“We shouldn’t use contractions because then people won’t take the content seriously.” Sound familiar?

Or maybe you’ve heard this: “We shouldn’t use contractions because they’re confusing for people who speak English as a second language.”

The result of these beliefs can be robotic chanting like the paragraph that you are reading now. I will not use contractions as I say that sometimes we become obsessed with details of grammar that are not actually useful, and as a result of this obsession we do not see the big picture. We are too busy enforcing small rules that do not help the learner, so we do not realize that our learner is thinking, “I will leave this course now because this text I am reading did not come from a human being.”

“They won’t take it seriously!”

Here’s what Ruth Clark and Richard Mayer have to say about “conversational” style in e-Learning and the Science of Instruction: (more…)

How well do you know your learners?

When I write, I try to think of a specific learner, so I can imagine how engaged or confused they might be as they use the material. The problem is, I usually don’t know anyone in the audience.

I hope you’re not so removed from your audience. And if your organization has some sort of discussion forum or blogs, you can get a lot closer to your learners by stealing the “Seven things you don’t know about me” meme that periodically moves through the blogosphere.

I’ve been tagged by Rupa to share seven things. I’m going to trim it down to three for my example: (more…)

Probably everyone on your team agrees that elearning should be concise and lively. But does everyone agree on what “concise and lively” looks like? Here’s one way to get everyone on the same stylistic page.

Quantify, quantify

When we talk about writing style, we can get bogged down in personal preferences that are hard to communicate. But if we use readability statistics to quantify style, it’s easier to guide writers.

I’m not talking about the nearly useless “ninth-grade reading level” requirement in your corporate style guide. Instead, let’s look at the Reading Ease measurement that’s part of Word’s readability check. It’s a much more practical guide, especially if you compare your score with that of familiar publications.

What does this chart tell us? (more…)

The right image can turn a blah message into a memorable, meaningful experience. But how can you find stock images that aren’t, well, stock?

Last fall I did a quick overview of how to find good stock photos. Here are more in-depth tips that will help you use stock photos to reach your learners’ hearts as well as their minds.

Aim for the evocative

In a previous life as a marketer, I learned the difference between functional and evocative company names. For example, compare the names of two computer companies:

• Digital Equipment (functional–it simply describes the product)
• Apple (evocative–involves our senses, suggests simplicity)

The same concepts apply to images.

For example, more courses than I ever want to see use sterile images of bland business people because the courses are about business, and “everyone knows” that business involves people in suits talking at meetings or shaking hands. That’s the functional mindset, and it has spawned thousands of lifeless photos.

But our courses aren’t really about stiff, overdressed people whose souls have already departed. They’re about problems that need to be fixed or changes that will improve our lives. To communicate that, we need emotionally evocative images.

Quick guide to finding evocative images

Let’s say your course discusses the importance of building trust in others. How can you quickly find good images about such an abstract concept? (more…)

How good is your ear for dialog? Find out with Dude or Droid, a simple drag-and-drop activity I created to try out Dragster.

As you decide who said each blurb, notice the cues that you’re responding to. What makes dialog sound natural, and what makes it sound stiff?

Click the image to start the activity, and pretend the “TRIAL” watermark isn’t there. Then come back here for some dialog tips and a mini-review of Dragster.

What did you notice about the dialog?

In the droid’s lines, you probably saw these symptoms of unnatural dialog: (more…)

The “Dump the Drone” slideshow presents quick ideas that can perk up your elearning. Some of you have seen the show on my main site, but now I’ve posted it on Slideshare. This means you can easily embed the slideshow in your own site like I’ve done here or download it as a colorful PDF.

| View | Upload your own

Topics:

• What makes online courses boring
• How to create compelling characters and stories
• Ideas for adding “safe” humor
• How to tighten flabby text
• The best uses for readability analysis

You’re free to use the slideshow in your internal training as long as the attribution page (last slide) is included. The slideshow isn’t available for commercial use (for example, don’t charge for it) and it can’t be used to demonstrate vendors’ products. (more…)

No budget. No time. No powerful tools. You’re under constraints, and it’s a pain. But are constraints always bad for creativity?

Imagine you had all the options and time in the world. This river has all the room it needs to spread out. Peaceful, isn’t it?

The next river has some serious constraints. What have the constraints done?

Constraints focus our energy. They concentrate our creativity and make us think in new, more exciting ways. Let’s look at an example. (more…)

Here’s another alternative to the Next button: fast-paced interactive conversations from the makers of “You Don’t Know Jack.”

In a comment on the elearning samples page, MM pointed to these examples by Jellyvision. Wow. Quick, lively, occasionally snarky, and always richly human. As Jellyvision says, “It’s conversation rather than presentation.”

What can we learn from them? (more…)

Tom Kuhlmann has posted a thought-provoking demo that shows four ways to approach narrating a course.

The first three slides use some sort of narrated text. The final slide shows the best approach for that content, which is narration with visuals and no text.

My concern is that many people assume that narration is best for all content. However, research suggests that narration should be used only in certain situations.

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