Spring is finally here—and it usually means a busy period for eLearning developers who are productively delivering on 1^st quarter promises. I have been following Clive Shepard and Elliot Masie’s posts on the economic condition in the training and development field. Both report a promising outlook for eLearning compared with face to face training.

We are receiving several jobs and inquiries for converting face-to-face workshops (one or two day events) into mostly asynchronous eLearning seminars/ courses/ eWorkshops. Not quite sure what to call this type of eLearning event, especially when it has an introductory synchronous activity.

Some of the good ideas that I’ve heard passed around include:

• What you call it depends on the market. Professors seem to like the term “seminar” as opposed to “course” since eCourse seems to imply a semester’s worth of education.
• Keep the asynchronous eCourse “time dependent” even if you don’t have to. Give adult learners a window in which the learning and assignments must take place.  Three weeks of access being equivalent to a one day workshop works for me.
• The first hour should be a live web conference that teaches how to use the technology and focuses on the workload/workshop expectations.
• Make sure all assignments have relevancy to the learner’s job.
• Work at making discussion threads (Web 2.0 anyone?) important to the learner by requiring them to post something they are working on and to post a related question.
• Pick instructors who will increase attendance and promote them as stars.
• Require instructors to post comments in discussion threads.

Please share your thoughts...