Avoid Making Assumptions That Backfire!

“This is easy touse.”

“Try this simple process.”

Do these statements really lower learners’fears? Or do they merely set unrealistic expectations that somethinglearners find hard is actually easy to perform — making them feel worse whenthey have difficulty?

Such presumptuousness about feelings is just one of many types of assumptions thatinstructional designers make when writing that can undo even the mostthought-out design plans. In this article, I specifically explore three of themost common assumptions that instructional designers make when writing, andsuggest how to avoid them. 

Assumption 1: About Knowledge

Wait! readers might say. “I perform a thorough needsassessment and, as part of that, I verify the entering knowledge and skills ofmy learners.”

Perhaps. So why, then, did you use an acronym withoutspelling it out or terminology without defining it? Or why did you skip overthat step to insert the key in the car when explaining instructions fordriving?

With time, we often make assumptions about the basic thingsor overlook important details when writing instructional programs. Some typicalissues:

• Failing to spell out acronyms. The general rulefrom most writing guides is that instructional designers should spell out anacronym the first time they use it in a document.

But because, in many courses,learners do  not necessarily take lessonsin sequence—and because an acronym used in the second screen of lesson 1 mightbe forgotten by its second use in the middle of lesson 6, learners are likelyto forget what the acronym means.

So define acronyms not only ontheir first use in a course, but also their first use in each lesson and, ifmore than 6 or 7 screens pass between uses—define it again, because learnerseasily forget since the focus of the content should be the objectives, notacronyms used in achieving them.

• Failing to define terms, especially basic ones. Ofteninstructional designers assume that learners know the term, and do not need tohave it defined. In other instances, Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) might advisethat defining a term insults the intelligence of the learner.

The problem is, many learnerseither don’t remember the definition or work with one that’s different thanyours. Starting out with a false assumption about knowledge can only takelearners down a bad path as you try to build on incorrect or incompleteknowledge.

Consider confusion over the termsformative and summative evaluation. For people trained as teachers, formativeevaluation refers to the quizzes and exercises given in the middle of a unit todetermine how well students are mastering the material; summative evaluationrefers to end-of-unit and end-of-year tests. For formally trained instructionaldesigners, however, formative evaluation refers to activities to assess theaccuracy, completeness, and usability of learning materials before they go intowide use; summative evaluation refers to results of satisfaction surveys, learningassessments, and assessments of transfer after a course goes into general use.

For those worried about insultingthe intelligence of their learners, consider using one of these expressions tointroduce a basic term: “As you might be aware,” or “To make sure that we’reall working with the same definition.”

One more tip: placing adefinition in a glossary is not the same as defining the term or acronym intext. Although, from a most-technical standpoint the definition is available tolearners, from a practical perspective, “out of sight is out of mind.” That is,if the definition does not appear immediately after the first use of the word,learners are not likely to search for the definition, even if a hot linkappears. Or, if they do link, there’s a chance they won’t return. So providedefinitions in-text.

• Names without references. Many instructionaldesigners use names of people, places, and organizations without first statingwho they are. Although instructional designers might know to whom they’re referring,learners often do not, especially if the reference is to someone or somethingin an organization and the learner is relatively new to that organization.

With names, state their roles. Withplaces and organizations, briefly state their significance. If they carryhistory that might not be apparent from the “location” information, brieflyexplain their significance, too.

• Missing steps in procedures or logic. In someinstances, instructional designers leap from one point to the next, unintentionallyoverlooking an intermediate step.

Consider this situation: boredwith writing, “Type your answer and then press Enter,” one instructionaldesigner decided in unit 5 to shorten the expression to just “Type youranswer.” The learner did as told and did not press Enter, since in all of theprevious instances the instructional designer said to do so, the learnerassumed she didn’t need to press Enter this time. In other words, if you meansomething, say something.

So think through all steps—inprocedures as well as in logic—to avoid gaps that learners need to fill ontheir own, and that will either baffle them or leave them waiting for aresponse that never comes, as in the example just given.

