Crystal James

Applying the Coherence Principle Adding Extra Material Can Hurt Learning I have decided to record notes from the chapters because it helps me with creating eLearning courses. It is also a great way for me to review important materials.  Here are my journal notes from chapter 8 Overview: Keep the lesson uncluttered Avoid adding any material that does not support the instructional goal Weeding refers to the need to uproot any words, graphics, or sounds that are not central to the instructional goal of the lesson Adding interesting but unnecessary material to e-learning can harm the learning process. Diving Deeper: Principle 1: Avoid e-Lessons with Extraneous Words The coherence principle recommends that you should avoid adding extraneous words to lessons. Subject-matter experts often like to incorporate considerable amounts of technical information that expands on the basics. We recommend against extraneous words added for interest, for elaboration, or for technical depth. Example s...

Below I have listed the important points that were discussed in this week's reading.  In designing or selecting e-learning courseware, consider how on-screen text is integrated with on-screen graphics. In particular, when printed words refer to parts of on-screen graphics, make sure the printed words are placed next to the corresponding part of a graphic to which they refer. When there is too much text to fit on the screen, the text describing each action or state can appear as a small pop-up message that appears when the mouse touches the corresponding portion of the graphic. This technique is called a mouse-over or rollover. One problem with rollovers is that they are transient. The text box disappears when the cursor moves to a different location on the screen. Thus, rollovers may not be appropriate for situations in which it’s important for the learner to view more than one block of rollover text at a time or to take an action that relies on rollover text. Alternatively, fixed ...