Easy tools to create online learning materials
How to make simple self-study content?
As an online learning designer, I received many questions from friends about how to create simple learning materials for their colleagues, students, etc.
Designing complex digital learning experiences is quite a complex and time-consuming process. However, sometimes you need a handy solution to explain, teach, and share important information. In most cases, there is usually no time and budget to deliver an extended learning program.
In any form of knowledge sharing the secret will be in the content. The format and framework are tools to deliver it. In complex learning programs, it takes a lot of time to find the best format for a large audience, but in most cases, you need a structured document that helps others understand what you know or that makes common knowledge transparent.
I usually recommend using the tool that you know and like. For me it is PowerPoint, but it can be anything. The magic will happen in any tool if you follow the steps below. You can work on this project alone or together with your teammates, these steps will be valid for both cases.
Clarify the target audience and the learning objectives
- Who will learn from your material?
- What do they know about the topic?
- How will they use what they learned?
- What is their motivation to learn?
- What do you expect from the learners after they complete the training
- What should change in the learners' daily life after completing the training?
I know these questions sound trivial, but try to answer them, and you will see that it requires some thinking and clarification. You can return to your answers when you are in doubt in the later phases and guide yourself with this basic framework.
Tool suggestions: You can use any note-taking applications, MS Word, or Google Docs or start to create a board for your project in Miro or any similar collaboration platform.
Create a list of the main topics
Do you know the exercise where you have a jar, and you put in the big rocks, the small pebbles, the sand, and the water at the end? You need to follow the same structure in content development. You have to identify the main topics first that you want to cover. Here you can create a bullet list, an excel sheet, a mind map, or whatever structure usually helps you collect and organize ideas.
After identifying these topics, organize them and add sub-topics, chapters, paragraphs, and everything you want to include in the material. By the end of this exercise, you will have a clear structure for your future course.
Tool suggestions: With the help of MS Excel or Google Sheets, you can easily create a hierarchic structure of the topics and visualize different levels. For some people, this is a comfortable tool, and it can work here as well. If you don’t have a linear structure or need a more flexible approach, you can use mind-mapping tools (Miro, MindMeister). In some cases, I also used kanban boards (Trello, Monday.com), where I created a card for each topic and a checklist for each card about the available material, todos, etc. If you use a kanban board to manage your workflow, maybe this will be more comfortable for you to follow up on progress in the later phases.
Collect your assets
By the time you start the training development, you probably have several materials ready on the training subject. Collect them in the structure that you identified in the previous step. You can create folders or a link structure or start copy-pasting materials in MS Word/Google Docs or MS PowerPoint/Google Slides. The aim is to get a feeling of what is available and missing.
Tool suggestions: I would generally emphasize using a cloud environment as that creates transparency and supports collaboration. Obviously, this is important in case you are working in a team. Feel free to follow your available file/link management methods, and you don’t have to overcomplicate this process.
Start the content development
One thing that you should remember while working on the content is that you will not be there to explain your thoughts. You have to be clear and simple, and you have to describe everything that you would explain in a conversation or presentation. How can you do that?
- Explain the context to make sure everyone is on the same page with you.
- Provide options for further explanations and definitions.
- Avoid compound-complex sentences that are 5 lines long. Break them in half and remove all unnecessary elements.
Read through your notes about the aim of the course and your target audience. Keep these goals in your mind when developing your content. Using empathy and understanding the needs of your learners will make a difference.
In learning program development, I usually create a storyboard first in MS PowerPoint/Google Slides, where I work on the text, images, and videos. I also suggest interactivities that the development team will implement in the e-learning authoring tool. In simple learning material, you can use this storyboard as an outcome and share it with your audience.
Start with developing the topic where you have the most available materials. It is easier to reduce the materials than to write something from scratch. It will help you get up to speed and feel about the content you have or need.
Slides are for free, so use them. Don’t fill one page with everything that you have to say. Use one slide for one thought. If you need to relate 2–3 things to each other, handle them together. Keep what needs to be together, but don’t overwhelm your audience in one section.
You can also support understanding with simple figures that you can create for yourself or with audio narration. If you need to demonstrate software, you can record your screen and explain the process in a video.
Tool suggestions: In the creation phase, I like to use MS PowerPoint because it can do many things besides creating presentations. You can directly record audio, or screen captures in the tool, which keeps everything in one place.
With Google Slides, you need another tool to add narration or record videos. For the narration recording, you can use your phone. In the last few years, that quality evolved a lot. For screen recording, there are many available tools. You may have some built-in solution on your computer, or you can use Camtasia or Loom.
In professional online learning development, Articulate is the most popular authoring tool. For one project, it can be expensive and complicated to learn as it supports interactions, layers, and advanced triggers as well.
Summary
- Clarify the target audience and the learning objectives:
Who and why will learn from your learning materials?
What is the goal of your training?
Tools: MS Word, Google Docs, Miro
2. Create a list of the main topics
Collect and structure modules, chapters, topics, and sub-topics.
Tools: MS Excel, Google Sheets, Miro, MindMeister, Trello, Monday.com
3. Collect your assets
Collect and structure all materials that are relevant and organize them in the previously defined structure
Tools: cloud drives
4. Start the content development
Focus on your goals in the development phase and put yourself in the learner's shoes.
Tools: MS PowerPoint, Google Slides, Camtasia, Loom, voice recording with a phone, Articulate
I collected many optional tools for each step. You don’t necessarily have to use a different tool for the steps. If you find one of them a bit more comfortable than the others, you can stick to that specific tool. As I wrote, the magic will be in the content, and the tools only support it.