Time is rapidly closing on flash based websites because the development environment is no longer compatible with today’s technology. Flash does not translate to mobile devices and as technology continues to evolve, responsive design becomes more and more important for all websites; especially learning systems.

By Carrie Zens, Director of Marketing / @carriezens

Ah, the world of ever-evolving technology. It’s wonderful and completely irritating at the same time. We continually push the envelope, making everything faster, smarter, better. Smartphones have larger screens and more bells and whistles. We've coined the term 'phablet' which I didn't think was a real word until I looked it up on Wikipedia. And please, continue to make battery life a priority for me and many others who struggle to stay connected!

By Steve Lee, Co-founder

AICC, SCORM, xAPI, TinCan, LMS, LCMS, LRS, wow so many acronyms, so much confusion, so much promise and yet so much frustration. If you are like me you may be asking: “why is this so hard?”

by Ann Iverson, instructional designer | @iverson_ann

If you’re like me, you have a basic understanding of the technical side of what we do. You try to follow along when developers speak their language, but when the conversation turns to closing loops, debugging code, or programming arrays, your eyes sort of glaze over. At that point, I might as well be at the market in a faraway land, and I kind of wish I was. Even though it’s tempting to leave the tech talk to the techies (note: you’re not a techie if you use the word), we just can’t ignore that side of our business. Instructional designers need to be able to communicate the technical design aspects of our courses to developers, LMS Administrators, and other IT Professionals. Also, technical specifications almost always surface in stakeholder meetings and, while we don’t require a high level of technical expertise, IDs do need to be able to speak intelligently about the business side of technology. So here are some FAQs that will help you in discussions related to SCORM, an important technical consideration in e-learning:

‘Crystal Balling with Learnnovators’ is a thought-provoking interview series that attempts to gaze into the future of e-learning. It comprises stimulating discussions with industry experts and product evangelists on emerging trends in the learning landscape.

The Serious eLearning Manifesto is meant to be a constructive, actionable document for developing quality learning. While the manifesto itself is not meant to be “learned,” there are plenty of tips and tools that can help you practice the principles of the manifesto in your real-world designs and projects. For instance, to help facilitate its impact you could create flashcards to memorize its values and principles, print up a poster and hang it high in the office, or even create a worksheet/checklist for reference on every project. 

By Gerald Matykowski, Inside Sales Manager

I am a relatively new employee at Allen Interactions and delighted to be here. In my role as Inside Sales Manager, I am challenged on a daily basis to apply my instructional design, sales and entrepreneurial experience developed over the last three decades. I provide support to our Strategic Relationship Managers and to those of you who come to us for resources and custom services. As I settled into my role at Allen Interactions and began talking with instructional designers about their existing and upcoming challenges, I started noticing history repeating itself. Today, instructional designers face challenges very similar to those encountered in the early 1980s, when the computer-based training space emerged. Let me share some history before I offer an example.