There is a lot of money, time, and energy invested in creating e courses. This is why you should make sure that you can stretch the use of that learning material.
Online learning has successfully expanded over the past five years. It has become in demand for both academic and corporate purposes. Both individual and businesses know how important it is and how it can revolutionize learning and training initiatives. It is expected that the demand will continue to rise.
Does that mean you should double your efforts to create new elearning courses to meet the demand? Not exactly. While new courses will definitely be needed, you can always create courses that can be used for a longer period of time. You just have to make sure that these e courses can be easily updated and made relevant even after years since it was initially launched. These updates are more cost-efficient and less time-consuming so it is preferable than creating the courses from scratch.
But the challenge is, how can you create such courses? Here are some tips that you can implement.
Have a template
Some developers call this the Master Course. It is like the benchmark for all the future online courses that you will create. Admittedly, this will take time for you to create because you have to make sure it is something that has generic parts and can be used across multiple topics and concepts. This should have multiple sections that can be replicated and easily edited or revised. This will shorten the creation of new courses because you do not have to start from scratch.
Conduct surveys
Getting feedback from the people who have seen or studied previous e courses will give you both good and bad points. This can be used to help you update and improve these courses. Be specific in the things that you will ask in the survey. Ask about the content, the flow, and even the instructor (or lack of it). Inquire if there are areas they are having trouble with and see if there is a pattern. Maybe they are having problems with the content – you can change the way it is delivered. Like, make a video or infographic instead of using just text and images.
Observe while the course is ongoing
To be specific, you have to note your observations while the course if ongoing. Try to focus on the reactions and behavior of the students. Notice changes and areas where they seem to have a difficult time progressing. You can keep a diary if the course will take more than a day to complete.
Keep it current
This is very important if you want the course to stay relevant. Take note of examples and even jokes – if there are any. Identify any content that makes references to specific people, issues, places, or events. You might have to change these especially if there is a change in what is happening in the community. It is also possible that you need to change some references when you have a different audience.
Set up a regular maintenance
Yes, e courses also need to be maintained. Schedule regular check-ups so you can review if the courses that you have are still updated. The frequency will depend on the content. Sometimes, it requires a monthly update while others might need a yearly update. Make sure to check the master course as well. If there are changes, you need to update this course so the future ones can automatically adapt to the updates.
You can choose to follow just one of these tips to make sure your e courses are always relevant and updated. However, using more than one is also possible. Just make sure your choices will still be aligned with the objectives of the elearning courses.
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