Ashley Chiasson, M.Ed

Over the past two weeks, I’ve talked quite a bit about the analysis phase of most Instructional Design models, and now it’s time to talk about the Design phase.

But I’m not a designer!

Oh. But you are! At least if you claim to be an Instructional Designer. Like analysis, many IDs don’t get the opportunity to dip their toes in the design phase, but it’s a very important phase to be a part of.

While it might sound as though we’re talking graphic design and look/feel, we aren’t exactly. Only sort of. The design phase is where you identify how the learning is going to occur. So the look and feel…conceptually. And it may also include elements of visual look and feel.

The output of this phase is typically referred to as ‘design documentation’. This documentation outlines things such as:

• Instructional Strategy
• Learning Objectives
• Assessment Strategies (and sometimes the assessment items)
• Prototype Requirements
• Compliance Specifications (e.g. system requirements for the end user and SCORM requirements)
• Branding Guidelines
• Screenstyles

The design documentation is used to guide the design and allows developers to keep their eyes on the prize (or the project requirements). It also allows multiple developers to ensure a consistent approach across development.

Have I piqued your interest?

Great! Stay tuned for more on the design phase…next!

Last week I started a discussion about Analysis, talking about some elements (e.g. Needs Assessment) and some strategies for conducting analysis. This week I’m providing a bit of a follow-through plan. Sort of. Or perhaps you can call it a guide for things of which you need before writing performance objectives. Call it what you want. I’ve made a doodle of some things you’ll want to analyze:

 

Less of a doodle and a bit more flow chart-esque am I right? Yeah. I know. Anyhow. What the heck do all of these things mean?

When working in the analysis phase, you may come in on any portion thereof, but the key things you need to analyze are:

• Your Audience – Who will be receiving the training? What prior learning experiences do they have? Do they need prerequisite knowledge?
• The Environment(s) – How will the training be delivered? Face-to-face? Online? Blended? Where will the audience be applying the training? If on the job, will they need a performance support tool? Will it need to be mobile-friendly? Will it need to be a stand alone training aid?
• The Job or Task – What is the job/task for which you are developing training? Break that task down into each individual sub-task. Don’t assume your audience will know how to complete ANY of the sub-tasks, unless you’ve been specifically told they have the knowledge, and determine how much information is required (for each sub-task) to achieve mastery of the task for which the training was developed.
• Content – What content is available? Once you’ve analyzed your audience, the environments, and the job or task, you will have a greater understanding of what content you will need. At this point, you can analyze the content that’s available and determine whether there are any gaps. If so, you can request or source the missing content.

I know these posts are a very brief primer (of sorts) about Analysis in Instructional Design, but they provide you with some primary information necessary for some forthcoming blog posts targeted at elements and strategies related to conducting analysis.

Stay tuned for next week’s post: Design Part 1 – EXCITING, I KNOW!

 

 

I’ve talked a bit about analysis before, but it recently dawned on me that there are a lot of components that fall under the umbrella of analysis, so I figured I’d channel my inner analyst and take a few weeks to delve a bit deeper into the topic of analysis.

Let’s Go! Analysis in Learning Development – A Refresher

Analysis is the highest level of course development. In it’s recommended format, this phase seeks to compile all information relevant to the project and 1) determine which delivery method will best display the content in a meaningful manner, 2) whether more information is required and from whom, and 3) high-level project goals.

Elements

Within this phase you may stumble upon several elements familiar to analysis (e.g. Needs Assessment, Instructional Analysis, Task Analysis, Environmental Analysis).

You can read about Needs Assessments here, and Task Analysis here.

The basic jest is that you want to collect all of the information you possibly can in order to ensure the training you’re planning to develop is 1) necessary, 2) relevant, and 3) informed. You want to thoroughly understand the performance requirements, who your audience will be, what they need to learn, and how that information will be relevant to their performance.

Strategies

There are many strategies for conducting analysis. For example, you might want to start at the end goal of the training and work backwards. This approach will allow you to identify the goal and then the steps or prerequisites required to get to achieve the goal. Another example might be to begin with a list of questions (e.g. who is the target audience? what is their prior learning? why is the training necessary?, etc.) and discover the answers to those questions in order to conduct a thorough analysis of the situation. You might wish to examine what the organization is currently doing and why it’s not working to determine a different way ahead that will work.

However you choose to analyze, just know that you’re doing very important legwork that may save you time once you get to the design and development, and certainly the evaluation phase of your course development.

Stay tuned for more on analysis next week!