For Instructional Designers by an Instructional Designer

Sometimes, it is really difficult to explain what exactly it is that we do. People love to teach - I mean isn't that obvious from the number of unsolicited advice we get each day? And then, people love to pass comments - don't we all say, its a free country and if we don't like something we have a right to say 'I don't like it' Weave these two steps into a logic and mix it with the fact that IDs in India are not certified IDs. [ I'm definitely not a certified ID - experienced yes, certified no. ] So, I can't really complain when people jump in to define what it is we do. How can I? I only know what I have done and what I am doing. But ID is a huge field and there are many IDs out there doing many different things... And yet when people try to tell me that ID is just commonsense and anyone can do it - my hackles are raised. Everyone can give advice: But how many have actually followed that very same advice before doling it out? S...

The first emotion we feel when a SB is scrapped is that that of being rejected . It is personal. Or at least it feels personal at that moment. But, as I have said before, the reviewer has not come to office decided to hurt your feelings that day. The reviewer is just doing the job. So, once the flood ( of feelings ) subside go back to the SB. Often, SBs are rejected not because you have not done it well but because the expected point-of-view is not coming through. For example, if during the initial discussion it was discussed that a particular topic (say 'A') can be dealt with in a humours way. The client and the reviewer would be looking forward to a SB which is written in that vein. However, when they find that the humour is not coming through, they ask for the SB to be reworked. At this stage, if as an ID, you are thinking 'but i don't think so...' guess what, you have 2 choices to help you move forward. 1. Convince the reviewer/client your wa...

Today's post is going to be short and to the point. First, never copy-paste content: We don't want the learners to say that our content is copy-pasted from some other source - the way we say 'Hindi movies are a remake of Tamil and English movies.' Second, when writing script ensure that the transition between the screens is smooth. Content source documents, books and webpages tend to give everything in grammatically correct language. However, it means that sometimes the text becomes boring and its inherent character is lost. There is no drama, no cause-effect relationship, no narration. For example, each sentence in my current content document starts like this: Ionic bond this, Ionic bond that. However, our (e-learning) mode of teaching consists of animations. So along with the visual elements, the script too needs to smoothly transition from one step/screen to another . Thus, we cannot write 'Ionic bond this, ionic bond that' and expect ...

In the fast changing world of communication tools, wars between iPhone and Google nexus, Twitter versus Facebook versus LinkedIn, communication tools have lost their old world charm. Gone are the days when we picked up a pen to leave post-it notes. Today we twit and SMS the note directly in the person's hand and we share our moods via messenger status and Facebook one liners. However, in our struggle to lead a normal life, to complete work 18 hours work in 12 hours and rush back to family and friends - we get caught up with the communication tools and forget to pay attention to our communication itself – often we don’t even realize when we are communicating. Nor do we realize with whom and how we are communicating. Today, we take pride in saying that we storyboard using MS PowerPoint, MS Word, MS Excel or Captivate and so on and so forth. But in all this wheeling and dealings, how many of us remember that our SB is also a communication tool. The bows and whistles of the tool used t...

In my last post, I sent you to Brett Bixler's list. It was huge but did YOU find it interesting? After going through it [ click here if you want to view it ] did you feel enthu about being an ID or were you exhausted? And do you have fun when you are working? When you get up do you feel I can't wait to work on my SB or is it more like I can't wait to complete this thing and do something more interesting ? It is important that we enjoy what we do, to be able to do it well. It is important that we laugh [ yes, even in office. ] Even when there is fire on project [ specially when there is fire on project .] The way I see us adding value is by being curious about what we do [ because we are really interested in what we do, not just cause I say so ]. That means wanting to know why we are creating the course. Knowing whether the course actually helps someone with their task or would it be just one more hoop for them to jump through? And if you create enough cou...

I know this is not an original question. And I know that with all of us being professional IDs we do know what it is we do. But know what... early in 2007 I came across this blog entry and it made me realise that there a lot more to our profession than just our daily tasks. It will be an exhaustive effort for me to jot down everything. And to be quite honest, there some tasks which even I have not had a chance to work on. So I'll just send you to Brett Bixler's blog entry which he claims took him only 5 minutes to write down. Click here to read What is Instructional Design? by Brett Bixler.

A reviewer does not wake up thinking, 'today, I'm going to make that ID's life miserable.' Trust me they have enough problems of their own and don't really care much about your life and day. When we send our SB for review, we are basically asking the reviewer to judge it. And sometimes the line is smudged. The judgment is made not only about our work but by extension about us [ the person ]. This is very human thing to do. Often, as far as the seniors are concerned we are as good as our last SB . This is life. Accept it. Know that it is difficult process to go through for both writers and reviewers. Now, there are multiple variables that affect this experience. Part played by each role in the life cycle of a project: IDs: They know the content best. However, they might not always understand the business need the content has to fulfill (mostly due to lack of experience). If the ID is someone just out of college or someone with absolutely no knowledge of...

First and foremost, know that you cannot work in isolation. Group work is the fundamental requirement of our industry. We, at least in India, are not taught team work in schools or colleges. Very few of us have ever played team sports. And so we are all ill equipped to handle failure without blaming others. Know that your team includes other writers, graphic designers and their lead, programmers and their lead, subject matter experts, editors, recording artists, delivery head, ID lead and last but not least – your reviewer . I’m stressing your relation with the SB reviewer here as it is one of the most difficult to manage. How to develop and maintain it will be the post for tomorrow. Today, repeat after me: ID is team effort. ID is team effort. ID is team effort. ID is team effort. ID is team effort.