A white paper titled "The Neuroscience of Learning & Development" by Pageup People, a provider of talent management solutions, begins with...

"In the beginning was life and then there was learning and, for the duration of our existence, there is life-long learning."

What does it mean to be a life-long learner?

As e-learning providers, we believe that every place we find ourselves in, and every person we meet is an opportunity - an opportunity to learn and to grow. By utilising the right technology and altering our view about how we should learn, we can embrace a progressive learning mindset.

How can this principle be applied to the work-place? And what is progressive learning?

Progressive learning simply means forward-thinking and a learning style that is current with the way we as people process and retain information. Consider many traditional learning styles - after years their approach remains rigid and unchanging despite global social, economic, political and technological advances that have both altered our environment and our expections around learning.

For example, technological advances have broken down social barriers - education is no longer a luxury afforded to only the wealthy: middle and lower class income families now have access to a wealth of learning resources. In a similar vein, changes in social norms have challenged technology to keep up: learning methods must now be agile, adaptable and accessible.

How e-learning has become the most progressive means to 'learn'.

e-learning is the future of education, and it's evolving quickly. E-learning isn't restricted by old technology, rather e-learning utilises current technology and always looks to future technology to develop, with the primary goal of providing the right courseware to the individual, not the collective.

TBCVault provides OHS online training packages for small to medium sized businesses.

Strike up a conversation with us:

Technological advances are rapidly changing the way we communicate, learn, conduct business and connect with one another.

These changes aren’t just to the technology itself, but how we use that technology to learn, especially within the realm of online-learning.

Technology that promotes active learning

As technology has advanced, including the expansion into the areas of online learning, so to has there been a change from passive to active learning styles.

In traditional learning environments, learners are typically tasked with dictation – writing down what the instructor is telling them. Online learning, however, encourages active engagement via the way of scenarios and interactive media, including the gamification of content, plus multiple choice and question and answer scenarios.

Varied mediums for multiple learning styles

The development of technology, specifically online learning, means users have a whole host of learning mediums to choose from – whether it be video, podcasts or online learning courseware via modules.

The bottom line: Powerpoint is out, learning that caters to all users is in...

Which brings us to our next point:

Tailored learning

Perhaps one of the greatest benefits new technology can offer is tailored learning.

By this we mean learning that is unique to the user.

This may include content that:

Utilises strong visuals for those who prefer to engage with imagery.Courseware that is text heavy, for those who retain text-based content.Provides multiple-choice options to cater for multiple learning outcomes.

Where traditional learning provides a passive, one size fits all approach to education, online learning and the new technology developments that have come with it, provide a tailored, active learning approach designed to engage users and help them retain knowledge for the long-term.

TBCVault provides OHS online training packages for small to medium sized businesses.

We’ve decided to take a different approach for this piece and put a face (somewhat) to the name tbcVault.

tbcVault is a division of The Big Canvas. In broader terms, you could say that we’re a digital, creative-services agency. In a more intimate and personal way, you could say that we are a people-centric, creative agency that always goes beyond. Mainly because we love the people we work hard for and strive to deliver the best, customised solutions across web, social, digital and content for our clients. While this work is primarily in the areas of online training, we’re expanding our horizons, so to speak, as we work to provide tailored social and content strategies to our clients.

tbcVault is a little different. Specialising in training programmes, tbcVault is a product offering – aged care, communication skills, childcare, corporate compliance, appropriate workplace behaviour and occupational healthy and safety programmes, all make up our training courseware. Aimed at small to mid size businesses, our goal is to provide HR Managers with the resources they need to ensure legal compliance within their business.

We’re incredibly excited about these new developments and look forward to sharing updates with you as we move ahead with our own content marketing efforts.

Strike up a conversation with us:

As globalisation has resulted in the increasing integration of ideas, products, economics and the movement of people and culture, we've also witnessed a 'cross pollination' of learning mediums - traditional learning environments are no longer essential to well developed learning, as more people seek alternative means to educate themselves.

