KEEP WORDS TO A MINIMUM
A quote from the article “A Picture is Worth 1000 Words: Visual Design in E-Learning” by Shevy Levy and Jim Yupangco in Learning Solutions Magazine kicks us off today:
An essential quality for truly effective e-Learning is a course design that exhibits “Efficient Sentence Use per Screen” — composed with reading-level-appropriate vocabulary.
If longer term retention is the ultimate aim of your training program, the emphasis of individual teaching screens should be on the visuals while the sentences/phrases may be included as an enhancement.
These visuals should be rooted in full motion video (and/or graphic animations) and may include photographs, graphics, charts, and diagrams.
We do not want our learners to concentrate on lengthy text screens, which have proven to be less effective in meeting retention goals.
Short sentences, then, or short “bullet” screens describing a single information point are the hallmark of good instructional design. The learner who can read quickly and well can then focus on the visual teaching of the screen, just as the individual who prefers to listen (by exercising optional full audio) can quickly move on to the real teaching focus of the screen.
(And, the words and short sentences you use should always be chosen on the basis of Grade 4 reading ability since about 40% of your trainees cannot assimilate anything written above that level.)
Instructional Designers who have a good grasp of effective teaching soon learn how to confine their scripting instruction to short, to-the-point sentences.
However, one fact remains: “A ‘moving picture’ is truly worth a thousand words!”
More on Monday – – –
— Bill Walton, co-Founder, ITC Learning
January 25, 2017
www.itclearning.com/blog/ (Mondays & Wednesdays)