Hi! I’m your older self, writing to you from 30 years in the future. Here in 2018, we can send messages to the past, but only to our younger selves. In this message I’ll give you lessons from the instructional design mistakes I made in the past, in hopes that you’ll avoid them. If you ignore this message, you’ll make these mistakes in the future. And that'll be bad for you and your learners. Within a few months, you’ll quit your job at the VHS tape factory, dust off your M.Ed. and become an instructional designer, developing courses for classroom trainers and self-paced instruction via computer. Of course, for you in 1988 there’s no such thing as “elearning.” But training over the “Internet”
“A goal without a plan is just a wish,” according to a proverb often attributed to French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. Pretty straightforward, hard to dispute, but difficult to live by. We take on a project, formulate a vague idea of how we’re going to do it, then jump in. It can be as simple as tackling today’s to-do list, or as complicated as starting development of a new course. And while action is good, planned action is even better. So why don’t we plan more often and more completely? I’d suggest two primary reasons: 1) the task doesn’t seem to warrant a plan and 2) planning doesn’t seem productive. Reason #1: "The task doesn’t seem to warrant a plan" On the first count, my to-do l