Assumption 2: About Feelings

As noted in the introductory paragraph, in an effort to makelearners feel comfortable with material, instructional designers often includemessages about the ease, simplicity, or speed with which learners can finishthe program.

But what happens if a simple, easy, quick program isanything but that to the learner? Consider the instructional designer who tooka “simple, easy, two-hour” Dreamweaver tutorial that took her 14 hours tocomplete.

Two issues are at work. The first is, “If I say it, it mustbe true.” That is, if the course tells learners that something is easy orquick, the power of suggestion makes it that way.” But, as many technical orpolicies–and-procedures trainers who have had to teach around a glitch in thetechnology or policy have learned through experience, one cannot teach around aproblem.

The second issue at work is learners’ responses to themessage. Learners generally believe what they read, so, when they read thatsomething should be easy, they assume it’s true. When learners find the materialto be challenging, many internalize the problem and assume that they’re theones with the problem, not the material.

That, in turn, affects their perceptions of their abilitiesto successfully complete the learning program, a concept known as self-efficacy.Several studies have shown that this self-perception of abilities plays animportant role in successfully completing courses.  

Avoiding this assumption involves avoiding the expressionsin the first place. Specifically, avoid assumptions about ease, simplicity, andfeelings about content.

When providing estimates of the time needed to complete acourse, only do so after timing several learners of differing abilities. Whenusing those times, do not report the average time but that time needed for 90percent of the learners to complete the course. Taking less time than suggestedto complete a course does not affect learners in the same way as taking moretime.

Assumption 3: About Culture

If you’re American, the following number might make sense toyou:

555-77-9999

It’s a Social Security Number, used not only to apply forold-age benefits but as an identification number for credit checks, students incolleges or universities, and similar situations.

But if you live outside of the U.S., you don’t have a SocialSecurity Number. For example, Canadians have a SIN (get your minds out of thegutter—it’s a Social Insurance Number).

If your learners are limited to those living in the U.S.A.,then you can probably safely use a Social Security Number. But if the learnersfor your eLearning program live in several countries, you probably want toavoid this. You might use a more generic term, Identification Number.

At the least, using an unfamiliar cultural cue will baffleyour learners—meaning that they’ll spend time they should invest in learning onde-coding the unfamiliar cultural reference. At the most, using an unfamiliarcultural cue will incense them—because the instructional designer appears tohave made little to no effort to understand them.   

Here are things to consider for simple cultural cues thattend to show up in eLearning. They include formats for temperature (Celsiusversus Fahrenheit), measurements (metric [mm, cm, km] versus Imperial [inch,foot, mile]), telephone numbers (the 10-digit North American system is notfollowed elsewhere), and the side of the street on which people drive (right insome countries, left in others).

Cultural cues range from simple expressions (elevator versuslift) to complex messages (such as historical references and shared values).  

Furthermore, cultural cues are not limited to regional andnational culture, but also to occupational culture. For example, within theculture of instructional design, needs assessment and writing measurable instructionalobjectives are important cues. In contrast, technical communicators—who alsowrite eLearning—focus on audience and task analysis (a variation on needsassessment), and share a primary concern for consistency.

Avoiding assumptions in your own writing

This article explored three common assumptionsinstructional designers make.  But the list of potential assumptions is somuch larger and most books on writing and instructional design emphasize theimportance of knowing your learners — not on the use of that knowledge in thechoice of sentences and phrases to avoid offending them. 

In closing, here are two practices you can adopt duringthe development phase of instructional design that may help reduce the impactof assumptions on your writing:

• Reviews and pilot (or usability) tests. Alternate views of the writing often identify passages that have the potentialto offend learners.  (Indeed, I learned many of these practices throughreviews and pilot tests.)

• Awareness.  The greater your awareness ofassumptions when writing, the more likely you might catch yourself in anassumption—and correct it.