and your e-learning will suck much less. (By the way, the course I was reviewing violated 8 of these 9 things).

Notice how I only have 9 things? Everybody does a top 10, but how often do you see a Top 9? Just me thinking out of the box a little (see number three below).

number one:
Don't indent in elearning. It's not a romance novel or English class we're talking about here, it's elearning and indenting is taboo. Stop immediately.

number two:

Don't overuse transitions. A wise man once said: "Just because you can doesn't mean you should". Use transitions selectively and make sure it has a purpose for being there.

number three:

Don't be affraid to step outside the box every once in awhile. It's easy to become complacent and this is when all your courses start looking the same. You can scour the blogoshere for ideas, and this is certainly encouraged, however be sure to mix in some originality and your own ideas. Unlock that creativity. Someone once said: "It's better to fail at originality than succeed at imitation". Now I don't 100% agree with this quote when it comes to elearning, but it does hold some weight so be sure to leverage your noggin and dare to be different. Check out this previous post for more on this particular topic.

number four:

Don't cram too much content on your pages. If you're not familiar with the term "White Space", become familiar with it immediately. White Space basically refers to the vacant or empty real estate on your pages (You should have some of it). Nothing will turn your reader off quicker than a cramped page loaded with text. Utilize show/hide functionality as appropriate so not everything is visible when the user enters the page, and consider breaking your content into more than one page. It's all about the White Space baby!

number five:

Don't forget the little things! Pardon the bluntness here, but don't turn out crap! If your environment is anything like mine it's busy as all get out, and everybody wants everything yesterday. With extreme time pressures it's easy to overlook the little things. Make sure images and text are lined up neatly, and that the quality and integrity of your images is maintained (No pixely graphics).

Below is an actual page I swiped from an e-learning course and my very quick attempt at fixing it. Notice how the original has things mis-aligned. To me it looks like whoever built this put about zero thought into appearance, which in my book is completely unacceptable. My revision literally took about 5 minutes.

I simply aligned some things, made the font a little bigger, put a subtle drop-shadow on the screenshot and added a person to give it a little human element. Don't skimp when it comes to appearance, it's one of the single most important aspects of elearning development. See this previous post for more on this.

number six: 

Don't use too many fonts! I live by the rule of never using more than two fonts in a course. Perhaps I'll use one font for my larger headers and then another font for my text. Too many fonts will subliminally turn off the learner. They may not know why they don't like what they're looking at, but it very well could be your overuse of fonts. One of my favortie fonts to use is Verdana, and I'm also quickly becoming a fan of Calibri, however be careful with this Calibri because it isn't a totally web safe font yet and users who are using anything previous to Office 07' may not have Calibri. Just for the record I don't think I've ever used Times New Roman in a course!

number seven:

Don't go crazy with colors! I've literally seen courses that have 6 or 7 different colors working throughout a course, and sometimes even on one page. With few exceptions, I try and stick to a maximum of three colors in a scheme. And by all means please don't do things like use white text on a yellow background. Make sure your text is eye-pleasing and readable.

number eight:

Don't let your SME wreck your course. If you don't know what a SME is then you can skip this. They are the content expert, not the development or presentation expert. Now you may lose this battle, but don't go down without a fight. If you think what you've incorporated into a course ads value to the user experience then let your SME know this. I have many times been successful at convincing my SME to let me keep something they wanted to ditch, so don't go quietly into that goodnight.

number nine:

Don't be so corporate and safe! I'm not a fan of corporate lingo and the use of big confusing corporate words (like Verifiable outcome, predictable journey, business acumen, etc.). I personally like to push the envelope a little with the casualness of the verbiage I use in my courses, I guess I'm under some crazy impression that my users are actual human beings and not corporate robots. I've used terms like bad-boy, gotta and even pulled an occasional 'Aint' out of the hat. In the words of Sergeant Hulka from Stripes: "Lighten Up Francis!". Sometimes it's better to apologize than ask permission. Here's a previous blog post I did on exactly this topic.