Empowering people to take control of their ideas

With increasing social and political unease - or, at least greater exposure to it via the onslaught of digital communication - podcasts, videos, social channels, have provided people with the power to take control of the content they're exposed to, by their being able to both limit and expose themselves to information.

Anywhere, anytime learning

Online learning removes the barriers of traditional learning environments, which are often:

Costly feesAccessibilityUniform learning not tailored to the individual needs of learners

And provides learners with greater control over both content and when they consume it.

A few things occur when this happens:

1. There’s an increase in engagement from the learner

E-learning often acts as an equaliser between learner and content, by allowing the user to either cherry pick content relevant to their learning interests, or by providing them with greater variety in the way of learning outcomes.

This essentially creates a learning environment that doesn’t alienate the learner due to difficulty of content, but encourages the learner to continue engaging with their courseware.

2. It completely eliminates financial, time and geographical barriers

And we needn’t say much about what this means, other than the obvious: flexibility in where and how you can learn, automatically provides greater learning opportunities for a greater amount of people.

For us, lifting the barriers that prevent people from growing is a brilliant way to pave the way for better learning - and a greater love for it.

Love learning as much as we do? Get in touch.

When we talk about e-learning accessibility, we’re not just referring to courseware designed for users with disabilities, but instructional design catering to differences in language, culture, customs and various devices (think mobile)

Why is accessibility of online training important?

Aside from the moral principle of accessible learning for anyone, it’s essential that as an online learning developer, you keep up with the changes in the digital world and ensure key features are applied to your own courseware.

By this we mean – with knowledge available at a user's fingertips, you need to ensure that the ease to which your user obtains their knowledge is maintained. Your user should not need to seek external resources to adequately fill in the gaps of their e-learning, rather, supporting resources should be just that - supporting resources that add to your existing content.

Four ways to make your online learning more accessible to your users

Make sure your e-learning content is formatted for both high and low context e-learning. For example, here at The Big Canvas, we've been working on a lot of projects related to the differences in communication techniques and how important it is to develop an understanding of these techniques to facilitate mutually beneficial relationships. Include alt-tags! A simple one, but often forgotten - alt-tags should be included todescribe all imagery. Consider how your e-learning content will need to be accessed by the user and the device they'll be accessing it from, for example, if your content is optimised for access via a tablet, you'll need to ensure your user interface works well without a mouse!

These are just four ways to ensure your online training content is optimised for accessibility – can you think of any others?

TBCVault provides OHS online training packages for small to medium sized businesses.

The topic of engaging learning has long been discussed amongst educators, researchers and users (learners) - whether they're aware of it or not!

Educators discuss the most effective means to engage their learners, learners provide insight about whether content is or isn't engaging for them, and researchers continually look for ways to improve our means to learn.

Whilst learning should be taken seriously, that doesn't mean that it needs to be pedestrian! On the contrary, with what feels like a day and age where we have very little time, it makes sense that content be formulated in a manner that is enjoyable for the user.

One proven way to make your e-learning more enjoyable for your user is through gamification.

Gamification in e-learning - what is it?

According to Engagement Alliance, researches in the education and collaboration of gamification and engagement science, gamification is all about using game mechanics and thinking in non-gaming contexts in order to engage users and to solve problems.

Through design and loyalty or 'points' program design, gamification seeks to generate an optimal environment for successful outcomes.

Learning should be enjoyable

And while that may sound like a basic concept – the simplicity of the principle ‘learning should be enjoyable’ is essential to driving engagement and consequently, guiding successful learning outcomes.

According to the American National Summit on Educational Games, learners recall only 10% of what they read, whilst 90% of content is recalled if they “do the job themselves, even if only as a simulation.” You’ve heard this before, and it’s true.

To add to that statistic, Talent LMS surveyed their users and found that 80% of them reported that they would be more productive if their workplace or place of study utilised some form of gamification.

