The Power of PowerPoint Master Slides in eLearning

Master slides in PowerPoint are very powerful and they are easier than ever to do with PPT 07. When using a rapid e-Learning authoring tools that runs off PowerPoint I always start with a template that uses master slides. (or I build one to use throughout the course.)

Why do I like master slides: Templates – You can create a bunch of master slides and then save it as a template.That allows you to chose from many different layouts with just one click. (see last image below.) Page Design – Create a different layout for each type of learning interaction. Build master slides with 1,2,3…. boxes, scenarios, title page, pre-quiz, course evaluation, etc. (see the example images below.) Consistent Layout – The text boxes and images for each layout are always in the same spot. It makes the presentation/course look clean and professional when things don’t “jump” around. Easy to Share – If you work with multiple designers it is easy to share the file so that everyone is using the same layouts. It’s Fast – Once you build some master slides it can really increase your design speed. You don’t have to “fiddle” with the layout of each page. Just click New Slide and choose a layout. Reusable – You can quickly select the master slides and make changes. These changes will be reflected on every slide/page that used that master slide. Quickly change fonts, text positions, colors, etc. Here are PowerPoint course templates and styles for eLearning that we’ve created. I hope that they speed up development and make your courses look great! Happy eLearning!

Handwritten Fonts – Where to Find Them

I’ve come across various posts lately about handwritten fonts and they can be a great addition to an online course.

Examples of handwritten fonts being used:

Here are some free Handwritten Fonts:

• Articulate
• Da Font
• TripWire Magazine
• Instant Shift

Great Post: Tom and the Rapid eLearning Blog on when to use handwritten fonts.

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Checkout PowerPoint backgrounds for your eLearning courses.

Articulate Tip – Lock the Browser Size

Have you ever published your Articulate course and the images and flash are fuzzy and look terrible? Well, if so it might be caused by your course content resizing in the browser.

There is a setting within each Player Template in Articulate Presenter that allows your to either allow the course to expand/shrink as the user’s browser window changes size or to lock the content as the “optimal” size. If you don’t lock the presentation then if your user has a large browser window your images/flash might look as though they’ve be “zoomed in”. They could start to get that pixelated look.

Here’s how to lock your presentation size in Articulate Presenter:

1. Click Publish

2. Open the Player Template (the button with 3 dots to the right of the Player Template drop-down)

3. Click the Other tab and choose Lock presenation at optimal size.

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Articulate eLearning games and interactive flash templates that you can insert into PowerPoint and Articulate.

eLearning Graphics – They Make a Huge Impact!

There is no doubt that graphics and images greatly improve online training content. The question is how to properly use them. I’ve come across some good articles lately and thought that I’d compile and list them here.  (the list also includes some posts on graphics that we’ve done in the past.)

Realistic Graphics and Learning: What’s most effective? (The eLearning Coach)

Really…Were These the Best Images We Could Find? (eLearning Brothers)

Don’t use Gratuitous Images in eLearning (eLearning Brothers)

Graphics: Adding Reflections (eLearning Brothers)

5 Common Visual Design Mistakes (The Rapid eLearning Blog)

Visual Design for Instructional Content (eLearning Post)

If you have some more good articles please let me know.

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(Check out amazing eLearning Games, Flash Interactions, PowerPoint Backgrounds, and e Learning Templates)

Really…Were These the Best Images We Could Find?

JOIN THE CRUSADE…NO MORE CHEESY, ANIMATED CLIPART!

How many times have you seen images like these?

Images are an important part of online courses. The trick is that the images we use must enhance the instructional qualities of the content. The images must also look professional and give the learner confidence that the material is accurate. The images above do not look professional and certainly do not give me a feeling that I can trust the course content.

So what types of images could we use?

Photos – Photographs are great because they are real. They don’t look cheesy and they aren’t animated. If you’d like to use a guide in your course why not take pictures of a colleague or friend? You could have them do multiple poses and then cut out the background in Photoshop. Make sure that you use a high enough quality setting so that you can have full screen images that look crisp.

There are tons of stock photography sites online. iStockphoto is great and lets you just buy the images that you want. You could also purchase access to large libraries that let you use as many as you’d like. I’ve used Photos.com and liked the selection.

