7 Steps Of eLearning Content Development Process

7 Steps Of eLearning Content Development Process
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Summary: In this article, you will get to learn 7 of the common steps that should apply in every eLearning content management system.

eLearning Content Development Process

There are some steps that all eLearning development process must undergo. Why are they important, and where do they fit in the whole process? As much as different companies follow their eLearning development process, some crucial phases have to be conformed to the letter. In this article, you will get to learn 7 of the common steps that should apply in every eLearning content management system.

1. Analysis

It is usually the first step when it comes to eLearning development process. At this stage, you should be able to analyze the learning content, profiles of the people you are targeting, and the objectives of learning. Once you take up the course, pay attention to the kind of tasks that are meant to be accomplished. Based on that information, a proper instructional strategy is created to be able to come up with an excellent way of presenting the content.

2. Creating The Instructional Design Document (IDD)

The IDD is a high-quality plan of the whole instructional approach of the course. Some of the most common procedures at this stage include solving problems, scenarios, and avatars. In this stage, it is also decided how the content will be broken down—whether it will be into courses, screens, or even modules. In a situation whereby several courses are supposed to be created, each course has to be created using a unique Instructional Design strategy. In this stage, you should be done with all the visual and instructional elements. Therefore, your web designers should be well-informed before they begin the job.

3. Scripting

In this stage, the content to be used for each course is finalized and divided into modules. Then, the content to be used on each screen is decided. The document used for scripting is usually a word document, but a PowerPoint presentation also works well.

4. Prototype Development

In this stage, you are presenting the whole course using a few slides. The content on screen and audio are finalized. All decisions that are based on the presentation of the content on the screen, interactivities to be applied, colors, images, and animations are all finalized at this point. During this stage, there is a lot of writing, rewriting, and revisions that are actually taking place. The prototype should be working on the eLearning content management system. Finally, it is essential to ensure that your web development team has done enough research on the popular CMS available in today’s market. For better reference, this article shows a great comparison of the most popular CMS.

5. Developing The Course Without Including Audio

In this stage, a practical course without audio is submitted to the stakeholders. The stakeholders are allowed to make changes to the content and narration. Once it is approved, the next step of creating audio begins. It is very costly to create an audio file and then recreates it with any iterations. Therefore, the audio file is created only when the audio script is final.

6. Developing The Course With Audio

The moment the audio script is final, the final course is sent to the stakeholders for approval. The quality of the audio and the pronunciation are essential and have to be perfect. The audio developed has to be in sync with onscreen text and animations.

7. Creating The Learning Management System Version

The first 6 stages in this article are mainly creative. The final stage, which is the creation of the Learning Management System version, is more mechanical and technical. The stakeholders have the responsibility of checking if the course is AICC/SCORM/XAPI compliant. Once it is compliant, it is ready to be hosted on the learning platform and go live. The technical team is in charge of doing that.

Conclusion

The main reason why all the stages mentioned in this article are followed to the letter by eLearning companies is that of the stakeholders. Since the stakeholders are involved in all the stages, the development team has to seek approval from them to proceed to the next stage. At the end of the whole process, learners get a course that helps them get quality and learn easily.

Originally published on July 6, 2018