AG08 Day 3

The last day of the eLearning Guild Annual Gathering was only a half day, but my brain was ready for a little rest.

Amazingly, for the third day in a row I made it to one of the 7:15 Breakfast Bytes (only a few minutes late). The speaker for the one I wanted to go to didn’t show, so I went to “Is SCORM worth it?” No one came up with a conclusive answer, but the discussion was lively and engaging. In general people seem frustrated by SCORM’s limitations and problems, but understand the need for a cross-vendor standard. My opinion is that SCORM has a place, but not for all training. Probably not even for very much training.

Stefan Sagmeister delivered the keynote based on his book “Things I have learned in my life so far”. The talk had nothing to do with eLearning, but was the best keynote of the conference. He showed some of his recent work which is based on ideas from the book. There’s a companion web site at http://www.thingsihavelearnedinmylife.com/ where you can contribute lessons you’ve learned.

After that I listened to David Metcalf talk about design for m-Learning. m-Learning design is really about information design for the platform you are targeting. You have to take the device into account. He gave examples from sales, service, and process training from different companies that used a variety of mobile devices. He also showed a couple of impressive educational examples including http://www.mysportspulse.com/.

I ended the conference with “What not to design: Visual makeovers for eLearning Content” presented by Donna Safo. I wasn’t able to attend the entire session because I had to leave for the airport, but what I saw was useful. What I got from the session is that the visual design of your eLearning matters. If it looks bad, people will be distracted and have a hard time focusing on the learning. Donna went over some basic design principles that can help even the most graphically challenged (like me). I stayed long enough to learn about alignment, repetition, and contrast. Her examples were simple and clear and I felt I learned something useful in the short time I attended. I wish I could have stayed for the entire presentation.

That ends my short series on AG08. I’m looking forward to DevLearn in November and will make every effort to attend the entire conference this year. As I write this I realize I have a bunch of links to go through, and share. As I do, I’m going to add them to del.icio.us and tag them AG08. If you do the same thing we’ll have a comprehensive catalog of all the links.