Graphics – There are times when you want to design your own graphic. There are several different ideas here:

Integrate part of the text into the image. Could the text be shortened and integrated into the image? Charts (pie, bar, etc) are great ways to present information Illustrate a process with graphics. A step-by-step process can be a create visual image

Icons – Every course should have a set of icons. Icons can be standardized and used in multiple courses. These icons give the user direction and add functionality to the course. Also, as the same icons are used over and over, the user begins to quickly recognize and understand them. Here are a few parts/functions of a course that could have corresponding icons:

Important/Caution Notes/Additional Information Launch Simulation Launch Site Launch Document/Job Aid Course Evaluation Test/Knowledge Check Activity Watch Video

To wrap it all up images should enhance the course content. They should not just be gratuitous graphics that mean nothing. And above all…cheesy, animated gifs have no place in a course. They scream “Novice” and there are so many better options out there.

Related Articles: Brand online training Adding Reflections to Graphics Spice up eLearning page layouts Stylize Flash Images (Check out amazing eLearning Games, Flash Interactions, PowerPoint Backgrounds, and eLearning Templates)

Is Classroom Training More Credible than Online Training?

Recently at a round-table discussion about eLearning in the Commercial Lending industry an interesting point surfaced periodically: “Why is classroom training perceived as being more credible than online training?”

I think that this varies a bit by industry (and commercial banking is not known to be pioneers in the latest technology) but many people believe that classroom training is the “best way”. E-Learning is acceptable as a “second-best” option but will not work as well as a classroom session. In fact the only reason why they may “settle” for an online solution is to save time and money.

Why does this perception exist?

Here are a few perceptions of Classroom training that might lead someone to think that it’s more credible (allow they might not be correct):

• Paying for Flights and Meals: It can get expensive to bring participants into a classroom. Maybe this is seen as a vote of confidence in the classroom because a company is willing to spend money and time to bring employees in. Showing that they are willing to put out $$ may portray to employees that it’s important.
• That’s how I Learned: Classroom sessions are how most people learned when they got their university degree. Online schools and degrees have not typically the same weight/prestige as traditional universities.
• I’m Present in a Room: Participants are sitting in a room and I can see them. It must be better than them staring at a computer somewhere.
• Yes…They Were There: A trainer can certify that a person actually arrived. Yes they had buns in a seat.
• The Message Was Delivered: Management can ensure that a person stood up and told everyone what needed to be said.
• Comments and Discussions: Participants have the opportunity to personally see and discuss topics with others. They can network and connect faces and names.
• Online Training is Just Reading: Unfortunately some online courses are bad…they just put pages in an interface and let participants read. This was especially true in 5-8 years ago. Some people have never had a good learning experience with a true online course and don’t know the potential.

In the early days of eLearning it seemed that the goal was just to recreate the classroom in an electronic format. That is no longer the case. I think that the attempt now is to use the strengths of both.

Overall, my round-table discussion ended with a consensus that blended learning could really be the best of both worlds. Both online and classroom have inherent strengths and can complement each other in many ways.

What do you think?  Is classroom training perceived as more credible and superior in your organization? Why or why not?

UPDATE:

Discussion points from Training and Development LinkedIn Group:

“There could be a couple of reasons -

1. More engagement and feedback mechanismThere is more experiential learning atmosphere
2. The question asked and the answers discussed could open up a lot of perspectives
3. There is more of the human connect, considering the fact that we are after all,flesh and blood of emotions
4. Online learning is too straight jacketed” – Dewalker Basnet

Point from Learning, Eduction, and Training Professionals LinkedIn Group:

“Bad training will always lack credibility while good training will always add value.

Whether it is delivered face to face or online is irrelevant……that is only the medium. I am assuming that professional trainers will choose the appropriate method.

Too many people are getting hooked up with the approach and they lose focus on the objectives, how to measure effectiveness, keeping learning pragmatic amongst other things.” – Tony Park

Point from eLearn LinkedIn Group:

“Some of the arguments that classroom experience is far better is the ability to cross communicate in the classroom. I have found that if you present a problem or issue and engage the classroom in a groupthink experiment, you engage the students to come up with innovative and creative ideas. This in turn engages the attention span of a student in the classroom.” – Jason Miller

“Classroom learning is given more credibility than on-line/distance learning. I believe that the reason includes the greater impact information makes on the learner when more senses are involved in the learning process. In a classroom, learners have the opportunity to use tactile as well as clear visual and auditory stimulation. Discussions are more easily and naturally facilitated. Visuals and audio on line are fed through a medium which tends to “dull” them, somewhat like watching a play through a window. Tactile stimulation is not readily available.” – Caroline Silver

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(Check out amazing eLearning Games, Flash Interactions, PowerPoint Backgrounds, and eLearning Templates)

Knowledge vs. Information…Which is it?

