Organizational Clarity:"HTML5 in E-learning – Signaling the End of the Flash Player" article

From the CommlabIndia community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email, I received was a link to: “HTML5 in E-learning – Signaling the End of the Flash Player” by Phani Madhav. This article talks about how the Flash player is going obsolete from Adobe to Apple almost every platform or company is trying to get away from using Flash. So, it can create major headaches when as an OD Professional or as an organization you are trying to create training programs for your employees to use at home or on various mobile devices.

While the HTML5 the latest version of tech language for the Web increases multimedia functions, Offline usage and storage, while increasing the performance and integration of various programs. Thereby becoming the all-around better option to help creating your training programs this article is a great heads up the next time anyone means “Flash” in the same sentence as “new training program”.

Here is the original article briefly discussing the Flash player going the way of the dinosaur: http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-development/flash-player-limitations-in-elearning

Here is an additional website that discusses HTML5 and all the new nifty options and improvements this version brings: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Guide/HTML/HTML5

Organizational Clarity: “More Friendly Illustrated People” free download

From the Articulate community dedicated to increasing a professional’s knowledge of E-Learning, giving out free tips and free resources on how to implement E-Learning in the workplace or how to easily find cheap solutions to organizational needs.  I received to an article called: “More Friendly Illustrated People” this is a free download in .ai  (Adobe Illustrator File) and .png (Portable Network Graphic) of illustrations of characters for presentation usage.

Just click on the link here to learn more: https://community.articulate.com/download/more-friendly-illustrated-people

You can find more illustrated people to download here as well:

https://community.articulate.com/download/friendly-illustrated-people

Organizational Clarity: “10+ Examples of Financial Calculators in E-Learning” article/free downloads

From the Articulate community dedicated to increasing a professional’s knowledge of E-Learning, giving out free tips and free resources on how to implement E-Learning in the workplace or how to easily find cheap solutions to organizational needs. In this week’s email I received a link to: “10+ Examples of Financial Calculators in E-Learning” this is article engages ten creators, like other e-learning challenges, that have developed examples of various calculators to illustrate how to make learning more fun.

You can download some of these and thereby use the financial calculators for your projects. Financial calculators are great when you need tools to balance a project’s budget, for performance or even reward assessments. These Interactive Financial Calculators cover various subjects and types of measurement but there is an example for everyone and helpful in training those who want to understand the costs of a training project.

Just click on the link here to learn more: https://community.articulate.com/articles/financial-calculators-in-elearning

Organizational Clarity: “Choosing the Right LMS: 6 Essential Aspects You Can’t Ignore” article

I was reading an article about online learning to make any programs I may develop in the future become more user-friendly and inviting to the trainees I want to reach. This article called: “Choosing the Right LMS: 6 Essential Aspects You Can’t Ignore” by Heera Edwin is purchasing the right learning management system for your organization in order to have effective e-learning sessions while meets the organization’s goals and training needs.

When it comes to replacing an existing Learning Management System, or if the training was being transferred to an online application process, this article briefly explains how to choose the best LMS for your organization. When more and more organizations are choosing to deliver training online, being able to determine the best type of LMS being selected and used, is often critical. Oh and do not forget cost too, many organizations hardly think of these and a few other factors that could determine what the best choice for them is.

Please click on the link for more information:

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-development/choosing-right-lms-6-essential-aspects

Organizational Clarity: “16 Creative Multiple Choice Quiz Designs in E-Learning” article/download

From the Articulate community dedicated to increasing a professional’s knowledge of E-Learning, giving out free tips and free resources on how to implement E-Learning in the workplace or how to easily find cheap solutions to organizational needs. In this week’s email I received a link to: “16 Creative Multiple Choice Quiz Designs in E-Learning” this is article talks the usage of multiple choice questions in creative ways to make training sessions and the training program more engaging overall.

The article is just linked to sixteen designer examples, some you can download other you can just view the project to get a general idea of what to do in your training program. I, of course, love the ones you can download because this means you can use these projects for your usage and thereby have a template for future programs all that is needed is some adjustments.

Just click on the link here to learn more: https://community.articulate.com/articles/multiple-choice-quiz-examples

Organizational Clarity: “25 Creative Image Effects for Stock Photos in E-Learning #156” article

From the Articulate community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “25 Creative Image Effects for Stock Photos in E-Learning #156” by David Anderson.

