Cost effective e-learning solutions from India



Over time, professionals of the e-learning industry and their clients saw the need for cost-effective solutions. Today, the following are known to be the best ways of showing cost-effectiveness in an e-learning situation:

• Who is your target audience? What are his learning preferences? To put across an effective learning program, you must know your target audience and his learning preferences exceedingly well. Only then can you write strong and focused content which should ideally be reviewed by an end user who will be able to say if it is workable or not.



• What are your learning objectives? Once you are sure of your learning objectives, it’s easy to write corresponding content for it. You must also know the objectives of your content and its outcome. Next, you should be able to communicate with your learners directly.



• Remember Keller's ARCS model and Gagne's learning events: In 1987, John Keller created the ARCS model which described the motivating factors for learning to take place. These factors are:
  
  A: Attention
  
  R: Relevance
  
  C: Confidence
  
  S: Satisfaction
  
  The content should grab the attention of the learner, be relevant to his needs, give him confidence during the learning process and give him satisfaction of learning.
  
  On the other hand, Gagne's nine learning events which should be the basis of designing instruction are:
  
  
  
  
  
  • Grabbing attention
  
  
  
  • Telling learners the objective of the course
  
  
  
  • Stimulating recall of earlier learning
  
  
  
  • Bringing forth the stimulus
  
  
  
  • Offering guidance while learning
  
  
  
  • Educing performance
  
  
  
  • Providing feedback
  
  
  
  • Rating performance
  
  
  
  • Enhancing retention and transfer
  
  
  
  
  
  



• Use of interactivity: By using various kinds of interactivity in e-learning content, learners remain involved, interested and continue with the course since this takes the monotony out of the single-way communication. It also makes active experimentation possible.



• Using real life scenarios: According to cognitive theories, any new learning is possible if it has a reference point, called schema. This makes retention of new information easier. Using real life scenarios and examples helps learners relate new information with familiar situations or facts and so improve the quality of transfer of knowledge and its retention.



• Self-paced learning: Thanks to technology, e-learning is easy with the help of webinars, facilitators, voice chat, chats, video conferencing, asynchronous and on-line tutoring, etc. These techniques form important links between ILT and e-learning, and add to their advantages.

Pratibha R. S.

Executive - Instructional Designer

About CommLab IndiaCommLab India (www.commlabindia.com) is a Custom eLearning Solutions Company based in India. Since 2000, it has been providing state-of-the-art eLearning services to organizations across the world in the areas of Learning Consultancy, Custom Courseware and Learning Technology. Some of our reputed clients are BC Hydro, George Washington University, Kawasaki and Deloitte. We are preferred vendors to some of the Fortune 500 companies like Alcoa and Hill-Rom.