Generating Interest at the Beginning of Learning

Robert Gagne's 1st event of instruction was "Gain Attention." Michael Allen's company, Allen Interactions, has been saying for years, "No More Boring e-Learning." We've all heard the stories of how often e-learning turns learners off. And yet, there is still a whole lot of boring e-learning out there.

An article from the eLearning Guild helps us avoid the trap, specifically by helping us start our learning interventions in ways that grab attention. Paul Clothier interviews Carmen Taran, author of the book Better Beginnings.

Dan Balzer and Susan Manning offer an excellent Podcast on the topic. You can find the link to the Guild article at their web page as well.

Comments

[Ken Allan]

Kia ora Will!

Engagement in elearning is linked to two main elements:

1 interest

2 relevance

ANY introductory part of an elearning module has to be both relevant AND interesting. Many elearning 'lures' that I've come across tend to either blow it, that is show all too much at the start in an attempt to attract interest, or are not relevant to the objective.

There are a lot of elearning myths around. Many of them are associated with the use of colourful images or videos to capture interest.

They can be used to capture interest provided they are relevant and the learner can relate to them. The latter element is very much to do with context, which has to be a learner centred element for it to work.

Catchya later
from Middle-earth