Is there a difference between Knowledge and Information? As training professionals are we sharing information, teaching knowledge, or both?

Last week I was discussing Commercial Lending training with various designers from financial institutions and someone mentioned how we aim to give knowledge not information. The comment made me start to think about how courses are created. What is knowledge and was is just information? Maybe they are the same?

Definitions from Webster:
Knowledge:
acquaintance with facts, truths, or principles, as from study or investigation; general erudition: knowledge of many things.

Information:
knowledge obtained from investigation, study, or instruction.

Today there is tons of information available at our finger tips. We can Google any word in the world and find pages of results that could take us days to view and read. Does a huge amount of available information mean that we are more knowledgeable? Should we cram as much information as possible in our online courses and “watch” our learners’ knowledge increase by 100%?

Instructional designers have an unique opportunity to “chunk” and organize information into a format that enables the transfer of knowledge. (or at least present information in a manner/format that speeds up that transfer.) ID professionals can sequence, simplify, and visually portray information.

I guess that my final thoughts are that I believe knowledge is gained from what we do with the information around us. I am more knowledgeable when I process information and retain it. The goal of online training could be how to present information in a way that is so inspiring, engaging, and interactive that it is destined to become the learners’ knowledge.

What do you think?

UPDATE from ASTD LinkedIn discussion
Here are a few comments that I liked:

“Knowledge is derived from information.” – Heather Porterfield

“Data does not have context, meaning, or intent.
Information is a subset of data once it is put into context and has a purpose. Knowledge is information that allows us to take action or make decisions.” – John Benson

“There is a hierarchy, in terms of structure, value and complexity -

Starting with

a) unstructured, non-correlated DATA,
b) DATA structured or correlated into INFORMATION,
c) INFORMATION aggregated into KNOWLEDGE, and finally
d) KNOWLEDGE refined into INSIGHTS.

Information hierarchy:
Data, Information, Knowledge, Insight.” – George Mattathil

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(Check out amazing eLearning Games, Flash Interactions, PowerPoint Backgrounds, and eLearning Templates)

Brand Your Online Training

The Learner’s Perspective
When a learner launches your online training do they know that it belongs to your company? Could a customer recognize your company by looking at your course?

I have always thought that training material should mimic the branding of the company and/or organization. So why do I think this way? Most companies spend a lot of time and money to develop a brand and a look/feel that they want to portray to the public. Often these are marketing professionals that team up with designers to create all sorts of electronic images/video and print collateral. If they’ve hired the professionals and spent so much money, why are we trying to recreate the wheel?

On a different note, many times our instructional designers are not multimedia gurus. Too often we waste time trying to create an interface, buttons, color scheme, etc. when in the end it still doesn’t look as good as what we could have gotten from marketing.

One other thing to consider is if your courses are for external customers or internal employees. It may be more important to use the appropriate branding if you’re targeting external customers. However, I’d recommend that even internal courses look similar to the overall company’s brand.

How to start branding content?
The first thing I’d do is talk to the marketing / advertising department. This could also include the website team. Most likely they have all of pieces that you need. (and in the file types that you need also). Many different layouts, images, colors, etc could be based on those corporate branding files.

A few things that I’d look for:

Color schemes
Most companies have established color schemes. You don’t have to limit yourself to just those colors but they could be the base for what you design. Or maybe use the main colors and add another one for accents and highlights. If you’re in a large company each division may have it’s own color scheme.

Fonts
Does your company have certain fonts used for tag lines, annual reports, and /or presentations? These may not end up being your main content fonts but they could be used for headings or within various image layouts.

Layouts
Marketing may have various PowerPoint templates that they use for presentations. This could be tweaked and used in many different rapid eLearning development tools.

Images
Does corporate have an image library? Have they purchased images in the past or maybe they have a stockpile of ones they’ve taken themselves? For example, if you work for a bank you could find pictures of branches, lobbies, employees, ATMs, etc that could easily be used in courses. Don’t forget about the website team. They may subscribe to a monthly image library that you could tap into. (added a user may not cost very much.)

Logos
Make sure that you get as many logo sizes, shapes, colors, and transparencies as possible. Logos are great because not only can they be used at the beginning of the course they can also be integrated into images. For example, does your company logo have a symbol? If so it can be used throughout various components of your course.

