5 Things That Make eLearning Boring: Mistakes to Avoid

I'm sure you've heard that some eLearning is boring, not stimulating, forgettable, etc. In order to avoid creating tiresome training, it's essential to be aware of less-than-stellar instructional design choices that tend to bore learners. Here are five things that can make eLearning boring (and therefore, not quite useful):

1. Pacing

I'll define 'pacing' as how fast, or slow, the course moves along. Pacing is related to time and we are all very acutely aware of how slowly or quickly time passes. All of us have preferences as to how we'd like to learn from a time perspective...

Pacing can be:
a. Continuous and monotone. i.e. time never speeds up or slows down, it merely proceeds at a very specific speed.

b. Time could fly by quickly, which would result in some learners getting something out of the training while others may be left behind. A pace that is very quick is not suited to the vast majority of people that learn more slowly.

c. Time can be very slow. This can make the fast learners become disengaged and bored very quickly (a paradox).

d. Variable speed. This is where the course can speed up and slow down at different places in the training. This is certainly more engaging than a monotonous pace. But this has a problem too: you are constantly losing and winning student attention at different times thereby losing engagement at different points of the course.

d. User-controlled time. This is usually the best way to pace training because the learner tends to control their own speed of assimilating information and feels more engaged and happy with the course duration.

User-controlled pacing can be implemented in various ways. For example, it can done by allowing users to control navigation from one place to another in the lesson or by interactive elements which can be done either quickly or slowly based on your preferred pacing.

2. Lack of Context

Think of context as how we frame what we are learning. In other words, what are we learning, why, and how.

If context is ignored, incorrect, or confusing, the learner will, in turn, be confused and in a short time become bored and possibly give up.

It is very important to ensure that the learner is learning what they really need to learn, what puts the training into a perspective that is understandable and easily grasped.

3. Needless or Useless Interactivity

You've all heard that interactivity is important in eLearning and that it should be used freely in a course to keep the content engaging, fun and interesting.

So what do many Instructional Designers do?

They often create long lists of letters or graphics that you have to click many times in order to reveal something that could have been read more quickly if it had just been visible in the first place.

Others repeat over and over that you need to "click the Next button to continue." We've all done this one and I have personally experienced what happens when we don't state this: we get calls from clients saying, "one of our learners has been sitting for 90 minutes waiting for something to happen..." Sadly, many of these calls were about PhD learners... Hmm? But that's another story...

Drag-and-drops done incessantly with no real context are also painful. Matching questions take a long time to complete and are usually badly put together.

All of these and many more examples of interactivity take time but don't provide much value for the learner or the company paying for their training.

Interactivity for interactivity's sake is not valuable and not enjoyed by most learners. Boring!!!

4. Creating Games That Are Not

Many people think a quiz or assessment is a 'game'. I'm not sure how taking a test even has elements of game design or how many of these game writers truly enjoyed taking tests in their youth (then again, there are some who did.)

I've seen many examples of games in eLearning that usually:
a. are out of context and have nothing to do with what's been taught
b. have no worthwhile interactivity and are either too difficult or too easy
c. are simply badly-written (people do notice bad writing)
d. do not have proper audio, video, interactivity, or other elements to make it interesting

If you're not a game designer or writer, it would probably be better to delegate these tasks to someone who is. It takes a lot of understanding of game design, principles, content, elements of interactivity and more to create an engaging game. Real game design is not cheap—it's actually pretty darn expensive.

Most games in eLearning are boring, repetitive and have little or no value for non-knuckle-dragging learners.

5. Bad Voice-Over Talent

Everyone loves to hear great voices in eLearning. But often, due to lack of budget, wannabe "talent" with no talent, bad reading, or lousy interpretation of the scripts and other reasons...Sorry, that was a long sentence! That brings up a good point - don't write garbage and then expect the poor voice-talent to read it like a Shakespearean play...

One of the worst things is when the instructional designer uses their own voice to read their script and it sounds monotone, unemotional, etc. This will kill a course's effectiveness instantly. People judge audio harshly, much more harshly than video.

Hire a good voice-over artist(s) that can read well, interpret, bring the text to life, and have a pleasant voice that keeps someone's attention. Keep in mind that a "nice" voice is not necessarily a suitable voice for voice-over work.

If you're curious to learn more what makes good voice-over, you can watch one of our classic eLearnChat videos on voice-over techniques for eLearning below:

Summary: Avoid These Hallmarks of Boring eLearning

These are just some of the things that can go wrong when creating courses. Pay attention to these points and you'll be on your way to creating training that is engaging, retentive, and ultimately makes the learners more productive in their jobs.

Need Help or Want More Info?

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