A Must-Have Tip to Save You BooKoos of Time!

2010-12-28T00:56:00.000-07:00

Is that how you spell BooKoos? Or is it BuKus? Anyway, in today's environment where everybody unrealistically wants everything yesterday, time saving tips sometimes prove invaluable. I can't remember exactly where I picked up this little gem, otherwise I would give appropriate credit, but it combines two very cool things at once. The first being the use of the 'Format Painter' option in PowerPoint, and the second being the very cool stuff you can find at Microsoft Office Online.

I use this 'Format Painter' technique all the time and get a lot of inspiration from the stuff on Microsoft Office Online, so if you're not already familiar with this information I hope you find it useful. Check out the SCREENR I recorded for the low-down.

Free PowerPoint Course Template

2010-12-21T00:53:00.002-07:00

In my continuing effort to aid in your course development endeavors, I give to you a FREE blue/green themed PowerPoint template.

I wouldn't call this a branching scenario course template, but rather a flexible Menu driven template. The way it's set up here the user makes a selection from a Menu page and is then taken to the appropriate page based on what they chose from the menu. It's non-linear allowing the user to choose whatever menu option they wish, in whatever order they wish. The template includes the raw PowerPoint images for easy editing.

I recently utilized this template to create a course covering several reporting options allowed by a system. It was determined that most users would only need the procedures for one or two reports and rather than forcing them to view all of the reporting procedures, this format allowed them to choose a single report and view only that related information.

Even if you don't have a need for this menu-driven navigation you can just ditch the menu page and you should find it useful and save some development time by using the template and the included text boxes, images and clipart.

To see the template in action Click Here.

To download the template Click Here. (ZIP file including both the PowerPoint pptx and Articulate ppta file.)

Please excuse any Go Daddy banners you encounter as you view the example. I manage this blog on my own dime and in an effort to save some money I use the free Go Daddy hosting service, which unfortunately forces those banners on you.

Enjoy, and if you happen to use the template drop me a line and let me know how it worked for you.

An Early Christmas Present From TipGuy.

2010-12-10T01:28:00.002-07:00

In the spirit of the holiday gift giving season I thought it appropriate to provide you with a free early holiday gift. As I develop e-Learning I tend to amass (is that the right word?) a collection of images, some purchased, but some I created myself in either PowerPoint or PhotoShop. I can't share the purchased one's due to obvious copyright restrictions, however I can share some of my own creations.

Just a sample, there's more on the attachment.

Just click the link below to download a PowerPoint where I have attached several images for your e-Learning usage pleasure. Some are pretty elementary and some more complex, but perhaps you can find something you can use and save yourself a little development time.

DOWNLOAD THE IMAGES POWERPOINT.

In addition to the images, following are some additional resources I sometimes use in my development efforts, so perhaps you might find a use for these too. If you're at all curious about the various tools I use to develop e-Learning you can check out this previous post listing my arsenal of tools.

Don't have PhotoShop or the know-how to create your own images, check out this Glassy Button Wizard, which makes it a snap to create your own custom glassy buttons.

Need a Caricature Headshot, check out this interesting little head maker. I don't remember how or when I stumbled across this one, but I've used it a few times when I needed the same character with several different expressions. As an FYI I usually open my final product in PhotoShop and add a little color.

You might already be aware of ffiles.com as a Flash Resource Site, but it's a great site loaded with a ton of free user-contributed Flash files. I love this site and use it quite frequently to not only snag great Flash menus and such, but also sometimes as a source to get inspiration and ideas. You'll need to have Flash if you plan on editing any of the files.

If you're not familiar with iStockPhoto, you should be. Not only does it contain a ton of great stock images, but it surprisingly has some pretty cool Flash stuff available too. From a Flash perspective I've primarily used the menus and image gallery stuff. You will need to have Flash if you plan on editing anything. The catch here is that it's not free, you purchase credits and then use these credits to buy stuff. The images and Flash stuff is somewhat fairly priced and if your company will pay for it then I definitely recommend looking into it.

