Ashley Chiasson, M.Ed

Instructional Designer & Consultant

Small Business

100+ Free Stock Photos for Use in E-Learning!

Screencast April has been a bit of a flop, but for good reason – business has been booming! I know that’s not the best excuse when it comes to blogging, but hopefully I can redeem myself with this post.

100+ Free Stock Photos for Use in E-learning

Instructional Designers and E-Learning Developers are always looking for high-quality stock photos they can use use within their e-learning development.

I’m one of those folks too! What I thought I would do is put together a FREE download of 100+ stock photos that you can use in a variety of e-learning contexts.

All of these photos have been carefully sought out by yours truly, and used within many personal projects. Within this photo set, you’ll find photos organized under several categories: Backgrounds, Business, Devices, People, Urban, and Workspaces.

Enjoy! And if you’d like to see more posts like this, let me know in the comments!

Click here to download 100+ Free Stock Photos for Use in E-Learning.

There’s also a lot of stuff going on at Sprout E-Learning. In the next month, Sprout will be releasing Articulate Storyline 2: Basics, a course that will get you up and running with Articulate Storyline 2, teaching you everything you need to know to create engaging learning experiences for any audience!

This course will be practical and video-based. You will also get access to exercise files, worksheets, and assignments. Stay tuned!

Sprout also has a FREE mini-course – Build Your E-Learning Portfolio. If you haven’t checked it out yet, you totally should. Just click through the image below!

Sprout E-Learning!

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Sprout E-Learning

First off, I want to apologize for the unanticipated hiatus that Screencast Monday and Terminology Tuesday has taken. I was travelling for what felt like three weeks straight, attending ATD 2016 and CAUCE-CNIE 2016, and then I got sick when I got back home. Oof!

But, today’s post is a little different. It’s about a new adventure I’m taking: Sprout E-Learning.

What is Sprout? 

Throughout my instructional design and e-learning journey, many colleagues and aspiring instructional designers/e-learning developers have lamented the lack of professional development opportunities. Yes – they do exist, but often times they’re quite costly (e.g. conference attendance can run $1,500 plus meals and accommodations, industry certificates can be of comparable pricing, and formal educational opportunities are expensive and often aren’t as targeted as learners need). Through Sprout, my hope is to offer affordable and sustainable training solutions that are inform its learners and help them on their journey to become successful e-learning professionals.

I love instructional design and have always been passionate about spreading the word (a lot of people don’t even know it’s a career option!). In the past I’ve thought about teaching instructional design, but was intimidated by the prospect of having to find teaching contracts and the limited number of opportunities available in the traditional higher education system. Instead of letting that red-tape get me down, I’ve decided to use Sprout as a platform to share my knowledge with my audience!

Initially, Sprout will focus on teaching instructional design and Articulate Storyline courses. Both are topics I love and have a vast knowledge of, so it’s a great jumping off point. In the future, I hope to expand to additional courses.

I’m really excited about this new adventure, so please check out Sprout E-Learning and sign up to stay up to date on when it will launch!

 

2015 Recap and 2016 Goals

2015 was a great year! Challenging at times, but still pretty solid. I learned a lot this year, worked with a ton of amazing clients, and I look forward to seeing where 2016 takes me!

2015 RECAP:

Let’s see how I did with my 2015 personal goals:

With that being said, my goals for 2015 are mostly personal goals:

  • Begin therapy to conquer my social anxiety (or at least learn how to cope with it);
  • Maintain a consistent exercise schedule and run a half marathon in May (and possibly another in September);
  • Take positive steps toward becoming the best version of myself I can be;
  • Spend more time with my husband and our family; and
  • Travel to Europe with my husband, taking a proper vacation.

As for business goals:

  • Complete both books and have them published;
  • Present and KILL IT at Learning Solutions 2015;
  • Continue networking with colleagues I respect;
  • Continue working with clients I respect;
  • Conduct various workshops at the university and encourage growth within our distance offerings;
  • Overhaul my portfolio;
  • Participate more actively in the ELH Challenges;
  • Continue blogging regularly; and
  • Begin authoring my third book.

Overall, I feel like I did pretty good with my 2015 goals – I also completed the Online Learning Consortium’s Teaching Certificate, 19 E-Learning Heroes Challenge entries and wrote 38 Terminology Tuesday posts. However, there’s still lots of work left to do in 2016.

2016 GOALS

Personal goals:

  • Slow down and take more time to enjoy the present;
  • Maintain a consistent exercise schedule;
  • Rehabilitate my jaw;
  • Spend more time with my husband and our family; and
  • Travel to Colorado and Iceland with my husband.

