If we go by Training Magazine’s prediction about the eLearning industry, it will be safe to say that Online learning is not a small industry anymore. In fact, expected to grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 5% between 2019 and 2024 and expected to cross the $200 billion mark by 2024.
Learning through a virtual medium has become highly popular over the last decade. Be it for basic education or for corporate or medical training, technology has made its place in among people as a reliable form of learning and development.
And as the time progressing in every scientifically, the learning (rather, eLearning) community is witnessing substantial changes in the ways that education has been adopted till now. Normal, subjective content has long left the field and now is the time to instill interactiveness in your courses.
By next year and beyond, some of these content design methods and advanced technologies would have taken the mainstream seat in L&D. So if you are an eLearning course developer, keep the following trends in mind to make your content a hit.
- Video-based learning content
It is no secret that finding time and will to sit through a dry, heavy-on-content online lesson for hours at a stretch seems impossible in today’s world. For this reason, interactive video lessons are taking the center stage in the learning community.
In order to create a compelling video for your future learners, there are some crucial points that you should keep in mind, such as
- Know your audience – Before starting content development, make sure that you are aware whether you are creating this video content for highschool kids, home-school kids, corporate leaders or startup interns. Each of these categories of learners has different expectations from the course. While the interns would enjoy games and funny animations, corporate leaders might appreciate a more serious approach.
- Address their issues – Another important thing to know before course development is the “WHY are you creating this course”. While creating content, knowing the problems and issues that you intend to solve with the help of your course, give it the right direction.
- Be consistent: To create great video content, quality and consistency are two of the most important factors. It helps you keep the learners engage and build a brand name.
- Engaging elements
While video content is good for substituting traditional content and make it easier to follow, engagement building in a course requires much more.
Some of the best element for building engagement in a learning course are;
- Tests and Quizzes: Tests, quizzes and practical examples which your learner demography can relate with are crucial elements which can be responsible for the success or failure of your course. For doing this right, you should know the habits and preferences of your audience and use them in designing tests. This will keep them interested until the very end. For instance, if you are creating a course for Customer Training, you can include role-playing exercises to test the learning instead of regular quizzes.
- Animations: Instead of simply reading about a topic, using animations to demonstrate the practical application of each topic is known for improving retention. So, strategically placing interactive animated examples throughout the course will keep it interesting. In fact, many course developers are now moving towards AR and VR technologies engage their learners.
- Micro-learning
Based on the fact that the average attention span of readers is not more than 8 seconds, today, there is a dire need of accommodating the online course accordingly. Micro-learning is a concept that caters to learners by keeping their lessons brief, to-the-point and action-oriented.
Many eLearning course providers are now opting for course layouts that require the learners to invest not more than 10 to 15 minutes a day for a lesson.
On top of this, With mLearning, mobile eLearning authoring tools make these kinds of courses highly accessible so the learners can undertake the course as per their availability and comfort.
An added but crucial element of micro-learning is basing daily learning on applications and exercises. So the learner is able to apply their knowledge to their daily work which builds on knowledge retention.
Lastly, the most important factor of eLearning today is Customization of courses and all the course development techniques and technologies follow this same path.
Today, when the customer is the king, it is vital for the success of any learning course to cater to the varying needs of all the customer categories. In the coming years, all the technologies, from AI to VR, will only follow one principal – Customization.
Let us know in the comments, what are your thoughts on making eLearning better.
EDTECH 4 BEGINNERS 
If we proceed by Training Magazine’s prediction concerning the eLearning business, it is going to be safe to state that Online learning isn’t a little business anymore. For this rationale, interactive video courses are taking the middle stage of the learning community. Lastly, the essential factor of eLearning now is Customization of classes, and the class development methods and technologies follow precisely the same path.
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