Enjoy the goodies and a very happy holiday season to everybody!

Ideas to Spice Up Those Title Pages!

2010-11-18T00:06:00.001-07:00

Who couldn't use some fresh ideas for their elearning title pages? You only get one chance to make that first impression, so why spoil it with static images and text on your title page?

I got these three ideas you're about to see while watching TV commercials. Come to think of it, I get a lot of ideas from the various presentation styles and effects used in everyday commercials so be on the lookout as you're watching TV.

Before covering the examples, let me explain that these examples are primarily for those using a PowerPoint rapid elearning tool. If you're a flash developer then you could easily create much more complex effects than you're about to see, however my goal here was to spice up those title pages using nothing but the tools and animation options provided within PowerPoint.

Click the image below to see the examples in action with narrated explanations. Don't ask me why, but even though I had my appropriate microphone peripherals in my bag, I used nothing but my built-in laptop microphone for this narration. I like to handcuff myself sometimes to see what I can do with limited resources. It could be better of course, but all things considered the sound is surprisingly not too bad.

If you're one of those people who like to get their hands dirty and disect things (No worries, I am too) the actual PowerPoint file(s) are available by clicking here. Download away!

Check out my previous post titled "Inspiration is everywhere, just look around" for additional ideas similar to these.

Quite Possibly the Single Most Important Element of Effective E-Learning.

2010-11-13T01:58:00.000-07:00

Have you ever browsed to a website and, not knowing exactly why, just thought it was cool? On the opposite end of the spectrum perhaps you've browsed to a site and, for whatever reason, just knew it sort of sucked! It's likely that the developer of the first site took some pride in their craft, and the second developer didn't. It's the little things folks that make all the difference.

It's not hard to find examples of this, check it: Good Site - Bad Site

One of the single most important thing you can do on your way to becoming a ninja elearning developer is to take pride in the product you're producing and not overlook the little things that help the overall appearance of your course.

Yes, the content is important. Yes, interactivity is important, and of course tossing in some story-telling, scenarios and such are also vital, but all that can be void if your course looks crappy. It simply ruins the credibility of your product if it looks cheesy.

It could be appropriate white-space, simple drop shadows or reflections on images, the placement and alignment of your text, or even your font choice. Pay attention to these little things and your half way home to creating kick-butt elearning.

Let's consider product packaging as an example. If you've ever opened any product packaged by apple you'll know what I'm talking about here. It's not an exaggeration that it's an actual pleasure to open an apple product. The innovation alone engineered into the packaging is a marvel, but it's the little things that make the big difference. The clever way the product is placed in the package, the easy to remove seals and fasteners and even the material is nice to feel and smell...yes I said smell. I think apple may scent their packaging because it smells good. I've kept every apple package I've ever purchased, that's how good it is! This is the type of craftsmanship and detail you should work into your elearning courses.

Call me a freak, but I actually like taking someones cheesy looking PowerPoint presentation or attempt at a job aid, and dressing it up and adding my touch to it, and I always get the Ooohs and Awwws when they see what I did with it. It gives me a rush and makes me feel good about what I've accomplished. Let's have a look at an example.

The first image below is the 'Before' version of an elearning page, and although it's just a sample I threw together in about 3 minutes, it's realistic because I've seen a ton just like it in actual courses.

Whats wrong? How about the fact that it looks like it took about 3 minutes to make. Totally unrelated image for the content, my least favorite Times New Roman font with the dreaded indent, The whole thing is off-center, there's too much vacant space at the bottom, and it's all capped off with a misaligned generic looking continue button. This is what you shouldn't do and, although they may not be able to articulate exactly why, will turn your reader off quicker than Kanye can insult Taylor Swift.

I spent about 20 minutes reformatting this page and here is my revised 'After' product.