Business goals:

  • Slow down, take on fewer clients (than in 2015), and work on fostering long-term working relationships;
  • Continuing networking with colleagues I respect;
  • Speak at 1-2 e-learning events;
  • Publish my 2nd book;
  • Conduct more workshops and speaking engagements at the university, continuing to promote online learning;
  • Learn a new skill;
  • Participate regularly in the Articulate E-Learning Heroes Challenges; and
  • Blog regularly.

Tools and Apps I’m Using – November 2015

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Tools and apps come and go, and there seems to be so much wasted time investigating tools that don’t necessarily work for your unique purposes. I get a lot of questions about the tools and apps that I use, and while many of them are included in the Resources section, I thought it might be helpful to update you on the ones that I’m using most often.

Articulate Storyline 2 – I don’t think I have to drone on too much about my love affair with Articulate Storyline, so I won’t. What I will say is that if you have yet to dip your toes in the Articulate pool, please just jump in…with all of your clothes on…because it’s pretty darn awesome!

Parallels – If it wasn’t for Storyline, I would never have discovered Parallels. I would just have been suffering through using Boot Camp to run my Windows-based programs. I know some folks out there love Boot Camp, but I’ve tried it, and I’m not one of those people. Parallels makes it very easy to run Mac and Windows-based programs, simultaneously. And for anyone wondering – No. I do not experience lag when working in Storyline.

SnagIt and Camtasia – Techsmith has my heart when it comes to SnagIt and Camtasia, which I use for all of my screen capturing and video development needs!

Dropbox Pro – Dropbox has saved my butt on more than one occasion and should be considered essential for any business person, especially those working in virtual teams. It proves critical in backing up all of your necessary projects so you can have them in more than one place (dropbox, your computer, an external hard drive – if you’re not backing up in three locations, do that now).

Actively Learn – In higher education, I’ve been recommending faculty members use Actively Learn because it’s very easy to create a more active learning experience than traditional lectures.

Nearpod – Coming in at a close second for enhancing the learning experience is Nearpod. You can create presentations and incorporate assessment throughout the presentation. Each student uses an access code (on their own device) to access the presentation as the instructor is giving it, and assessment is completed in real-time. You can share the stats (e.g. graphs) of responses, but only the instructor will see the student name associated with the response.

Canva – In the past, I had dabbled in Canva, but it really proved its worth to me when I was developing graphics for a sample course. It’s a site that easily allows you to create professional looking graphics without having to install and navigate the complexities of a graphics program (e.g. Adobe Photoshop). I’ve been recommending this to faculty members as an easy way to create quick and professional looking module introduction graphics.

Soundcloud – It’s not often that I have to regal people with my voice (and thank goodness!), but when I do, I upload and share my audio using Soundcloud. It’s free and easy to use!

Vimeo – All of the videos I create in Camtasia are uploaded and shared using Vimeo. It’s easy to use, you can easily share, and you can add metadata if you want to enhance search-ability. For personal use, I use the free account, and at the university, we use the Pro account. The free account makes you wait in a queue for the video to upload and process, but it never seems like much of a wait (especially when you upload super early in the morning).

Fetch – Fetch is the best FTP client for Mac that I’ve found. I know that’s a subjective statement, but I really enjoy using it. It’s user-friendly, and while you wait for your files to upload, your cursor turns into a running dog – how fun is that?!

Hopefully you’ve found at least one tool in this list that you can make use of, and if not, I’ll be drafting these posts regularly, so stay tuned!

Articulate Storyline Essentials GIVEAWAY!

As many of you know, I wrote a book – Articulate Storyline Essentials. I’m at Learning Solutions Conference 2015, it’s my first time being here, and to share my excitement of both of these things, I’m giving away two copies of my book!

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All you have to do is enter, and I’ll be drawing a winner over the weekend. Maybe it will be you!

 

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10 Things I Learned in My 1st Year of Self-Employment

It’s hard to believe that it’s been a year since I threw myself overboard from the corporate ship, and I thought it might be fun to share some things that I’ve learned in my first full year of self-employment. Now. Don’t get it twisted. I do still have a full-time gig, but it’s in an industry I love, so while I’ve reduced the amount of work I do with my business, I’m still very active in the small business world.

