3 ways to use content curation in learning design

Content curation is not just one thing or one method. It’s a range of different techniques for reusing and modifying existing content.

Not only do you save time on designing learning from new. You also gain the time (and budget) to create the content that matters.

Read on for 3 practical ways you can use content curation in learning within the organization you work in.

1. Pure resource curation

“The hunter gatherer of content curation”

What does this look like?

This is gathering existing resources on a topic and putting it in one place to grab at your will.

You’ve hunted (or used a tool to hunt) for the content and now it’s gathered in one place. You’ve filtered and selected the best content but there is no rearrangement of it. It’s simply made available in its raw form.

Here’s a personal example. I wanted to learn about interactive and 360 video as a learning solution, so I researched the topic. I used a content curation tool to help me out. First I entered my keywords into Anders Pink, which trawled the internet and showed me content relevant to my keywords. I saved the most relevant content and refined my search. Not only did this automate my search, it saved me both time and effort trawling the internet myself. It also meant I could keep relevant content organized and in one area.

When content curation is mentioned it is usually this method that is being referred to. Information that is hunted and gathered into one place, and then utilized and/or shared with others.

When to use pure resource curation:

• Gathering research on a specific topic
• Watching trends in an industry
• Gathering resources to support special interest groups or learning communities

Don’t stop here though, this is only one method of curation. There are more ways to use curated content, such as story-based curation.

2. Story-based curation

“Using existing resources and arranging them to create a different point of view”

What does this look like?

This is where resources are collected to make a new idea or story that is separate and different from the individual resources alone. They are arranged together creatively to tell a new story.

The resources could be organized into a timeline or tell a story by comparing their similarities and differences. And good curation means you won’t need to overtly tell the story as the resources will do this for you.

“The whole is greater, than the sum of its parts”
– Gestalt Psychology

Many museums are particularly good at this type of curation. Look for examples of this method at your local museums.

When to use story-based curation:

• To show changes over time
• To communicate a journey
• Using similarities or differences to tell a story

3. Audience-based resource curation

“Crowdsourcing and sharing curated resources based around a topic or task”

What does this look like?

The key difference here is who is finding and sharing the resources.

Instead of resources being shared out from a central point like a Learning and Development department, they are sourced by those who will use them, and stored in a central point. This is more active as it directly involves the audience in curating resources for themselves. This is a great way to get buy-in for curating content.

I’ve used audience-based curation when designed in a university level course on Social Informatics. Students were asked to search for relevant examples of the topic being studied and then share these examples on social media. They used a set hashtag designated to that year of the course. This meant the students could search for the curated resources of both other students in their year and also of previous students.

When to use audience-based curation:

• Great for micro search, find and share activities
• When you want the audience to find examples of content that are relevant to their own experiences or environment
• Good for audiences with a wide range of different backgrounds or experience levels
• Good for when the content or topic is rapidly changing and developing — a technique to keep the content current
• Great for researching a specific problem or topic
• A motivating way to gamify resource hunting and sharing on a topic

These aren’t the only ways you can use curated resources for learning. How do you use content curation for learning? I’d love to hear more examples or your thoughts.

If you found this blog useful, let me know by leaving a comment, like, or curate and share it.

Want to talk more? Or want help with your content strategies? Reach out to me on LinkedIn.