I changed the image to a more relevant image conveying emotion and threw in a perspective shadow to add depth, put the text into a colored box (spent some time here fiddling with the bevel and shadow until I liked the way the box looked), bulleted and spaced out the font, added some font color variation to emphasize some things, changed the font to a sans-serif font, and capped it all off by creating a cool looking glossy continue button in Photoshop (see my previous post on how to create this glossy effect in Photoshop).

It may take a few extra minutes to do these things but the juice will definitely be worth the squeeze and the end result will be a more professional eye-pleasing product that you can take some pride in. These little things can make the difference between a generic amateurish looking course, and a catchy, professional eye-pleasing masterpiece!

No Big Words Please!

2010-10-27T00:56:00.000-07:00

Ask anyone who knows me and they'll tell you that I'm an advocate of simplicity. I like the stuff I read to be easy to understand and the things I look at to be easy on the eyes. In other words I despise the overuse of big words and I hate e-learning screens that are a cluttered busy mess. In this post we will focus our attention on the use of big words in elearning, and save the cluttered screen topic for a future post.

Now I happen to work for Corporate America, who in my humble opinion is enemy #1 when it comes to using big words, so I'm constantly saturated with this written vomit. Check out this example which was pulled from an actual corporate email sent to employees.

"As we execute on our 2010 key deliverables, current stakeholder analysis reveals that opportunity exists in the realm of key performance indicators. Company Core Values are cornerstone to executing on our competencies and methodologies, with a focus on business acumen and key company deliverables".

Reading something like this makes me want to (for a lack of a better word) puke! And that's putting it nicely. Why people insist on writing like this will stump me until the day I die! Did they get a new dictionary or thesaurus and thought it appropriate to load their writing with as many big impressive words as possible? Is the 'big word' fairy holding their family hostage demanding they use these words or else? I just don't get it.

I implore you as a developer NOT to write like this, and I used bold caps on NOT with great purpose and intent. Nothing will turn off your viewer quicker than verbosity (or big words). Don't want to take my word for it? Consider the following from perhaps more credible sources:

"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication." ~ Leonardo DaVinci
"Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated." ~ Confucius
"Three Rules of Work: Out of clutter find simplicity; From discord find harmony; In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.” ~ Albert Einstein

Let's backtrack now and explore how we might better write that monstrosity of paragraph we looked at earlier. Here's my attempt at it:

"Becoming more familiar with our overall business and continuing to follow the policies and practices we have in place will help us meet our 2010 goals".

Notice the exclusion of all the big unnecessary words. All of the following were left out: execute, key deliverables, stakeholder analysis, key performance indicators, competencies, methodologies, business acumen, etc.

In closing, those big fancy words may impress at the staff meeting, but they won't in an e-Learning course. Consider writing your courses so a 6th or 7th grader can read it (That's an 11 or 12 year old). Make your course an 'easy-read' and don't force your reader to pull out a dictionary to figure out what you're saying. Your anal retentive, corporate big-word using SME might not appreciate it, but your audience sure will.

Free Articulate iPad Course..Come And Get It!

2010-10-19T23:54:00.003-07:00

I know what you're thinking out there my Articulate peeps! You're short on time and ideas and not only could use some inspiration, but also something pre-built to give you a head-start on your development efforts. Well, look no further, I have your solution.

With this post I offer you (FREE of charge) a pre-built Articulate iPad course for your development pleasure. It includes graphics, animations and syncing all built in, Now all you have to do is open it up, add your content, tinker with your additions then kick back and take all the credit as your peers, manager and stake-holders marvel at your accomplishments.

The iPad was built completely using the shape tools available right in PowerPoint, and the people graphics are standard clipart so if you use them rest-easy when it comes to any copyright worries.

If you use this course leave a comment below or shoot me an email and let me know how it worked for you. ENJOY!

Rules Are Made To Be Broken!

2010-10-16T00:35:00.004-07:00

I'm currently in a debate with a colleague at work about the appropriateness of audio narrative in e-learning courses. My colleague stumbled across an online article where research and studies have shown that adding narrative in e-learning is wrong and actually hinders learning. (Here's the article he was referencing). This comes from Cathy Moore's 'Making Change' e-learning blog, which I do subscribe to, so this post in no way is meant to disparage that blog or the information it contains. In fact I really enjoy this blog and the information it provides. With that said....