According to the Talent LMS survey, the most popular gamification techniques are as follows:

Progressing to different levelsScoresAvatarsVirtual currencies

Whilst 23 gamification professionals have concluded in their book, ‘How Gamification Reshapes Learning’, the most effective uses of gamification in learning result in the following outcomes:

Increase engagementCreate challengesInstill a sense of accomplishment

Want to know more about how gamification can be incorporated into your online training? Contact us now.

Television writers are tasked with creating drama that can hold itself over a period of time – not simply ‘convey’ information. What’s the difference? Drama = great storytelling. It’s gripping; engaging and most importantly – you remember it.

It’s this exact principle that can be applied to learning. When you simply ‘convey’ information, you risk losing your user because it doesn’t effectively engage them in a meaningful manner. No sooner have they read it, they’ve then forgotten it!

In last week’s blog post we gave an overview of what cognitive overload was – but how can we prevent it? Storytelling is just one technique, here’s two others’:

Use familiar patterns (such as recognisable visuals) in place of statistic-based examples

According to research by leading communications specialist, Jenny Nabben, many of today’s analytical and abstract (this is considered ‘informational’) content only engages two areas of the brain – Wenicke’s area and Broca. However, we can engage greater areas of the brain when we utilise familiar patterns to format the delivery of our content.

Instead of providing users with statistics to develop their understanding, try utilising existing and familiar visuals to convey your point. You might, for example, choose to showcase a visual that demonstrates a statistic in a tangible way – X doesn’t = Y, X is instead shown as 50 oranges filling up three cars, or perhaps three tennis courts are used to demonstrate size, opposed to providing your user with measurements.

Break content down into ‘snack bite’ sizes

As the way we communicate with each other has changed, so has the need to alter content. With so many digital channels of communication, our attention span and ability to read long-form content has significantly diminished.

Sometimes it’s just about breaking up the ‘monotony of the page’ – jarring the reader into viewing something different. Try breaking down your content into bullet points, shorter paragraphs or accompanying your content with a visual as a means of increasing engagement and your user’s ability to retain your content!

Learn more about e-learning and how it can benefit your business – get in touch.

When developing e-learning courseware, it’s essential that you have an understanding of cognitive load theory, so you can effectively enable your users to get the most out of your content.

Cognitive load theory is the idea that learners can only effectively absorb information that does not overload their brain - we’ve written previously about a similar concept in our piece about the importance of storytelling in e-learning.

The basic premise – content must be styled in a way that doesn’t force the mind to shut off from the content presented to it, and enables it to retain knowledge in the long-term (this is successful engagement with e-learning material).

One of the theories behind storytelling as an effective means to achieve engagement from users is that its narrative structure activates multiple areas of the brain, including emotional engagement. By doing so, the brain is more likely to retain content for the longer term.

Cognitive load theory (CLT), explores the concept of short-term memory and our working memory. Our short-term memory stores sounds, images and words. It also filters information that we either retain or is discarded.

Working memory, on the other hand, is key to long-term learning. It’s what helps us track, or retain, information, until we need to use it.

There are three types of cognitive loads that relate to e-learning. By understanding them, the instructional design of your courseware will ensure long-term retention of content from your users.

Intrinsic

The idea that all instruction has inherent difficulty associated with it – the more difficult they are, the more overload they cause to the mind. It’s the ‘thinking’ component of cognitive learning.

Extraneous

This is learning that’s under the control of instructional designers.

It is generated by the format that information is presented to learners (its design) i.e graphs, which require additional mental processes to work through.It’s considered the ‘materials’ component of cognitive learning.

Germane

Germane is a positive cognitive load. It enables learners to devote their mental processes to help facilitate the development of their knowledge base.

NOTE: Next week we take a look at the ways to reduce cognitive overload in your e-learning course, plus, a more in-depth look at learning theories.

Want some support for your e-learning? Get in touch.

Sources:

Have you heard the saying, “Talk with, not at”? The principle commonly refers to communication between people as a way to highlight that effective engagement requires communication of an equal footing to achieve desired results.