This article ties 25 projects that emphasizes the use of creative image effects for stock photos when you are using them in the E-Learning process. This allows you to bring the learner’s attention to the object or main idea of the presentation, this helps the learner maintain a visual of the subject matter and retain the knowledge learned at that time.

Each link is simply discussing the methodology or reason each presenter took as they approached this issue, in maintaining the focus of the learner. They are very brief so even though this article gives you a lot of links and examples it is really not that time consuming, you may even find some ideas you can use in your own presentations.

If you want to know more just click the link here:

https://community.articulate.com/articles/image-styles-and-effects-in-elearning

Organizational Clarity: “Sound Effects in E-learning: Top 8 Sample Music Sites” article

From the CommlabIndia community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “Sound Effects in E-learning: Top 8 Sample Music Sites” by Gitika Nagra. With experienced and novice instructional designers constructing E-learning lessons for their organizations on a budget (we all have them) this article presents eight websites where you can find the music you need to up the level of your E-Learning training sessions.

Realistically, we have all sit in presentations in which a voice just drones on and on talking about the information presented adding music can actually help in keeping the learner's attention. With a little music, even boring subjects can be made to come alive so I would recommend using some of these sites for your E-Learning productions today.

But before you move ahead please take note of the “free” sites, free is always good whether you are working for an organization or self-employed, or even if you are a student creating a project for class, take the free option, FIRST.

These are the eight music websites listed in the article that will allow you to download music from creating your E-Learning training sessions:  

1. freesound.org
2. Free Music Archive (FMA)
3. Audionautix.
4. ibeat.org.
5. PacDV.
6. ccMixter
7. Partners In Rhyme 
8. Audio Archive

If you want to know more just click the link here:

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-design/sound-effects-in-elearning-music-sites

Organizational Clarity: “15 Examples of Interactive Video Quizzes in E-Learning #15” article

In an article called “15 Examples of Interactive Video Quizzes in E-Learning #15”, the author David Anderson compiled this list of different examples of video used in the E-learning process. Keeping the video being interactive allows the learner to have a visual during the learning process.

This also captivates their attention where simple text or verbal presentations can “bore’ the learner and decrease the effectiveness of the training program. Having a video in the training process also allows the visual type learners to succeed, when most training programs are usually straight forward and presentation related.

Being interactive allows the learner to be a part of the process instead of watching it, to put the solutions or material that they learned to work in a practical way. By practicing through these videos quizzes, this also helps the organization gauge the effectiveness of the training program while it is being implemented.

Here is the hyperlink to “15 Examples of Interactive Video Quizzes in E-Learning”:  https://community.articulate.com/articles/interactive-video-quiz-elearning

Organizational Clarity: “PowerPoint '13: Whimsical Course Template” free download

From the Articulate community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “PowerPoint '13: Whimsical Course Template” by Trina Rimmer for a free download.

This Microsoft PowerPoint presentation download was made with the 2013 version of PowerPoint made up of fourteen slides and would give any presentation or training session, a great look and feel to it.

Although it's free, this download contains great characters, icons, layouts and presentations of multiple uses. This is just one of those free downloads that have a lot of thought put behind it, to the point that it looks very professional as if done by the Microsoft Corporation itself

If you want to know more and download this PowerPoint just click the link here:

https://community.articulate.com/download/powerpoint-13-whimsical-course-template?

Organizational Clarity: "A Step by Step Guide to Convert PowerPoint Presentations to E-learning" article

From the CommlabIndia community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “A Step by Step Guide to Convert PowerPoint Presentations to E-learning” By Darshan Dudhagundi. Need a quick guide to create some E-Learning courses quick and cheap but you only know how to make Microsoft PowerPoint presentations? This article is a step-by-step guide to make that possible, create an E-learning course from a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation before you do so there are six steps to complete before uploading the file to a Learning Management System.

The six steps to complete before uploading:

1.       Gather and Organize the Content in a Logical Flow

2.       Set Measurable Learning Objectives

3.       Fill Gaps in the Content

4.       Formulate Instructional, Visual, and Audio Strategies and Decide the Interaction Level

5.       Choose the Right Rapid Authoring Tool

6.       Convert the Presentation to an E-learning Course Using the Tool and Thoroughly Test the Output

This article mentions Rapid Authoring Tools you can use, along with links to other articles discussing the right Rapid Authoring Tool for you and your organization, that can be used to convert your PowerPoints to an e-learning course for future use.