I'm not like my colleague who tends to be a rule follower and when he reads something like this he automatically takes it as the gospel and starts adhering to it. I tend to challenge and question studies like this, hence our current debate. I've taken many narrated courses in my time and many of them I enjoyed and found very effective, so how can these courses be wrong? How can I be wrong? I'm never wrong!

I happen to think that if the user can hear the narrative articulated it can squelch much of the misinterpretation that occurs when you leave the reading to the user. Tone and manner, inflection, phrasing, emphasis and more can all be achieved through narration so I tend to disagree somewhat with this article and claim.

The only aspect of this article I do completely agree with is that it's better to have images and short succint text accompany narration, rather than having the word-for-word narrative appear on the screen while it's also being spoken.

Here's an article on how narration in e-Learning can be a good thing. So who's right here? The post that opposes it, or the post that promotes it? Perhaps there is no clear right or wrong answer? Which is exactly my point.

I'm writing this post to encourage you to not always follow the rules. Studies are great and all that, but sometimes they just get in the way of creativity. If everyone followed the rules then we'd all be a bunch of robots building nothing but cookie-cutter courses and what fun would that be? Take a risk people, buck the trend, question studies and don't be affraid to break the rules. Compliance is over-rated!

Now if I could just get my colleage to buy what I'm selling I could win our ongoing debate. What do you think? Click the 'Comment' link at the bottom of this post and let me know.

Free e-Learning PowerPoint

2010-10-10T21:27:00.006-07:00

Hello e-Learning peeps! In my random browsing I've run across a few sites that offer free e-learning PowerPoint templates for those that use a product like Articulate Presenter to develop e-Learning. Many of the sites charge for these and in some cases it's upward of $100.

I decided to take a crack at this and would like to offer this PowerPoint for FREE. I had Articulate users in mind when I developed it, but it should work with any PowerPoint to e-Learning tool you utilize. Please note that it is void of animation and navigation, so you'll have to insert that yourself. This PowerPoint is designed to kick-start the layout design of your e-Learning course. Included in the PowerPoint are various text effects, call-out boxes and more.

You can easily change the layout, color or any aspect of the template in the slide master or on the individual slides. I used an orange & gray theme in this template but you can easily change the colors to match your organizations brand.

As an added convenience, all images in this PowerPoint are pulled from Clip Art (Some I slightly modified) but they are royalty free and can be used at will.

CLICK HERE to download the PowerPoint, and please leave a comment or shoot me an email and let me know if this was useful, or a complete waste of time. ENJOY!

At the conclusion of this blog post you will be able to:

2010-09-28T22:39:00.000-07:00

So at what point did the practice of having lengthy Objectives describing exactly what the learner will be able to do at the conclusion of the course become the gold standard de-facto approach to elearning design?

Trust me I took the bait and ran with it for years, in fact I even went so far as to have a 'Blooms Taxonomy' list of about 100+ verbs hanging up in my my cube. You know the one's I'm talking about ("Identify, Explain, Utilize, List, etc...). but then I started asking myself; Self! Is there a better way of doing this? Are these Objectives really necessary? I mean will the whole e-Learning universe explode if I don't have an "Objectives" page?

I think I just kept doing it because at some point someone said that it was the thing to do and I just went along with it. Well I'm getting older now and in my old age I tend to go against the grain more. I don't want to be like everybody else. I don't want to follow a million rules. I want to be creative! I want to surprise people. Most great inventors are those who think outside the box and do the unconventional thing when everyone else is being conventional.

Now me spouting off about being different and how you don't necessarily need crafted lengthy objectives is one thing, but me justifying it's validity is another, so here's my attempt.

