Top 10 trends in e-learning solutions and developments | OpenTeQ

E-learning is something that doesn’t need an introduction, to begin with, but if you are still a newcomer in its world, let me just give you a quick definition of what it exactly means. So it is a learning or teaching technique that involves formalised use of electronic technologies to obtain the right education from anywhere possible but with the proper internet access. And with its evolution, it has completely outweighed the old school face to face learning techniques.

With that being said, don’t you think elearning has had an impact on the commercial education market and businesses? Well, I don’t think I need to dig deeper into this than I already did. But I will at least drop some of the most tried and tested trends in e-learning solutions and development that will benefit you as they did to me.

Top trends in e-learning solutions and developments:

After interviewing a couple of eLearning industry experts, I have come up with the most needed and crazed up trends going on right now. So, here are the top 10 trends that will blow your mind for taking every other eLearning solution and digging up its developments that will help your business get dominance in coming times.

1. Mobile learning:

When it comes to e-learning, people are gradually turning that name into mobile learning since it has been proven by many organizations to be a significant mode of training. This involves formal and informal learning techniques, instant as well as collaborative learning aids that help both the involved parties to have their work done in as minimal time as possible, saving everyone from misspending on the same things that can be discussed in less time. The biggest advantage of mobile learning is that it comes with the flexibility to have your work done at any time or anywhere with proficiency. In recent times there has been a whopping increase in mobile learners by 67% which makes it more applicable to be on number one.

mobile learning | OpenTeQ

2. Video learning:

Video learning is probably a very underrated teaching strategy that I have found to be among the best of all due to it having a high virtual impact on the minds of learners. Video learning is considered to be a versatile medium of teaching that helps the employees to understand and scale up their required skills with higher engagement and better recall experience. These videos can be shared individually or you can make a series of them and share with your audience on the shared learning network. These videos may convey awareness which has short videos that deliver some moral message or watch and learn kind of DIY, demonstrative videos.

video learning | OpenTeQ

3. Gamification:

Gamification, which Cambridge defines as, the practice of making activities more like games to make them more interesting, has been into a talk for its enjoyable learning strategy. It is the utilization of gaming elements to enhance the old school learning techniques and build up engagement. Through this technique, there is a higher chance of attaining long-awaited higher recalls and retention with higher completion rates resulting in inflated engagement. To me, it feels like gamification has the best feature of instant delivery of feedback, be it positive or negative. But I have to say that it comes with its baggage. Gamification is a higher cost craving dread that no business will be willing to take on the expense of leaving themselves in liabilities.

gamification | OpenTeQ

4. Self-directed learning:

SDL i.e. self-directed learning can be understood as handing over power of learning to learners themselves. This helps the learners to gain control of every step of their learning process and it is a cost-effective method as well. One the other hand, the tutors need to make sure they update and motivate their learners with modules. On taking up this flexible method of learning, they will be able to recognise their learning needs and get to know their minds well, which helps in tracking their progress.

Self-directed learning | OpenTeQ

5. Immersive learning:

It's the advanced era and there is no way we are not discussing the immersive learning technique. It is a learning method that brings to use an artificially built environment that pushes the learner to get on with virtual reality(VR), augmented reality(AR), and mixed reality(MR). The aforementioned virtual reality focuses on using the real world with a digital suffuse of information. This technique comes with easy to learn steps and implement solutions and is cost-effective too. Virtual reality (VR) is more of a gaming experience to the learners where they are given a synthetic environment with a digital background. And lastly, mixed reality(MR) offers the learners with both augmented and virtual reality experience.

immersive learning | OpenTeQ

6. Artificial intelligence:

Artificial intelligence is one of the advanced learning methods that originally was a computer science branch which stretches more on grabbing and developing intelligence through machines. In short, artificial intelligence is meant to be a thinker and doer just like humans and for instance, speech recognition or planning and problem-solving etc. before taking this up, the learner must know the artificial intelligence area he/she is taking up i.e. reactive machines, self-awareness or theory of mind and memory. The benefits that this method gives is improved accessibility, creation of unique content, natural language processing that will help in getting or giving a personalized learning experience.

artificial intelligence | OpenTeQ

7. User-generated content:

Like any other old themed methods coming for renewal, content curation is also in trend. This is the most budget-friendly e-learning solution you will come across hands down. Here you will be able to recycle or reuse your old content and turn them into a completely new way of delivery. For example, if you have a long PowerPoint presentation or webinar, you can turn it into a course that will make it seem a bit exciting to the viewers. Or you can turn this into an infographic where your learners will be able to take up important points from your lectures and go through it in their free time. Not gonna lie, this teaching technique will surely give your business a facelift that it needs to grow further and make a fresh name for itself in the market. But one thing to be kept in mind is that the data which you are curating must be mindfully dealt with.

8. Big data:

This is more of a task done bythe learners where they create and collect the data during the training module. Which means an employee’s progress, their assessment results, and tier involvement in the company’s policies etc will be included in Big data. This technique helps the learning expertise to get to know how much of their teaching is getting to the minds of their learners and enables them to pinpoint the areas that need high or low-level concentration. I would recommend you to go further and learn about big data as it is going to leave an impact on the learning industry for being the most informative and target effective e-Learning course. The e-learning expertise can keep a direct check and track where and how learning is uplifting or burdening himself with data. In short, it's about time we start to embrace the evolution of big data in e-learning solutions for the expanded understanding it delivers using in-depth information that makes it possible to digest all that knowledge without having to put much effort.

9. Microlearning:

Microlearning is a small chunk of information that you gather from the internet. Any podcasts, infographics, youtube or ted-ed videos or anything that has helped you with gaining tiny bites of information and learning from it is considered microlearning. It comes under a formal training process that aids just in time jobs and helps in recapping and challenging one's ability to grasp as much data and skills in a short time as possible. It also helps in enhancing employee performance with the correct implementation of its techniques.

10. The digitalisation of ILT(Instructor-led Training):

To know this, you need to know what exactly ILT is. So, Instructor-led training, commonly known as blended learning or fully online learning, can be understood as conducting course training using a physical instructor(which may be in-person training or virtually through webinars) or PowerPoint presentations etc. but this cannot be delivered to all the employees simultaneously which means it needs to be digitized to overcome its drawback. And just by this, it is converted into a fully online learning course which offers a wide range of benefits to both tutors and learners in the long run. It empowers the instructor to introduce versatile teaching techniques and helps the learners in maintaining flexibility, and improves their engagement.

Conclusion:

Overwhelming, Aren’t they? But I bet you just cannot resist the urge to take up one of these e-learning solutions to gain more and more exposure to the global world. And coming to that, I guess before jumping to conclusions, you should make a plan on what exactly your employees need to be skilled with and then choose one of the above trends to execute their course and bring out the future entrepreneurs.