by Ethan Edwards, chief instructional strategist | @ethanaedwards

As I watch people from various areas of expertise move into the role of
e-learning instructional designer, it has become clear that we seem to have a rather vague idea of what instructional design for e-learning really is. It differs from more concrete areas of expertise, like being a carpenter.  The skills and knowledge required for quality carpentry are pretty clearly defined, bound by a reasonable universe of application, and success is easy to recognize both by experts and less-informed customers.

But the tasks involved in instructional design for e-learning (that so often blend into development) are incredibly diverse and a universally-recognized measure of success or quality is non-existent. The vague and varying definitions of instructional design don’t exactly help clarify.; Here’s one definition: “the practice of creating instructional experiences which make the acquisition of knowledge and skill more efficient, effective, and appealing.” Like so many definitions, it’s not very helpful unless you already know what it means.

To help clarify the role of the instructional designer, I’m going to take an alternative approach (using a tried-and-true instructional design approach of examples and non-examples) to try to clarify our role.

An instructional designer is not simply a transcriber of information. Too often I see designers simply transferring textbook content or even narrative from a live presentation onto the screen. Rather than transcriber, an instructional designer needs to be a creative writer: taking a message, paring it down to the essentials, and expressing it in a conversational tone, creating a story arc that engages the learner’s imagination, even when the content might be dismissed as regulatory or boring.

An instructional designer is not simply a decorator. Compelling use of media, particularly graphic images, is central to any good e-learning program. But too often I see designers acting more as advanced scrap bookers - adding images to a presentation with the vague intention of making it somehow prettier and therefore more interesting. But media must be so much more than superficial ornamentation. Good instructional design requires media communication skills—an understanding of how to use media as a core element in effective communication.

And finally, an instructional designer is not a teacher. Granted teaching and instructional design have much in common., But a good teacher is constantly adapting in real time—shifting approaches at a moment’s notice between one student and another, often without more than a few seconds to formulate a plan, usually using considerable interpersonal skills to smooth what otherwise might be a rough experience. An instructional designer has no comparable role in e-learning. The e-learning designer is more like an architect whose work is all done in advance of the actual teaching event, and thus must be more formally analytical in identifying all the possible responses a learner might make to any given challenge, and then deciding which challenges will best support the design.

I hope my characterization doesn’t sound discouraging as that is certainly not my intent. Despite the lack of universally-accepted measures of quality, the potential for creativity, transformative impact, and learner empowerment is enormous if we, as instructional designers, open ourselves to the idea of being creative writers, media communication specialists, and architects of learning.