When e-Learning was in its infancy more explanation was needed to educate the learner. I mean self-paced learning was new to the user, thus familiarity was comon-place and this familiarity included clear objectives at the beginning of the course, much like is done in a classroom learning environment.

Well, over time e-Learning has become familiar to the user and research has justified straying from how you do things in a classroom, not to mention that technology and improved bandwidth have catapulted elearning into the stratosphere. e-Learning must now buck the trend, it must capture the learners imagination and interest and one way to do this is to breach tradition and expectations.

Let me pause for a moment and say that I'm not 100% opposed to objectives, and that they do belong at the beginning of the course, but I think an overall more all-encompassing objective at the begining may be a better option than a detailed itemized list. For example:

Rather than this:
Upon completion of this training you will be able to:

Identify How to cook noodles
Describe the different ingredients that compose a good spaghetti sauce
Explain the different pots and pans needed to cook spaghetti
Identify the order to add ingredients
Mix the ingredients together and plate the spaghetti

You might do something like this:

This course will provide you with the tools necessary to create an awesome pot of spaghetti.

What I'm saying here is that you don't need to list all of these items. In fact listing all of these things could distract or turn off the learner from the get-go! If there's an item they already know or are not interested in then they now know up-front that they are going to be exposed to it. Not a good start to the course!

Don't do things in a course just because everbody else is, or because your SME or boss is expecting it. In fact I'm going through this right now. I created a course that had a more generic overall objective rather than listing detailed objectives. As a matter of fact I didn't even use the word 'objective' anywhere in the course. As sure as ants at a picnic my boss has put me in check on this. Her feedback included this predictable nugget: "There's no clear learning objectives at the beginning of the course". I think my boss is just expecting them and when they are not there they freak out. I will now spend about an hour justifying my design and trying to convince her that these objectives are not necessary. I may lose the battle, but I'm going to fight this battle over and over. My next course won't have them either and I'm sure I'll have to fight the fight again.

I encourage you to fight this fight, argue your decision and don't let SME's and bosses detract from your creativity. Heck, point them to this post and tell them: "See, if it's in a blog it must be OK". Take a risk people, think outside the box and be a risk taker.

I'm out like the objectives in my next course!

Creating a Rollover ToolTip in Articulate

2010-09-17T23:18:00.000-07:00

For those that use Articulate Presenter you know it's not the easiest thing in the world to create rollover (mouse over) actions, in fact it's pretty much impossible unless you use an external source like Flash. Now it may seem odd to have an e-Learning blog pimp another e-Learning resource but I'm a big believer in not reinventing the wheel, and part of my goal with this site is to turn you on to e-Learning resources.

OK, on with the information. I was browing around the web (like I do on occasion) and stumbled across elearningEnhanced.com. This site provides a bunch of really kick-ass stuff, some free and some for nominal fees. While browsing around the site I found this Articulate Widget that makes it easy to create audio and/or text rollover tooltips in articulate presenter. The widget does cost $20 but that's pretty cheap for what you get here and if you work for a company (as opposed to yourself) I don't imagine it would be a problem getting approval for $20.

There's also a couple of nice Screenr videos that explain how to use it. Go check it out, and while you're there be sure to check out the free stuff elearningEnhanced.com has to offer.

Lectora Inspire Reviewed

2010-08-30T22:07:00.001-07:00

I just got done checking out Lectora Inspire, the latest installment of Lectora by Trivantis. For those familiar with the Lectora product, it's basically Lectora bundled with SnagIt (For basic image capture and editing), Camtasia (For screen recording), and Flypaper (for creating flash-based interactions and animations). I would have loved to see Captivate instead of Camtasia, but in my opinion the inclusion of these additional tools keeps Lectora on my list of must-have's when it comes to e-Learning development tools.

My favorite of the new features has to be Flypaper. I had heard of this application before but never got the opportunity to fiddle with it, until now. I must of spent a good 5 hours at home one evening just playing around with Flypaper and I have to say that it does some pretty cool stuff. It does have a layer of complication associated with it for some things, but overall it makes it very easy to create some pretty slick flash animations and interactions, not to mention that it's a breeze to incorporate anything you create directly into Lectora.

