Are you developing online training content (eLearning)? Do you want to save money and time? Are there multiple members on your team and you need everything to be consistent? Are there varying levels of technical expertise on the team?

These are just a few questions that we come across while building online training content. Using templates to build eLearning can address many of the questions above. Before discussing a few points let me describe what I mean by eLearning templates.

Templates can include many different assets. Many common ones are PowerPoint master slide layouts that have many different pages ready for you to insert content. There are also various tools that create template interfaces and GUIs for courses. E-learning templates can include buttons, icons, color schemes, images, quizzes, games, and more. Basically they can be used over and over in different projects. Now let’s discuss a few benefits.

Save Time and Effort

Wouldn’t it be nice to have the interface, page layouts, buttons, icons, colors, and the most often used components of an online course ready to go? Right there on your desktop and ready to drag and drop into place?

Having templates ready to go means that you don’t have to waste time re-creating the same pieces for each course. This can be very valuable for those who may not have a strong background in multimedia. It could take a novice designer a long time to create a flash movie or design an asset that an expert could do in minutes. Also, the quality will be very different.

Another huge plus is that the designers can now spend time focusing on writing good material and less on how to make a button look pretty.

Consistency

Many organizations want their online courses to be consistent. They should have the same colors, look/feel, quality, etc. no matter who the individual designer was. Templates can help achieve this desire. Designers have a base to work from and are all using the same files.

You can also develop a template interface player. This would ensure that learners always have the same navigation options on each course. You could also standardize where links to job aids, outlines, bookmarks, and other features appear. The learner becomes familiar with navigating your course and doesn’t need to waste time trying to figure that part out. They can jump right into the training.

Technical Functionality

Are there certain requirements that your Learning Management System has for courses to function properly? Are there guidelines that the IT department has? Templates are a great way to build a file that works within all guidelines and then to share it with the entire department. As designers use the template it cuts down on troubleshooting time trying to determine why something isn’t working. That effort has already been done and only needs to happen once.

Move Beyond Your Talent

There are some amazing multimedia designers that can create some great content for online training. Not all instructional designers are good at creating multimedia. Templates can be created to add a lot of professionally designed interactivity and games to courses. All you have to know how to do is edit the template and then you can add content that is beyond your skill level to create on your own.

Increase Output and Creativity

I touched on this earlier but e learning templates allow designers to spend time on what they do best…writing course content. Templates can allow you to spend project time on the “meat” of the course and not on the “administrative” parts. This has two consequences: 1. You can spend time thinking of creative ways to make your course interesting and 2. You can build more courses in a shorter amount of time.

I hope that this article gave you a few ideas around how eLearning templates can help you and your team.

If you would like to see some templates here are some examples:
eLearning Flash Template Interactions
eLearning Games
PowerPoint Templates

The other day I posted a blog about designing a custom steel texture background and adding it to a PowerPoint template. It turned out so nice, I thought that I’d make some matching Flash Activities and Flash Games.

Click each sample below for a demo.

Here is a tutorial on how to import a custom graphic background into a Flash Template.

8 Flash games, 1 PowerPoint eLearning course style theme , 1 Flash Interactions Pack included in this bundle AND 1 Articulate Presenter Course Skin!

These are PowerPoint and Flash based templates that are super easy to update. Each template is fully customizable in Flash and PowerPoint (we give you the source files). Easily integrate into your Articulate Presenter course.

BONUS: Reuse the templates over and over again in multiple courses or even other websites and presentations.
Purchase these templates at eLearningTemplates.com

This Flash Ninja game is a customization of one our eLearning template games. The client ordered our ShootOut Challenge Flash game and had us shake it up a bit. This was a lot of fun to do and created a pretty unique elearning game. If you’re familiar with our flash templates, you know that pretty much every element in the template is customizable (we give you the Flash source file).

Check out our e learning template site to learn more about this Flash game and others.

Play the game

This Flash Spy Challenge is one our eLearning template games. We just wanted to take a moment and highlight it as one of our new products that we developed in 2009. If you’re familiar with our flash templates, you know that pretty much every element in the template is customizable (we give you the Flash source file).

Check out our e learning template site to learn more about this Flash game and others.

We think it turned out quite nice.

This Flash golf game is one our eLearning template games. We just wanted to take a moment and highlight it as one of our new products that we developed in 2009. If you’re familiar with our flash templates, you know that pretty much every element in the template is customizable (we give you the Flash source file). Check out our e learning template site to learn more about this Flash game and others.

We think it turned out quite nice. Play the game

This Flash Millionaire game is a customization of one our eLearning template games. The client was great to work with and we had a lot of fun developing this Flash game for them. We changed the colors, added an instructions page, and incorporated sounds. If you’re familiar with our flash templates, you know that pretty much every element in the template is customizable (we give you the Flash source file). Check out our e learning template site to learn more about this Flash game and others.

We think it turned out quite nice. Play the game

This Jeopardy (like) game was developed for one of our “hairiest” clients of the year. Petomundo.com was great to work with and we had a lot of fun developing this Flash game for them. The game was a customization of one of our eLearning templates. We added Randomization to the questions, changed the game characters to dogs, and wrapped the game up with a custom dog house frame.

Go ahead and give the game a whirl. Play the game

If you’ve been coming to this site for awhile you probably know that we build a lot of custom flash games/quizzes/interactions for eLearning developers. I want to take a moment and focus on how the templates work with Articulate.

eLearning Games

Each of the games is created in Flash and has scoring and looks amazing. A learner answers various questions and gets feedback and a running score. Every game comes with the .fla file so that you can customize everything until your heart is content.

However, if you don’t know flash very well, that’s ok. All you have to do is insert your question text into the movie clips in the library. (a tutorial is included with every .fla and there are videos on our template tutorial site.

There are 8 games available right now:

Articulate Presenter Games (Jeopardy, Millionaire, Pyramid, Golf, Spy Game, Board Game, Soccer, Bootcamp)

eLearning Interactions

Ever wish that you have tons of interactive page layouts just ready and waiting? Now you can! We’ve created 4 different designs of interactive flash layouts. Pages with tabs and sections, scenarios, drag and drops, flash cards, quizzes, and more! Each set has over 30 interactive layouts.

All you need to do is add your text to the text movieclip in flash and publish. Here are some samples:

Using Templates and Games in Articulate Presenter

Here are the steps to use these flash templates in Articulate:

1. Add the text that you want to see in your game/interaction to the appropriate movieclip in Flash.

2. Publish the flash movie as .swf

3. In PowerPoint go to Articulate / Flash Movie

4. Select your .swf

5. From the Insert Flash Movie window choose these settings:

• Display in slide
• Advance to next slide “When user clicks next”
• Movie plays independently of slide

6. Click OK

That’s it.

Bonus – eLearning PowerPoint Backgrounds

There are also PPT backgrounds available that have over 80 different layouts. We also provide a PPT master template file that you can use to speed up the development process.

(Updated 3/2011: This bundle has been enhanced. Checkout the new Biggest Bundle.)

These are PowerPoint and Flash based templates that are super easy to update. Each template is fully customizable in Flash (we give you the .fla Flash source file). All you have to do is open Flash, paste your text, publish, and insert into your favorite eLearning Development tool. Made to work within most rapid elearning software (Articulate Presenter, Adobe Captivate, Rapid Intake, Lectora, Adobe Presenter, PowerPoint and more).

BONUS: Reuse the templates over and over again in multiple courses or even other websites and presentations.

Purchase these templates at eLearningTemplates.com