E-Learning and the Science of Instruction: Proven Guidelines for Consumers and Designers of Multimedia Learning - Hardcover

Clark, Ruth Colvin; Mayer, Richard E.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1119158664 ISBN 13: 9781119158660

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Inc, 2016

Synopsis

The essential e-learning design manual, updated with the latest research, design principles, and examples

e-Learning and the Science of Instruction is the ultimate handbook for evidence-based e-learning design. Since the first edition of this book, e-learning has grown to account for at least 40% of all training delivery media. However, digital courses often fail to reach their potential for learning effectiveness and efficiency. This guide provides research-based guidelines on how best to present content with text, graphics, and audio as well as the conditions under which those guidelines are most effective. This updated fourth edition describes the guidelines, psychology, and applications for ways to improve learning through personalization techniques, coherence, animations, and a new chapter on evidence-based game design. The chapter on the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning introduces three forms of cognitive load which are revisited throughout each chapter as the psychological basis for chapter principles. A new chapter on engagement in learning lays the groundwork for in-depth reviews of how to leverage worked examples, practice, online collaboration, and learner control to optimize learning. The updated instructor's materials include a syllabus, assignments, storyboard projects, and test items that you can adapt to your own course schedule and students.

Co-authored by the most productive instructional research scientist in the world, Dr. Richard E. Mayer, this book distills copious e-learning research into a practical manual for improving learning through optimal design and delivery.

• Get up to date on the latest e-learning research
• Adopt best practices for communicating information effectively
• Use evidence-based techniques to engage your learners
• Replace popular instructional ideas, such as learning styles with evidence-based guidelines
• Apply evidence-based design techniques to optimize learning games

e-Learning continues to grow as an alternative or adjunct to the classroom, and correspondingly, has become a focus among researchers in learning-related fields. New findings from research laboratories can inform the design and development of e-learning. However, much of this research published in technical journals is inaccessible to those who actually design e-learning material. By collecting the latest evidence into a single volume and translating the theoretical into the practical, e-Learning and the Science of Instruction has become an essential resource for consumers and designers of multimedia learning.

About this title

From the Inside Flap

Over the 15 years since the first edition of this book, various forms of digital learning have grown from 10% to about 40% of training delivery media. The emergence of virtual classrooms and evolution of asynchronous formats on multiple digital platforms make the research on what works to promote learning more important than before. In this Fourth Edition, you can review guidelines, checklists, and examples that guide your major e-learning design and development decisions. Whether you are reviewing off-the-shelf courseware or creating your own lessons, this book will address fundamental issues such as:

• What kinds of graphics help learning and what kinds of graphics hurt learning
• Which audiences most benefit from graphics
• When and how to best use animations
• Situations in which it is best to use audio to describe graphics
• Situations in which it is best to use text to describe graphics
• How to place text on the screen to maximize learning
• How to avoid mental overload caused by inappropriate use of graphics, text, and audio
• The benefits of personalizing lessons through informal language and on-screen avatars
• Ways to increase social presence in virtual and asynchronous learning events
• How to maximize learning benefits of examples and demonstrations
• The best forms of engagement for learning
• Practice activities and placement that optimize learning
• The types of feedback that promote learning from practice
• When and how to use online collaboration to optimize learning
• Techniques to use in e-learning to build thinking skills
• The benefits of scenario-based e-learning
• The effects of video games on cognitive skills
• Instructional methods proven to improve learning from games

If you are an e-learning instructor, you will find online resources that you can adapt to your own academic schedule and student population. These include an updated syllabus, case studies, and test questions. Each chapter in this new edition includes reflection questions you can use to help students apply chapter guidelines to their own environments.

From the Back Cover

The Best-Selling e-Learning Design Manual, Updated with the Latest Research, Design Principles, and Examples

Fully revised with two new chapters and sixteen updated chapters, e-Learning and the Science of Instruction: Proven Guidelines for Consumers and Designers of Multimedia Learning is your essential reference for evidence-based guidelines for designing, developing and evaluating asynchronous and synchronous e-Learning for workforce training and educational courseware.

There is a great deal of valid experimental research on best methods to use in the design of e-learning lessons that support human learning processes. This scientific research is found in diverse academic journals and presented at research conferences not attended by most practitioners. In this book, Ruth Clark and Richard Mayer have gathered, organized, and illustrated that research to give you a practical guide in one place. In this Fourth Edition new evidence is included on the best use of text, audio, and graphics in e-learning as well as design guidelines for examples, practice exercises, computer-supported collaborative learning, and thinking skills lessons. Two new chapters focus on effective and ineffective forms of engagement in e-learning and the latest evidence on best practices in design of games for learning. You will find research summaries, examples, and checklists that show you:

• The kinds of visuals that best promote learning
• How and when to use instructional animations for optimal learning
• How best to use text and audio to describe visuals
• Techniques to improve learning through personalized language and on-screen agents
• What instructional techniques make learning games effective
• The effects of playing commercial games on basic cognitive skills

You can use the evidence and guidelines in this book to guide your own design decisions as well as to communicate proven practices to your development team, subject matter experts, or e-learning students.

Edition details

• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Inc
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 1119158664
• ISBN 13: 9781119158660
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 4
• Number of pages: 510