What other things should be considered when branding courses? How can you find what you need?
We’ve also created eLearning templates that are branded.

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e-LearningTemplates.com
eLearning flash interactions, games, and PowerPoint backgrounds for your online courses.

Have Fun with your Flash Images!

Ever wanted to make your photographs a bit more “stylized” or look more like an illustration or cartoon? Here is a quick tip on how to use Flash to turn your bitmap images into vectors.

1. Import image onto the Flash stage.

2. Select the image.

3. Select Modify / Bitmap / Trace Bitmap.

4. Adjust the settings as desired.

Here is the details about the settings (From Adobe Tech Notes): Color Threshold: The range is from 1 to 500. This setting determines the degree to which one pixel may vary in color from adjoining pixels before Flash interprets them as different colors. As you increase the threshold value, you decrease the number of colors. Minimum Area: The range is from 1 to 1000. This setting determines the size in pixels of each shape generated by the trace. The lower the setting, the smaller the shapes generated. Curve Fit: This menu has six settings that range from Pixels to Very Smooth. These menu settings determine how closely the edges between the individual vector shapes conform to the bitmap colors. The Very Smooth setting draws longer curves, while the Pixels setting creates many short curves. Corner Threshold: This menu has three settings; Many Corners, Normal, and Few Corners. These menu settings control the degree a single curve can bend before breaking into two separate curves with corners. Many Corners will yield a smoother line.

5. Viola! Fun images that you can use to add a bit of style. You can also manipulate the colors and backgrounds.

Here are a few examples:

Check out our eLearning games and Flash interactions!

10 Design Standards to Create Better eLearning!

If you’re thinking about creating eLearning courses you’ve probably started to think about standards. eLearning content needs to follow standards just like classroom manuals and material. When content is standardized it makes it easier for the learner to understand and quickly process the content. They stop noticing inconsistencies and focus on what you’d really like them to – the meat!

Once you’ve come up with your own list of standards, make sure that everyone on the team has them (and lives by them). Don’t be soft. Enforce the standards and maybe even create some templates that are already “standardized”. You could also implement a final Q/A checklist that makes the designer complete a checklist that they followed each standard. After awhile following the standards will just become second nature.

Here is my list of 10 things that I’d include in my list of “standardized items”:
1. Bolding: Decide how to use bolding. To emphasize, as headings, for sections, to indicate actions?
2. Italics: Are hyperlinks italicized? What about names of documents, screens and systems?
3. Fonts: Choose 2-3 fonts and decide which one is for headings, body text, and possibly image design.
4. Colors: Find colors that contrast well. There are many different websites that help create color schemes and check contrast. Just a tip…stay away from lime and purple text.
5. Layout: Design 5-10 different layouts and let the team use them. This saves time because each page doesn’t have to be custom designed each time. It also trains the learner to know how to understand your pages. Consider using e Learning templates.
6. Grammar and tense: Are you talking directly to the learner? Past tense or present tense (maybe future)? Should you be formal or informal?
7. Images: Will your images have shadows, rounded corners, feathering, borders, reflections, be square?
8. Buttons: What buttons will you always use? You might need buttons for next, back, jobaids, exit, simulation, more info, tips, play, course evaluation, get help, FAQs, feedback, and replay.
9. Logos: What logos will you have displayed? Company, department, none?
10. Text Size: What size are the headings? How about the body text?

Bonus List:
- File types: What types of files are allowed and function in the course? (.mov, .swf, .avi, .png, .wmv, etc.)
- Icons: Create a library of standard icons such as: caution, checkmarks, notes, numbers, arrows, etc.
- Interactivity: How do you tell the user to do something? Click the XXXXX button or Click XXXX? Do you bold what action the user should take?
- Bullets: What shape of bullets will you use?
- Course player/GUI: Create a standard interface for all courses. This allows the user to get used to how to navigation and use the courses.

Even More Tips from the Comments Section…Thanks! (view comments below)
- Component names: What do you call parts of the screen? Drop-down menu or List box? How to you tell them to access these components? Select, click, choose, enter, type, etc.

- Capitalization: Make it consistent throughout. For instance, are you capitalizing button names (on the buttons and in instructional references — all lowercase, all caps, title case)? What about certain terms (and if so, which ones)?

Here’s a nice article on Legibility from Adobe Magazine.

I know that I’ve missed a bunch. What others would you include?

(Check out amazing eLearning Games, Flash Interactions, PowerPoint Backgrounds, and e Learning Templates)

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