I really like this new version of Lectora and the inclusion of SnagIt, Camtasia and Flypaper, but what I don't like is the cost. I currently have 7 licenses of Lectora 2008 and it would cost me over 11K to upgrade these 7 licenses to Lectora Inspire. I'm not sure my company is gonna front the bill for this so I'm slightly turned off by the high price tag. Other than that though I highly recommend Lectora Inspire.

Lectora still needs to work on their assessment engine (I still use Articulate Quizmaker for all my assessments). Figured I had to crow-bar that in.

Create a "Roll" Effect in Articulate!

2010-07-16T23:46:00.000-07:00

This video will show you how to create a "Roll" effect using Articulate Presenter and PowerPoint. There's definitely room for improvement here so leave a comment if you can find a way to improve this effect.

Inspiration is Everywhere, Just Look Around!

2010-07-12T00:03:00.001-07:00

I look everywhere for inspiration, TV, Movies, Billboards, Magazines, etc. Here are two ideas I got from TV commercials the other night that would work great for your title page. These are very easy to create and provide much more impact than just a static image.

Captivate & Lectora Can Interact!

2010-07-10T00:13:00.003-07:00

I had this post previously with text and screen shots and decided to replace it with this SCREENR video. I tend to like these better so thought you would too.

The video below demonstrated how you can get Captivate to talk to Lectora. In this case I needed a Lectora 'Next' button to stay hidden until the Captivate movie was done playing. Enjoy! If the video appears a little off-center, just click it and it should straighten out. I noticed this during preview but not sure why it's happening.

Simple Tips To Reduce Course Maintenance!

2010-07-03T02:28:00.000-07:00

Ask anyone who works with me and they'll tell you that post-publish course maintenance is not my favorite thing. You've been there right? You just put the spit & polish on your course, packaged and published it to your LMS and then the next day you get a laundry list of updates. Maintenance is an unavoidable aspect of development. It comes with the territory, however there are some things you can do to reduce course maintenance.

Avoid using actual names in your course, for if that individual changes jobs or leaves the company it will require changes to your course. Instead of saying "Bill Jones, Head of Security", just say "Head of Security". That way if Bill Jones moves on you don't have to change your course.
Link out to often changing processes rather than embedding them directly in your course. These procedures and processes are going to change and if you have the procedure specifics in your course you will have to change your course every time these procedures change. If you link to the procedures instead you will not have to update your course when the procedure change.
Avoid over-using system screen shots if possible. Systems usually have scheduled releases and change frequently. If you have screen shots of a system in your course and the system changes (Even slightly) you will be required to obtain new screen shots and update your course. Now sometimes you have to put screen shots, but sometimes you can get away with being more generic. For example; Let's say I'm only explaining a Submit button on a certain screen, rather than include a screen shot I will just include a solo Submit button, that way even if the screen gets a face lift my course won't require maintenance.
Avoid using dates in your course if possible. If your course points out specific dates things happened then your course will inevitably become stale and require maintenance. Instead of saying "Released in 2010, Release 6 of Acme system contains the following feature enhancements", just keep it generic and say "Acme system feature enhancements include".
If your course has audio, do it yourself. I once commissioned a fellow employee (who had a nice deep radio-like voice) to record the narrative for one of my courses. It was all wonderful until I needed to change something, at which point I was now reliant on this individual and working around their schedule. Worse yet is that this person eventually left the company and I was forced to re-record ALL of the narrative. Not Fun!
If you have audio narrative in your course, break it up into many short clips. This way if something changes you only have a small audio clip to update, rather than long one's. I had a colleague once who was creating audio narrative for a course and the audio on each page averaged about 2 or more minutes. I was helping with the technical recording aspect and maintenance was tedious to say the least. For even the most minor change (sometimes only one or two words) my peer was forced to re-record the entire 2 minute clip. Keep em' short and reduce maintenance.