By this we mean communication that effectively supports

UnderstandingFacilitates the desire to discover moreLasting retention of information

The whole point of engagement is to develop a connection between person A and person B, or, person A and B – courseware, a book – sources from both a traditional and online learning environment, that extends beyond a simple ‘talking at’ or ‘memorise’ mentality.

Long working days and long hours in the classroom are common topics of debate. Recently, Sweden has been trialing a 6-hour workday as part of a growing number of family-friendly initiatives. It’s not just about increasing productivity, but part of a wider understanding that to achieve improved productivity, we need to address the way in which we work and learn.

People are tuning out, because the way their learning is structured does not support their learning capabilities

If you think back to your years at school, you’d undoubtedly have memories of tuning out – most likely around 2-2:30pm. At this point, you weren’t retaining information for the long term, you were being ‘taught’ or ‘spoken to’, but may have struggled to understand and engage with content.

Anywhere, anytime education is one of the biggest benefits of e-learning, because it doesn’t force time constraints on its learners. In this way, users are able to learn on their terms, which means less being spoken at, and more talking to.

As online learning professionals, it’s about developing a mutual conversation – a power dynamic shift that allows users to take control of their learning.

Find out how we can help you develop comprehensive online training for your users – get in touch.

Where do you search for your information? If we were to say to you, what’s the capital city of Afghanistan, what year did the first PlayStation console come out, and what’s the basic principles of Newton’s Law of Gravitation, where would you search?

It’s unlikely to be via a library, no, you’re most likely to be checking Google.

Online learning isn’t just the future of education – it’s happening now, and you’re learning, most likely every day, via the ‘virtual sphere’ even if you aren’t actively aware you’re doing so.

When you think of online learning, what comes to mind? Whilst training in the form of comprehensive courseware is the norm, it’s by no means the be all and end all of e-learning.

Podcasts, videos, - TED talks that you find engaging, informative and interesting but wouldn’t necessarily classify as a form of traditional learning, all count as online learning.

More recently, online instructors and e-users have been turning their attention to Twitter as a means of facilitating learning via delivering ‘bite size’ or ‘snack size’ information to learners. What they’re quickly learning is that our attention spans have dwindled as multiple digital channels and media enters the scene.

Learning any time, anywhere learning

Podcasts, audiobooks, video content, Twitter – bite size information allows for the packaging of knowledge for easy digestion.

The best part is that this information can be processed any time, anywhere. If we need to consider what the future of education looks like – just pop on to your Twitter account, or put in your headphones.

The Big Canvas is a creative, digital services & online learning/training agency, with clients spanning the globe. To find out how we can help you – get in touch.

Whilst traditional learning environments have the physical benefit of stimulating engagement from users, how can users achieve the same, or higher, level of engagement from an online learning environment?

It’s a myth, albeit a challenging misconception, that an online environment is not as engaging as their traditional counterparts.

Here’s three key ways to engage e-learners:

A huge benefit of online learning is that multiple scenarios and choices can be presented to the user.

Generally traditional learning environments cater for larger groups of people. Educators, resources and other traditional learning tools simply don’t have the means to cater to all learning styles.

By providing the user with multiple scenarios and courses of action to take throughout your courseware, without there necessarily being a right or wrong outcome, you’re catering for multiple learning approaches.

Develop user-friendly, accessible content

And here’s where e-learning can have a real edge over traditional learning environments.

Whether content be visual or text-based, e-learning allows for the development of content that works for the visually inclined, as well as those who prefer to process text.

E-learning also allows for the development of content that is accessible to the visually and hearing impaired. By incorporating these considerations into your e-learning courseware, you’re immediately opening up greater channels of engagement.

User storytelling as a framework for your content

We touched on this in an earlier piece – storytelling is key to structuring your content for effective engagement. Not only does it promise greater engagement from your users - they’re far more likely to retain the knowledge you impart to them.

Need help engaging your users? Check out our blog, The Art of Learn for tips, resources and information about e-learning.