If you want to know more just click the link here:

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-design/guide-to-convert-ppt-into-elearning

Organizational Clarity: “6 Factors to Consider When Outsourcing Your Online Training” article

From the CommlabIndia community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email, I received a link to: “6 Factors to Consider When Outsourcing Your Online Training” By Ashok Kumar K.  Sometimes organizations are able to afford to outsource parts of the training and development activities to third parties so that the main core training programs can be focused upon and developed further.

It has been my experience that usually, this is due to either budget constraints or even staffing issues in the training and development department. But before committing to a third party for outsourcing even one activity to an external company there are six factors that this author believes should be considered.

The six factors to consider when outsourcing for eLearning are:

1.       Decide the Scope of Outsourcing

2.       Measure the Outcomes

3.       Research Training Vendors Thoroughly

4.       Take Small Steps

5.       Take a Call on Control

6.       Build a Relationship

If you want to know more just click the link here:

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-design/outsource-online-training-factors

Organizational Clarity: “Getting Started with E-Learning”article

In an article called “Getting Started with E-Learning”, the author discusses briefly different concepts such as:

• Understanding Key Concepts and Terms
• Creating E-Learning
• Your First Project
• Getting Familiar with Mobile Learning
• Connect with the E-Learning Heroes Community

Each section is interactive, and has a link that leads to more information regarding the concept you are more inclined to learn more about. Here is the hyperlink to “Getting Started with E-Learning”: 

https://community.articulate.com/articles/getting-started-with-e-learning

Organizational Clarity: “PowerPoint: Basic Slide Layouts” free download

From the Articulate community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “PowerPoint: Basic Slide Layouts” by Ashi Tandon for a free download. If you need to add a professional look to your Microsoft PowerPoint presentations or training sessions, I would suggest this download its simple and easy and has great look and feel to it.

Plus, it's free, when there are tons of product that you need to pay for to add on to programs like Microsoft PowerPoint I would recommend surfing this site for more downloads.

If you want to know more just click the link here:

https://community.articulate.com/download/powerpoint-basic-slide-layouts

Organizational Clarity: “Why are Organizations Migrating From Classroom Training to E-learning?” article

From the CommlabIndia community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “Why are Organizations Migrating From Classroom Training to E-learning?” by Aruna Vayuvegula. Creating a LMS for an organization that has international or a global reach is a challenge, to keep costs down the basic tenet is to stop training or allow in-house training by managers.

However, this is not always effective, so getting the organization’s training department around the world or at two or more sites simultaneously an organization must think outside the box. This is one of the reasons that organizations choose E-learning as a usable option to meet these challenges as an extensive global organization.

E-learning is a great option to reach employees no matter where they are and assist in their professional growth in and out of the organizational span.

These are the five reasons why organizations move from Classroom Training to E-Learning:

1.       Need to update skills to match growing business needs

2.       Compulsion to keep training costs low while not compromising on training hours

3.       Need to train a large and dispersed workforce

4.       Demand for flexibility in knowledge transfer

5.       Need to track training completions and effectiveness

After reading these five reasons you can understand the desire for many organizations to move from one theater to another. Meeting the employees halfway on these training courses by allowing them to complete sessions on their own time, goes a long way to achieving the cooperation and involvement of employees in the learning process (for the organization). If you want to know more just click the link here:

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-design/migrating-from-classroom-training-to-elearning

Organizational Clarity: “Vitalize Your Online Training Programs with Videos”article

In an article called “Vitalize Your Online Training Programs with Videos” by Sushmitha Kolagani, the author discusses why on-demand videos should be used in Online Training Programs. The basic tenant is that it is much cheaper than sending a trainer to various locations for annual events and presentations. 

When it comes videos reusability, training uses or increased retention are great reasons to use videos in addition to e-learning programs or with performance support tools. The more of the material that a learner learns has access to the better, also the adaptability of on-demand videos to either be used to increase or boost morale or even giving quick techniques for representatives to do certain tasks in half the time. The idea of introducing on-demand videos into your training repertoire is one that should be made into reality.

If you see the same thing happening in your organization I urge you to click on the hyperlink below and read the article about E-Learning to educate yourself and your organization’s E-Learning dissenters

Here is the hyperlink to “Vitalize Your Online Training Programs with Videos” by Sushmitha Kolagani: 

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-design/5-things-to-know-about-elearning

Organizational Clarity: “5 Tips to Set Flawless Learning Objectives for eLearning Courses” article

From the CommlabIndia community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “5 Tips to Set Flawless Learning Objectives for eLearning Courses” By Ashok Kumar K.  Learning objectives are always tough to create especially for the eLearning arena.

