About Guild Articles
Find practical, solution-oriented information—on design, development, management, technology, and executive matters—that you can use to make well-informed business decisions to ensure your organization’s success with learning.
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Dispatch from the Digital Frontier: Social Learning Technology for Ninth-Graders (Part 1)
Can a learning technologist find a way to harness social learning technology in a way that will offer supportive solutions for ninth-graders and their teacher? In August, 2009, Anne challenged readers to join her in volunteering for their local school. Walking her talk in this and the following several columns, she will share her experiences in doing just that.
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Thinking Out of the Box: How the University of British Columbia School of Nursing Created a Practice e-Portfolio
Faculty and staff at the University of British Columbia’s School of Nursing (UBC SoN) worked together to create an open source e-Portfolio system for students in the BSN and Master of Nursing – Nurse Practitioner programs. The result is a perfect fit to these unique competency-based programs, one that also supports the students after graduation. Read about it here!
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Rethinking Online Course Marketing: Build a Tribe in Six Steps
The fundamental way to grow any business, including e-Learning, is to have customers who are crazy about you. It takes time to build the kind of brand and reputation that generates this level of loyalty for your online courses, but the effort is worth it, and it pays off better than “hard selling” or “soft selling.” Here are six simple steps that will take you there.
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When a Rapid Approach Makes the Most Sense
When does rapid e-Learning work best? What types of rapid authoring tools are there? Which rapid authoring tools do Guild members favor? Here are the answers from The eLearning Guild Research Getting Started in e-Learning Report on Rapid e-Learning, published February 10, 2010.
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Making Letters and Words Move: Video Titles in After Effects
Titles (letters and words on the screen) make a big difference in video, and they need to be done correctly. They shouldn’t attract attention to themselves, either by being too flashy or by being badly done. Here’s a quick tip on making use of movement in your titles, and it applies to almost any video editing program.
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Getting Business Results From E-Learning
The technology of e-Learning gets better every day, yet the results are often called into question by senior management and by critics. What is preventing employees from using and applying e-Learning to achieve business results in your organization? An understanding of the “5As” can help answer this question.
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Substance Abuse: The Danger of Superficiality in e-Learning
Instructional designers must always deal with the question of how much is enough? Unfortunately, under the pressure of clients’ “I want it yesterday” demands, too often the default is to offer as little as possible in order to get the product out the virtual door on time and under budget. Take some time to savor this essay on avoiding superficiality!
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Beta Testing an Online Course
Beta Testing is a key step in creating insanely great e-Learning applications. Often overlooked or omitted out of concern for budget and schedule, it is actually simple and cheap to do, and when planned with care it takes little time to execute. Done before development is 100% complete, it ensures faultless releases. Here’s a step-by-step guide from an experienced developer.
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Locked Out: Bridging the Divide Between Training and Information Technology
Customers demand more flexibility, less disruption in how training is delivered, and faster, better access. Business demands more frequent updates to training content. Both Training and IT have a vested interest in meeting these demands. Despite their differences, the two groups ultimately have the best interests of the organization in mind and can only succeed when bridges are built between them.
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Book Review: Learning Online with Games, Simulations, and Virtual Worlds: Strategies for Online Instruction by Clark Aldrich
Clark Aldrich has produced a great guide to the selection, justification, and development of Highly Interactive Virtual Environments. Readers will find it useful, whether they are new to design of such applications or highly experienced.