I would love to hear any tips you might have to reduce maintenance, so leave a comment and let me hear it.

Articulate, I didn't know I could do that!

2010-07-02T15:43:00.003-07:00

If you're like me you subscribe to a few e-learning blogs, mailing lists etc. and are exposed to the good, the bad and sometimes the ugly. In my recent web surfing expedition I uncovered a really cool post at 'The eLearning Coach' titled : "10 Best Articulate Presenter Tricks & Tips" that I thought was very interesting. Things like replacing the side-panel with an image, adding custom Flash files as a Player Tab, Creating nifty Zoom & Pan effects, and more. Check it out, I learned a thing or two in this post. By the way I really dig the Screenr videos, I'm gonna have to jump into that arena sometime soon. I think the firewalls and proxies at my work block it though so I may have to do some convincing. Just thought I would share that last nugget cause' I know you were sitting there wishing I would share some irrelevant personal issues with you.

Do You Really Need A Storyboard?

2010-07-01T00:46:00.004-07:00

I'm often asked my opinion about the relevance of Storyboards in the e-learning development process, so I thought I would address my opinion here in this post. Let me start by saying that if your company's process requires a Storyboard then you don't have much choice, so this post more applies to those who are lucky enough to have flexibility when it comes to these types of decisions.

In my opinion there are situations where a Storyboard makes sense, and situations where it doesn't, so here's my short & sweet take on Storyboard relevance.

Makes Sense:

When your course includes audio narrative. Having a storyboard with the audio narrative can be useful as a script for you (or your voice talent).

When there are multiple developers, or a designer/developer relationship. If more than one person will have a hand in the development of the course it makes sense to have a Storyboard to maintain continuity.

Doesn't Make Sense:

When developing a standard course with no audio. Some argue with me on this one, but I'm sticking to my guns here. With today's technology and environment of rapid e-Learning development you can build the course in your product(s) with the time it takes to create a Storyboard. Storyboards rarely look like the end-product, require a lot of maintenance and with all the interactivity we put in today's courses, it becomes more and more difficult to accurately represent interaction on a static storyboard. Your finished course can be a Storyboard as far as I'm concerned.

I would love to hear your opinions on Storyboard relevance so leave a comment and let's hear ya.

Let's Make Some Glossy Text

2010-06-30T20:57:00.004-07:00

I just love me some Glossy Text so I thought I would provide you a tutorial for creating this effect in Photoshop. I sometimes use this effect on my e-Learning title pages and throughout the course as page headers, but this same effect can be used to make your own cool glossy buttons and more. This tutorial uses Photoshop 7 but should translate regardless of your Photoshop version. My PC runs like a slug when I run CS4 so I still use old reliable 7.0. Don't be afraid to experiment and deviate a little to get just the effect you want. Here's our desired result.

Open a new document and slap some text on that bad boy. The thicker the font the better the effect comes out.

Put a light gray 'Stroke' on it (About 2 pixels) and also put a dark 'Inner Glow' until it looks something like this.

Now you need to add an additional layer above your text layer.

Now hold down the 'Ctrl' key on your keyboard and click the original text layer so your text looks like this.

Now we want to bring that selection in a little so click 'Select' from the top menu, choose 'Modify', then 'Contract' and contract the selection by 1 or 2 pixels (depending on the original size of your font). I contracted by 2 pixels here. Your image should now look like this.

Now choose the Elliptical Marquee Tool.

Now hold down 'Shift+Alt' and select only the top part of your selection. You're image should now look like this.

Now select your gradient tool and set it up as 'Foreground to Transparent', with the Foreground being white.

Start at the very top of your selection and drag down to the bottom of your selection like so.

Now deselect your image and you should have something similar to this.

This is pretty good as it is but I like to access the Blending Options for the top layer and lighten it every so slightly, then I go play with the previous 'Inner Bevel' setting I did earlier until I get it just like I want it. Here is my final product.

Now go make some cool glossy text and buttons. Have fun!