I honestly thought that my on-line training programs were pretty decent, until I started to read some of the latest thinking… it kept me up last night after 12:00am and almost made me miss my bike ride this morning!
It comes from the Elearning Blueprint website authored by Cathy Moore, who has a fantastic blog called Making Change. She has pioneered a new method of thinking about designing powerful Elearning called the “Action Method” that she describes in much detail at her site (a woman after my own heart!)
(As an aside, I love meeting other “wannabe-thinkers” who also want to change the world in some way, and believe me… she’s gotten the ideas presented in a way that’s concise and compelling.)
The reason I am loving what I’m learning is simple. I’m opening up my on-line programs for registration – MyTimeDesign 2.0.Free and MyTimeDesign 1.0.Plus+ – in September and I’m keen to make it the best on-line training in time management in the world. One of the problems that I have to conquer is the transition from just giving out a bunch of information, to ensuring that participants who register end up taking action by building the habits that make up their upgraded time management system.
Well, she debunks the idea of dumping information, in favor of creating experiences and a light bulb went on for me, because that’s exactly what happens when someone takes my course. Here are the experiences that I have come up with so far that people have when they encounter Time Management 2.0 in one of its forms.
- Experience #1: Going from “I don’t need this” to “I need to change some things“
- Experience #2: Going from “I don’t know what things to change” to “I know exactly what I need to change“
- Experience #3: Going from “I need to change too much” to”I need to change a little at a time“
- Experience #4: Going from “I’ll never continue after I start” to “My support system makes it easy to keep going“
- Experience #5: Going from “I’m stuck because I can’t see a new level” to”I know how to set and find a new level whenever I want“
If I understand the website correctly, good Elearning is about emphasizing these kinds of experiences. They are quite real, and the aim of the Elearning is to ensure that the tools and information are given to help the learner to solve the problem themselves. They get to discover the consequences of their choices, and don’t have to be told what they are: if it’s done well, they can see them for themselves.
When these experiences are powerfully crafted, they result in behavior changes that produce results in the real world. They need not involve flash videos or anything fancy, and should just do enough to cause the behavior to shift.
I’m planning to use her principles to enhance MyTimeDesign 1.0.Plus+, which is starting to look quite different from it’s Free cousin due to the new angles that I’m adding. Stay tuned — ultimately, it’s really the participants who will be telling whether or not I achieve the big goals I have set for these programs.