E-learning cannot be exempted from questions of how initiatives can be measured. In fact, it IS one of the biggest challenges faced by the e-learning industry today.

As The Big Canvas co-founder, Mo Baptista, notes,

“There’s a real need to focus on behaviour change, rather than metrics, as a measure of success”.

We need to evaluate training based on qualitative surveys, not quantitative metrics, and develop an understanding of just how much a user has learnt based on knowledge levels, before and after training.

Questions that need to be asked, include:

Did their training result in true behaviour change?Was the content of their training relevant to their context and experience?Was the content engaging and immersive?Did the user find the guides easy to navigate, and were there clear paths to show them where they were heading and how long they needed to spend throughout the guide?

As a recent study from Brandon-Hall research notes, while numbers may be what’s used to convince management of the effectiveness of e-learning:

“E-learning is about training people and the resulting effect on your organisation.”

Indeed, a crucial approach to measuring the overall success of an entire course is to identify the goals that need to be achieved from the first implementation of e-learning initiatives. Considering how the course could be designed to support these goals is crucial; content such as learner questionnaires and surveys should be included, helping to indicate the progress of the user’s knowledge base throughout the course.

Follow-up questions for users a month or two months after they’ve completed the course, also provides the opportunity to evaluate the success of an e-learning initiative. Questions could be anything - from, ‘How has your online learning affected your job performance?’ to ‘What skills have you learnt and applied to your role, from the e-learning course?’

As I sit here, I think about those old, worn traditional projectors my teachers used to easily spend 15 to 20 minutes setting up. They would tediously switch it on while the rest of us lazily placed our heads on our desks and mumbled to each other, giggling.

We were utterly disengaged.

Fast-forward a few years and there’s been some exciting developments in the sphere of virtual learning. Understanding that as we change, so must the way we learn, universities and workplaces are adapting e-learning to work for them.

It’s just a new way to communicate, and businesses are better for it

E-Learning myth #1 – it’s complicated.

Learning modules are designed for complete ease of learning - many tailored to the styles of the individual e-user.

And for businesses, it’s about efficiency – the ability to train all staff quickly and deliver a wide range of content effectively. Furthermore, e-learning places a minimal strain on resources – a big plus for smaller businesses looking for high quality training on a limited budget.

Scenario-based learning = greater development of soft skills

E-learning has proven to be an effective medium for the development of soft skills and high-context learning by ‘placing’ the user within virtually simulated environments.

These simulations provide the user with the ability to make informed choices about various possible scenarios.

In some situations, there isn’t necessarily a right or wrong answer to each outcome; instead, often the e-user is prompted to simply reflect on how their own choices might impact certain outcomes.

e-learning scenarios provide a real level of diversity in learning that’s harder to replicate (and impossible in some situations) to traditional learning environments.

The Big Canvas is a Creative Digital-services and Online Training Agency that transforms ideas into solutions. You can get in touch with us here.

How ELearning is revolutionising the education industry

The rise of the digital age has been a catalyst for widespread change in how we learn and educate others; change, that hasn’t always been easy to steer, let alone get people on board with.

But eLearning is quickly challenging the generalisations associated with it, from school and university, to corporate working environments.

eLearning is revolutionising the way we learn – and it’s here to stay.

Flexible and scalable learning

The digital sphere has helped alleviate the pressures of physical learning environments. With traditional models of learning often requiring resources beyond the scope of businesses, organisations and learning institutions - flexible, scalable and tech-driven initiatives such as e-modules, are providing high-quality learning outcomes for the end user.

The digital age has changed the way we search and process information… simple

‘Move or die’ – sounds sinister, but the principle applies – methods of education must adapt as ‘the people’ adapt to changes in their own lives. The digital revolution has changed our buying patterns, the way we communicate, and the way we learn. We don’t need to take time to head to the library; a quick Google search provides us with reputable, academic resources. We’re saving time – and we’re getting smarter doing it.

It’s made education affordable and accessible

And by accessible, we’re also talking about providing people who don’t thrive in a ‘classroom’ styled environment – note: this is applicable to the work place, with an alternative means of learning.

