As the world becomes more aware of eLearning, we (thankfully) get to experience more and better eLearning courses. With new and improved technology replacing older ones, the future of eLearning will far beyond our wildest expectations. But first, let’s talk about the present. Every Instructional Designer or eLearning course creator is responsible for providing outstanding, perfect e learning management system experiences as more and better eLearning courses become available to everyone. But doing so necessitates understanding what to do and knowing what not to do. In this essay, we’ll go through 15 catastrophic eLearning mistakes to avoid if you want your courses to be flawless.
15 of The Most Common eLearning Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
Too much coercive training
For those who need step-by-step instructions, forced learning is the way to go. When your target audience is comprised primarily of beginners, this is an excellent method because it ensures that they do not skip forward, losing vital information. On the other hand, forced learning may produce apathy and even dissatisfaction in all of your courses, even those designed for advanced learners. Pushing all of your learners to suffer through the fundamentals is a mistake. It can easily lead to boredom, which is the death of learning.
Getting distracted from the learning objectives
Your learning objectives should constantly be at the top of your mind. From the content itself to the seemingly trivial images you utilize on the final page, every aspect of the eLearning course should fulfill those goals. You risk delivering a chaotic or ineffective delivery if you lose sight of the learning goals and eLearning objectives. Have a clear understanding of what the learners anticipate to get out of the eLearning course and what content you’ll need to deliver to meet those expectations.
There’s way too much text
This should be a self-evident error to avoid. Visuals and interactivities are what give eLearning its power of engagement and retention, and it’s superior to plain books because it’s so much more than page after page of text. On the other hand, some firms copy and paste learning content from traditional classroom training into their eLearning courses. To top things off, they don’t even chunk the content appropriately for eLearning. This is considered poor eLearning design since it fails to interest the audience. It’s a deadly blunder that must be avoided at all costs.
Creating deliverables that aren’t difficult for the learner
One of the most common eLearning mistakes is creating a course that isn’t difficult enough to challenge the learner. Learners must feel as if they are being pushed beyond their current knowledge bounds as if the eLearning course is providing them with practical experience. Otherwise, they would be unable to recognize the true benefit of enrolling in that eLearning course and will be unmotivated to learn.
Content is packed with audio
The auditory faculty is where a lot of learning takes place for people. When you think about it, people learn to communicate by listening to others. However, relying too heavily on audio is a common blunder when it comes to eLearning. Worst of all, when designers combine on-screen text and audio on the same screen, consumers are forced to read and hear the exact phrases throughout the course. Most users’ reading speeds are faster or slower than the narration speed. Always give your students a choice to turn off narration, and make sure they understand which parts of the content should be read aloud and which should be left to on-screen text.
A lot of information
Although it is debatable whether there is such a thing as “too much detail” in a course, spoon-feeding the learner every single detail is a bad idea. For example, how much retention do you believe will occur if your course narrates and presents everything without allowing the learner to truly utilize their brains? Allow your students to tinker with their minds, to get intrigued, perplexed, and to genuinely pay attention and engage with your subject. It’s understood that this is a fine line to walk, but generating effective eLearning has never been a trouble-free, and it continues to be so.
When a learner’s mind is bombarded with too much knowledge, cognitive overload occurs. Incorporating text-heavy pages within your deliverable will almost certainly result in cognitive overload. When composing information, keep it short and sweet. Irrelevant content should be removed, and more complicated concepts should be broken down into smaller, more digestible bullet points or paragraphs.
Developing difficult-to-navigate eLearning courses
When creating an eLearning course, usability is crucial. Even if the content is of great quality and the graphics are perfect, if a learner cannot navigate around the eLearning course easily, they will not attain their learning objectives. They’ll just click away. It’s critical to check that all links are live and that each page is easily accessible. Read more: corporate training platform
More visuals than required
eLearning is all about achieving a delicate balance between all of the factors that contribute to its success as a learning methodology. While images are important in engaging students, there is such a thing as too much of a good thing. Too many pictures or graphics can easily confuse learners, especially if functionality is sacrificed to accommodate them. Less advanced learners may feel silly if they can’t figure out what they’re supposed to accomplish in the midst of a barrage of graphics, which defeats the objective of an eLearning course. Always examine if your course can do without it as a basic tip to recognize when you’re overdoing it. You probably don’t need it if it can.
No clear concept of who your target audience is
Have a clear idea of who you’re designing the eLearning course for. What are their passions? How high is their level of experience? Do you have an idea of their educational level? If you don’t spend the time to investigate your target audience, you’ll end up with courses that aren’t very engaging. Not to mention that the end-user will be unable to connect the deliverable with the value of the content being provided.
A scarcity of useful assessment tools
A major eLearning mistake is providing material to the student in the form of images, text, or audio snippets without occasionally checking their knowledge. These tests, such as exams and section quizzes, allow you to see if they are genuinely absorbing and remembering the material. It also allows them to summarise the information so that they can commit it to long-term memory more effectively.
Paying no attention to the content’s quality
While you need to focus on the aesthetic features of your eLearning course, you should also consider the quality of the content you provide for learners. Every piece of content you present should make learners feel as if it will assist them in some way. Errors and badly written information can detract from the quality of the eLearning experience, making the learner doubt the course’s worth and potentially jeopardizing your company’s credibility.
Omitting interactive aspects that might make the experience more engaging
Videos, audio snippets, real-life scenarios, and background music are all examples of interactive features that can improve the effectiveness of an eLearning experience. If you don’t include these strong tools in your interactive eLearning strategy, you risk creating eLearning courses that dull learners rather than making them feel like active participants in the learning process.
Using a limited number of distinct learning methods and eLearning technologies
It’s critical to incorporate a variety of learning methods into your eLearning strategy. We can say the same for technological advancements. As eLearning experts, we must always be on the lookout for new technology and solutions. Why? This can aid us in providing better training experiences. Similarly, we must keep up with the latest learning methodologies, instructional design models, and theories. It enables us to build immersive, engaging, and informative online learning environments for all users.
Creating an eLearning course that is too difficult to maintain and update
We’ve all seen eLearning courses or modules that were visually gorgeous, jam-packed with useful material. They are dead-on when it came to communicating the main message and ideas. However, it fell short in terms of updates. It’s fantastic to create beautiful and meaningful eLearning courses, but they also need to be straightforward to maintain in the long run. So, keep things simple and make sure you (or your client) can simply amend the deliverable if the need arises.
Wrapping It Up
It might be that you’re new to the field of eLearning and instructional design. However, keeping these guidelines in mind while creating your next eLearning course can help you produce effective eLearning courses. Now, we also have those of you who are more experienced eLearning experts. We hope that this list allows you to fine-tune your deliverables by avoiding these common eLearning mistakes.
