In my first 2 acts I introduced you to the concept of mLearning and provided you with some instructional design considerations for mLearning content development. Now, in my final act, I bet you’re wondering "How should I organize my content for this delivery platform?" Here are a few simple guidelines to remember:
- Organize content into short (5-15 minute) non-linear chunks
- Organize the content chunks into categories
- Avoid long paragraphs—break up text with bullet points, quotes, and simple graphics
- Keep the content entertaining to keep the learner engaged ("edutainment")
Remember, shorter chunks of content require less bandwidth and take less time to develop.
Finally, it is important to remember that mLearning is not appropriate for all content. When you’re teaching something for the first time, you’re better off creating a traditional eLearning course to promote in-depth learning. mLearning is best suited for refresher training, communicating policy and procedure changes, or troubleshooting solutions.
When deciding whether or not mLearning is the most appropriate platform for disseminating your educational content, you also need to ask yourself the following questions:
- "How will your learners access the content?" (Consider whether or not most learners will have a persistent network connection, whether the content will be streamed or need to be downloaded, and if most learning devices will have adequate memory to store downloaded content.)
- "How will I assess the learning?" (Consider whether or not most learners will have internet access/network connection and whether the data will be collected using a traditional LMS or Tin Can API.)
- "Would I like my learners to have the ability to collaborate?" (Consider combining the content with social media.)
-- Kris Castiaux, Senior Instructional Designer, ePath Learning, Inc.
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