People with visual impairment, people who prefer a more visual or text based approach to learning – eLearning can better assist the individual, rather than the individual having to adapt to the majority’s learning styles.

It comes down to one simple thought - we’ve changed – so why are we still using outdated methods of learning?

Source list:

http://www.tgdaily.com/talent/128891-5-reasons-e-learning-will-radically-change-the-education-systemhttp://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/teacher-blog/2013/jun/19/technology-future-education-cloud-social-learninghttp://elearningindustry.com/why-digital-learning-is-here-to-stayhttp://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4152471/

Originally believed to have been used as a means of easing fears and retelling failures of the battlefield into stories of legend (The knight does in fact slay the dragon and gets the girl!) storytelling today remains a powerful communication technique that can assist in all areas of learning.

Jenny Nabben, a communications specialist who has written extensively about the power of storytelling, points out that emotionally engaging stories affect more areas of the brain than ‘logical’ or data-driven messaging. By that she means that people are far more likely to resonate with information that is compelling and follows a familiar narrative structure.

What does this mean for e-learning?

Nabben has noted that many of today’s corporate styled messaging is challenging for the brain to engage with. Through extensive research, she’s noted that only two areas of the brain engage with content that is dry, analytical and abstract in its delivery (Wenicke’s area and Broca’s area), whereas multiple regions of the brain are activated when information is presented in a narrative structure.

These areas of the brain include:

Motor cortex – when we read about physical movementOlfactory cortex – for scent memoriesVisual cortex – for shape and colourSensory cortex and cerebellum – for processing sensation and textureAuditory cortex – for sound

Nabben also noted that information broken down into a hard, factual manner can be overly confronting for the brain, causing it to disengage. When multiple areas of the brain are activated, however, we start tapping further into our ability to feel and emotionally respond to information – which means greater retention and acceptance of information as our brain becomes engaged on a deeper level.

Format information into storytelling structures to keep your user from tuning out!

Engaging the brain as much as possible is essential to digesting information in an e-learning environment because of the lack of physical stimulants in the virtual world.

By integrating storytelling methods into e-learning, we can more effectively engage users and trust that the information we are trying to convey will be digested in the long term.

Sources: https://www.melcrum.com/research/strategy-planning-tactics/science-behind-storytelling

Thoughtful communication – key to workplace success

‘Talk more, tell less” seems to be the nature of communication in many of today’s workplaces.

Instead of engaging with our colleagues in a manner that recognises differences in learning ability, method and preference for communication, a “one size-fits-all” approach seems to be somewhat the “Australian-way” - begging the question, is our direct communication style really serving our ability to successfully engage with others?

Intention lost in translation….

Globally regarded for his insight in to verbal and non-verbal communication, Professor Albert Mehrabian found that non-verbal language makes up 55% of how people communicate face to face.

If 55% of the way we communicate is via non-verbal communication, just how much of what we intend to communicate is left unexpressed?

Here at The Big Canvas, we’ve been closely looking at the differences between direct and indirect communication styles. In Australia, direct communication is our primary modus operandi – we rarely read body language, let alone consider body language to be a substitute for verbal responses such as ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.

What is high-context communication?

In contrast to Australia’s general direct communication style, most Asian countries communicate in what’s known as high-context communication style. This form of communication relies more on intuition and the development of trusting, interpersonal relationships.

It comes down to meeting individual needs

A good manager – a great leader, understands that personality, culture, language, and a variety of other attributes all factor into the way people communicate. Understanding this, they use resources and communication techniques relevant to the unique style of each employee - this may include a mixture of both direct, and indirect communication techniques.

It doesn’t mean reinventing the wheel, rather, it’s as easy as tailoring everyday communication practices in small ways that better benefit your employees. Whether it’s scheduling greater face-to-face time, investing more in our relationships to build trust, or simply opting for visual-heavier presentations, greater consideration for the communication preferences of others is key to a healthier, more productive work environment.