Designing world-class e-learning

-The New York Times

A Leading Guru's Guide to "e-Learning by Doing"

The majority of corporate training programs are weak, ineffective, costly—and inconvenient for the time-pressed employees they are supposed to train. Designing World-Class e-Learning explores online learning—today's hottest business training topic—and explains the "learning by doing" approach that the author and his firm have used to develop effective online courses for Harvard Business School, IBM, GE, Columbia University, and other leading organizations.

Designing World-Class e-Learning explains how Web-based simulations and role-playing scenarios can be used to radically rethink the process of providing training in organizations. Roger Schank—widely recognized as a leading e-Learning guru and innovator—demonstrates steps and strategies proven to excite employees, make them want to learn, and decrease training costs as they increase productivity. Schank's approach to e-Learning involves :

• Encouraging employees in training to fail—and learn from that failure
• Just-in-time storytelling from experts
• Powerful emotional impact

Designing World Class e-Learning explores the ways in which the Web can improve the content of training programs, by placing employees in virtual work environments, that allow them to experiment and practice without fear of failure. Written by Dr. Roger C. Schank, creator of custom-designed, interactive training programs for many of today's largest corporations and universities, this innovative book examines the known components of effective training, then explores how they can be greatly enhanced by technology and the Web.

Designing World-Class e-Learning examines every aspect of designing and implementing Web-based, user-friendly training programs , from three essential steps you must take before creating an e-learning course to methods for assessing and measuring the results of your e-learning program. Opinionated, innovative yet down-to-earth, the book explores:

• Examples of flawed e-learning initiatives, with analyses of how each could have been improved
• Methods for orienting new-hire employees through interesting, interactive activities
• Strategies for teaching complex tasks and attitudes to all employees, even those with lower educations or skill levels
• Seven criteria for assessing the effectiveness of an e-learning course

When organizations simply transfer existing training programs to the computer screen, they miss out on 98 percent of the Internet's impact and interactivity. Designing World-Class e-Learning explains how to design an e­learning program to leverage 100 percent of the delivery and content advantages of the Web, substantially decreasing training costs as it increases overall productivity and training results.

Table of Contents

• Part I
• e-Learning by doing
• Chapter I Get Smart: The problems with traditional Training
• Chapter 2 The Secret to Success: e-Learning by Doing
• Chapter 3 e-Learning by Doing at IBM, A.G.Edwards, Enron, and Wal-Mart
• Part II
• Instructional Design Principles for e-Learning
• Chapter 4 : Expectation Failure : The Engine That Power e-Learning
• Chapter 5 The Powerful Design and Delivery Principles The Rules
• Chapter 6 The Building Blocks of e-Learning : Scriptlets and the Learner's Personal Goals
• Chapter 7 The e-Learning instructional Design Process
• Part III
• e-Learning in Action
• Chapter 8 Bad e-Learning : Five examples
• Chapter 9 e-Learning by Doing at Deloitte, Cutler-Hammer , and GE
• Chapter 10 Designing e-Learning for Frontline Hourly Employees: Stories from From First Union and GE Card Services
• Chapter 11 e-Learning at Harvard Business School
• Chapter 12 Web-Mentored Courses: How Columbia University Uses Live experts to Ehance
• Part IV
• Assessing AND Measuring e-Learning
• Chapter 13 : Let Freedom Ring: Seven Criteria for Assessing The Effectiveness of an e-Learning Course
• Chapter 14 How to Apply the Freedom Criteria
• Chapter 15 Postscript : e-Learning Does Not Mean Copying School
• Index