Most organizations do not have the resources to commit to E-Learning courses so when the practitioner has the chance, they have to do it right! Stating to the learners and one’s sponsors what one will learn from this presentation of material is crucial to maintain support and fan the learner’s desire to engage.  

The five tips to setting flawless learning objectives for eLearning Courses are:

• Keep learning objectives specific
• Keep learning objectives simple and concise
• Say NO to ambiguity
• Specify expected performance
• Align assessments & activities with learning objectives

If you want to know more just click the link here:

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-design/5-tips-to-set-elearning-learning-objectives

Organizational Clarity: “ETEC 524: Example Technology-playtesting Reflections: Affordances of Video” blog

This is a great blog that discusses why video should be used in the learning process explaining how video captures the learner’s attention. Plus, how watching is more effective than reading and how the rapid presentation and control of video in the learning process is highly effective. Please click the link to learn more:

ETEC 524: Example Technology-playtesting Reflections: Affordances of Video: 

I hear lots of kudos for YouTube and how engaging it is to use videos for instruction, but blanket statements applauding YouTube as “great!...

Organizational Clarity: “4 Easy Steps to Translate Online Courses into Multiple Languages” article

From the CommlabIndia community is an article from easy, cheap solutions to meet organizational needs. In an email I received was a link to: “4 Easy Steps to Translate Online Courses into Multiple Languages” By Phani Madhav.  

When creating training courses online you usually do not think globally only locally, therefore creating an online training in different languages is not something that comes to a designer. But if your organization is starting or already has a global reach then this quick little article will give you four quick tips to increasing your international reach. The five steps to translate Online Courses into Multiple Languages are:

Step 1: Translate learning content into the desired languages

Step 2: Get the content reviewed

Step 3: Complete the audio recording and develop the translated courses

Step 4: Send the courses to the stakeholder for final review and deliver them

If you want to know more just click the link here:

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-translations/translate-online-courses-multiple-languages

Organizational Clarity: Free E-book (download)“Determining the Learning Outcomes for an E-learning”

This is another free E-book from CommlabIndia in pdf format from the 7 books series called “Determining the Learning Outcomes for an E-learning” this short e-book discusses why it is important to set outcomes or guidelines for the learning process. With clear learning objectives we are able to set expectations and goals from a certain level of performance that the learner must produce as a result of their training. This also helps determine how the learning process is delivered, assessed and the content covered with the training sessions itself.

The E-book also covers briefly pitfalls to avoid and tips to make sure that the learning outcomes are achievable most of these you may think are common sense but a refresher is always good to have. Plus if you are working in or with a team, not everyone has the same knowledge base as you might have, so this e-book will get everyone on the same page without the need for extended explanations or details.

After reviewing the E-book and you see that the information is useful for your purposes go ahead and download. Just click on the link here for your free download:

https://www.commlabindia.com/elearning-components/ebook/7ebooks-2-determining-the-learning-outcomes-for-an-elearning-commlab.pdf

Organizational Clarity: "6 E-learning and Development Trends to Watch Out for in 2017" article

For maintaining a status of an effective training manager one must be current upon existing and future trends to develop a proper strategy for training in an organization’s upcoming year. Understanding what new trends are “hot” or “popular” in your organization’s market will help you determine how you will allocate the organization’s resources. There are in many organizations those “higher ups” that will like to try a new methodology or a current trend to make the organization “modern” or competitive with the other organizations in the market. So keeping one eye on what may be chosen or earmarked for adoption ahead of time, it just a smart thing to do!

In this article, “6 E-learning and Development Trends to Watch Out for in 2017” Hema Gopalakrishnan what is covered is six trends that have a high probability of being using for training purposes in 2017. These trends have been chosen with the object of increasing the effectiveness of an organization’s training procedures and increasing the organization’s Return on Investment.

The majority of these six trends I can rightfully say has been discussed on the academic level as useful to meet the objectives I have aforementioned, unfortunately, in the professional setting, some of these trends are not applicable with the resources that are available from the organization in question. But here is a list of the six trends believed to be the focus of trainers in 2017 as covered and explained more in the article:

1.       Mobile Learning

2.       Gamification

3.       Personalized Learning

4.       Social Learning

5.       Microlearning

6.       Immersive Learning

If any of these tips are sound right up your alley and you want to know more, please click onto this link:

http://blog.commlabindia.com/elearning-development/2017-elearning-and-development-trends