How to Make Engaging eLearning Content

If you struggle to concentrate when reading online content, you’re not alone.

Studies show that since the advent of the internet, our attention spans have dropped from 12 seconds to a mere 8 seconds in a span of 15 years. At the same time, the eLearning industry has grown upwards of 900% since the year 2000 and it shows no signs of slowing down.

The dilemma we’re trying to paint here is this: how does one retain information in this digital age from a source that is equal parts useful and distracting? The answer lies in how that information is presented to its audience. Creating engaging eLearning content is possible by using some important strategies to design and organize your content. Read on to find out how!

Understand Your Audience

Before diving into the content, take a step back and ask yourself: who is the target audience? Knowing who your learners play a great role in how you shape and present your content. Is it a younger, tech-savvy generation that knows its way around technology? Are they busy professionals who can’t commit to long periods of training? What skills do they already possess and will they be able to handle the difficulty level of your content?

These are all important factors to consider in order to connect with your learners. Recognizing your audience’s learning behavior, level of expertise, and habits helps map the way you present the information. And that’s where the journey to creating compelling content begins.

Organize the Content Thoughtfully

Organizing your course materials to make a logical and natural flow of information is crucial to holding the learners’ interest. It is important that successive modules build on each other and don’t cover
too much content all at once. Spacing out concepts in digestible pieces prevents learners from getting overwhelmed.

It is also important to give good structure to your online courses so that the audience can associate concepts learned with each module, thereby enhancing retention. You should also give some thought to what aspects of the course are optional or which learning paths students should take if they want to pursue a specific track within the curriculum.

This idea of specific tracks, sometimes called ‘Learning Paths’, encourages users to take the content that they’re the most interested in. More interest from the user can also contribute to better retention.

Create Compelling Visual Experiences

In order to leave an impact on the learners, it is important to present content in a visually appealing manner. Using an attractive visual design, with rich graphics, colors, and animations is one way
to do that. Adding small chunks of text with relevant imagery can help learners recall information with much greater success. It can also break up the monotony of long passages of text.

Not just that, delivering information in the form of videos is also better received by most learners as compared to text. While doing so, it is important to keep the videos short and to the point and to also
make supporting content available to learners in other formats. For more complicated concepts, breaking down the information into several small videos can be very helpful. Video content can allow for training
across more devices and for users to watch and revisit content that they’re most interested in.

Give Learners the Reins

As a learner, have you ever had the opportunity to create your own learning paths? If not, you’re missing out! Imagine having the opportunity to decide what to learn and how to go about it. The freedom to peruse content at your own leisure is a surefire way to spark curiosity.

Taking an active part in their own learning journey is a great way to keep learners invested in their courses. By navigating to different modules, exploring all the resources, and experimenting with different
assignment types, learners are likely to engage with the course content in a much more meaningful way.

Brevity is Key

Let’s face it: students today may not have the time nor the motivation to learn huge chunks of information. It is important to keep your lessons short and to the point, and not overload presentations and notes with too much information. Lengthy lesson plans and intimidating assignments are perhaps the quickest way to lose your learner’s interest.

This also ties into the concept of microlearning. By focusing on one learning objective at a time, learners are likely to dedicate greater attention to the information presented and would be more inclined to
retain it. It’s also helpful to leverage microlearning tools to make engaging eLearning content in workplaces, where trainees have very limited time for learning and development.

Incorporate Interactive Elements

A hands-on learning experience that requires active participation from the audience is perhaps the most effective way to ensure engagement. This can be done in several ways. Converting a lecture from passive, one-way interaction to an interactive virtual classroom, incorporating drag-and-drop functionality in quizzes, open response assessments, and discussion prompts, the list is endless. What matters is keeping the learners mentally occupied and attentive.

Another way to boost interactivity in your courses is by leveraging gamification. Incorporating game-like elements like leaderboards, levels, badges, or points, attach a challenge to each learning objective and turn it into a fun and competitive exercise.

Make the Learners Reflect

Reflective pedagogy is not just a buzzword. It has great potential to ensure that learners retain content by creating a meaningful learning experience. If the audience is able to make an emotional connection to
the content, they are much more likely to connect with the information and grasp new concepts.

This can be done by including reflective prompts in your eLearning content. Asking the audience to think about and share experiences from their diverse backgrounds make for memorable lessons. Other means
could include injecting humor, compelling stories, and motivation in your lectures to leave a lasting impression on the audience.

Keep Up the Good Work

Creating engaging eLearning content does not end with the course itself. After creating your course, it is imperative that you observe how well it is received by the audience. Direct feedback from students
is one way to gauge areas for improvement and potential missteps. But other data, such as enrollment numbers, attendance, grades, and course progress are also key indicators of how well your content resonates with the learners.

At the end of the day, improvement is a continuous process and the wheel never stops turning. Making engaging eLearning content can be a tricky task that sometimes feels like a shot in the dark. But it doesn’t have to be. All you have to do is keep some basic principles in mind when creating your next course, and the rest will follow!

By Edly, EdTech Solution Provider and @OpenEdX Partner.