1. Invest in things that will make your work-life easier.

There are still investments I will make in my little business, but I cannot emphasize this point enough. You have a career that you are passionate about, so invest in the things you need to do that job well! For example, I’m an Instructional Designer who develops e-learning products. Things that make my life easier that I’ve invested in over the past year include: a computer that can handle the type of work that I’m doing, a nice desk, an all-in-one printer, some external hard drives, dropbox business accounts, software licenses, and a billing software (which admittedly I don’t leverage to its full potential, but it keeps my finances organized), professionals who know how to do things better than I do instead of trying to do X myself (e.g. my portfolio plugin and an accountant for tax time).

2. Keep organized records.

Administrative blah blah is still the bane of my existence, but being somewhat organized makes my life a whole lot easier when it comes time to do say…taxes. Or locate an invoice. Or locate a software product key. I’m in the middle of preparing to file my taxes, and let me tell you…it is OVERWHELMING. However, keeping organized records is making this task a litttttttle easier for me and using the best online tax software also helps!

3. BACK UP YOUR WORK…ALL THE TIME.

This might seem self-explanatory, but I know I’m guilty of not backing things up everyday. However, after several lessons learned that I paid dearly for in headaches and extra labour, I back my work up REGULARLY. This comes especially in handy if you’re guilty of over-trusting your technology. Yesterday my Macbook decided it wanted to get lame. To the point of having to reinstall the operating system. It sucked and cost me the better part of a day to resolve, but in the end, I had all of my stuff backed up, and it was business as usual once the reinstall was up and running.

4. Reward yourself with professional development opportunities.

Professional development is always important. It allows you to network with fellow industry professionals and learn new things. In this new fangled information society, it’s important to always keep learning.

In 2014 I participated in two speaking engagements (Articulate E-Learning Heroes Community Roadshows: Toronto and Denver), and I learned so much! It was also a learning experience for me to get up and speak about something I know in front of people interested to listen. I also began my Online Learning Consortium Teaching Certificate under the recommendation of the Director of my department at the University. I’m almost finished now, and it’s been a fantastic learning experience.

This year, I’ll be speaking at Learning Solutions Conference 2015 (later this month) and I’m hoping to speak or attend Dev Learn in the fall. I’ll also try to hit up at least one more Articulate E-Learning Heroes Roadshow.

5. Take opportunities when they’re presented to you.

I understand that you might not be able to take all of the opportunities presented to you, but you can weigh the cost-benefit and determine which ones you can engage in. For me, this was authoring two books for Packt Publishing, Articulate Storyline Essentials (released in a week or so – EEEE!) and Mastering Articulate Storyline (released later this year) – the former will hold your hand and get you up and running with Articulate Storyline, while the latter will have activities and will teach you how to push Articulate Storyline to the limits.

I had never before considered writing a book, because who am I to be an authority on ANYTHING?! But, when in Rome. YOLO!

6. You are your best sales person.

You know what you’re capable of doing and you know (or have a rough idea) of who you want to do work for, so get out there and SELL YOURSELF! I’m not saying you’ll making half a million dollars in your first year of business, because that’s just nutty. What I’m saying is that there will always be some modicum of hustling that you have to do, and sometimes you’ll need to hustle more than other times, but eventually you’ll get to a point where you’re comfortable with the level of hustling you do.

7. Come correct!

Piggybacking on #6, in order to be an effective sales person, you need to come correct. What I mean by this is: overhaul your resume, get a proper email address (e.g. not xohotgirl81), update your linkedin profile, update your portfolio, and BE PROFESSIONAL! When applying for new opportunities, you want to put your best foot forward.

8. Network like you mean it.

Find out where your clients or peers are hanging out, and go hang out with them! For me, this started with the Articulate E-Learning Heroes Community. I found so many great clients through the forums, gained a lot of insight, grew myself as a professional, and made a TON of friends.

I slowly began incorporating social media, so now I engage with my new friends on Twitter and Linkedin.

9. Don’t be selfish.

Once you find your clients (and potential clients) or peers, don’t just engage with them on social media for your own benefit, promote them! Whenever one of my pals tweets about a new blog post or promotes an interesting article or something they’ve developed, I try to share these items as much as I can. This will help your pals out when they’re looking for opportunities, or it might help a client find the perfect person for the job.

10. Treat Yo’ Self!

You might not need  fine leather goods or velvet slippies like Tom Haverford and Donna Meagle, but you do need to take time and enjoy life. Many of us are guilty of being workaholics, but there’s this thing called burn out, and if you’re not careful, you will find out exactly what it is. Going on vacations, find a hobby, get out of your chair and go outside!