Once you have decided on the platform and tools you are going to use to craft your course, then all that remains is the write it in a way that will be suitable for online learning.
Many people assume that if they have their content as a Word document or PowerPoint, then it will already by suitable for transition to online learning. Courses delivered in a synchronous manner are basically lectures delivered online, so this format is convenient. However, for other styles of delivery a different approach is required as the instructor isn’t present for the delivery.
Either way, a plan should be made to ensure that you design an effective learning experience – in much the same way that you have a blueprint for a building. You will need to create objectives, content that supports these objectives and some sort of assessment to check for learning. Additionally, you will want to create the course in a way that is intuitive and interactive for the learner to maintain their engagement.
Learning objectives are an essential starting point for any good course. Think of them as the outcome of your course. They tell the learner what they will know or be able to do when they have finished. They also give you a framework when you are writing the course.
The objectives should focused. Being too vague about what they are going to learn doesn’t inspire learners and will make your job writing the course harder. An objective such as:
“Know how to make a drink”
… is far too broad. If your course is about making a cup of tea, then your objective could just be:
“Learners will know how to make a cup of tea by the end of this session”
Notice how the objective has specifically said what the learner will get out of doing this course.
Good learning objectives are also SMART. This means they are:
You should also focus on observable behaviours, as these are easily measured. Using words such as “describe,” “analyse,” “create,” “apply,” “evaluate,” and “demonstrate” are ideal. Conversely, you should avoid vague terms like “understand”.
So, when learning about making a cup of tea, you may just want something simple such as:
“By the end of this course you will be able to make a cup of tea”
Finally, make sure your objectives align with what you want the learner to get out of the course. If you are going to tell them about the history of tea drinking, make sure you say it in the objectives.
“By the end of this course you will …
… know about the history of tea drinking
… be able to make a cup of tea
… be able to analyse the health benefits and implications of different teas”
Once you have your learning objectives and know where you are going, you need to present the content. The course content is everything you use to get your learning across, like text, videos, and activities. Anything you put in your content should be aimed at helping reach a learning objective – it’s not just about filling space.
To be effective in delivering the learning, content must be up-to-date and relevant. It needs to be structured logically, maybe introducing a topic, discussing the basics and then building to more complex ideas and concepts. From the example above, the objectives introduce the concept of drinking tea before they go on to describe how to make a cup of tea. Finally, the more complex topic of advantages and disadvantages of drinking different teas are discussed.
Within the content there should be clear explanations and examples to help learners understand. Most of all, you must remember that you are not present to explain things and questions cannot be answered immediately. The content should contain everything a learner needs to know.
One of the important things is to think about how you consume content on the internet. Do you read every single word, or do you skim the text for the relevant bits? Is it easier to read if it’s broken up by images, graphics, moving to another page, or if it’s a wall of text?
The answers to these sorts of questions will help when you design your course. You want to make sure it’s engaging to keep learners motivated and prevent them from dropping out. To do this, use the different learning styles that have been discussed previously. Using a variety of techniques, such as text, multimedia (video, audio, etc), interactive exercises, and real-world examples will keep learners engaged. There is nothing more depressing and difficult than reading screen after screen of text.
Using storytelling can make complex topics more relatable and memorable and break up text with visually appealing content (graphics, animations, etc.), which can also enhance understanding and retention.
But it’s not just about adding the fun bits, it’s also the way you write your text. Attention spans are short, which means your writing needs to grab people fast. Here are some ideas:
For our example, the history of tea may include some pictures of tea plants, equipment used to brew tea or simple some early tea drinkers. Maybe an interactive timeline of important milestones in making tea would help. An obvious video of someone making a cup of tea with a voiceover is going to help with the section on making tea. There may be the opportunity to break down the process into different slides so that people can work through them, or a downloadable document to help them practice. Finally, the section on drinking different teas may have interactive elements such as accordions and tabs to help summarise the information, as well as images of the different teas.
You have your learning objectives, and you’ve designed your content in such a way that it is engaging and fun. How do you know if your learners have learned anything? Traditionally, assessments are how learning has been checked for hundreds of years and there is no reason why your course can’t be the same. Assessments are things like quizzes, projects, and discussions. They show if learners have understood the course content and can use what they have learned.
There are two main assessment types, formative and summative. Formative assessments are used throughout the course to check learning. Remember being at school and the teacher asking questions during class – that was their way of checking learning during the course. You can do this too, with quick knowledge checks. Maybe one or two questions at the end of each section or asking for learner to reflect on what they have learned if you want to be more involved.
Summative assessments are the more formal assessment that we are all familiar with, exams, presentations, case studies, etc. You can use these too. A final quiz at the end of a course with questions on every topic covered. Be warned, using anything other than platform marked quizzes will take time for the instructor.
Whatever assessments you choose to use, they should match the learning objectives. If an objective is to “design a website”, the assessment shouldn’t be a multiple-choice test about web design. Instead, it might be a project where you build a real website. For our tea example, there may be some multiple-choice questions on the history of tea and the health implications of drinking tea. Ideally, you would ask for a video of them making a cup of tea to prove that they learned how to do it, but this may not be practical. In this case, you can get creative and maybe do sorting exercises to put the steps for making tea in the correct order.
