I spoke at the 2017 ISO/RTO Training Working Group meeting at the Southwest Power Pool in beautiful Little Rock, Arkansas today.

Here are some of the things I mentioned:

Books & Papers

• E-Learning and the Science of Instruction by Ruth Colvin Clark and Richard Mayer – This textbook has tons of research-based principles and examples that you can use to make more learner-friendly training materials.
• Evidence-Based Training Methods: A Guide for Training Professionals by Ruth Colvin Clark – This shorter book is a more condensed version of the textbook mentioned above. It is very readable. Keep this within arms-reach whenever you need to prove to a Ph.D.-type SME that research backs your way of presenting information.
• Applying the Science of Learning: Evidence-Based Principles for the Design of Multimedia Instruction – If a textbook or a book book is too much for you, this 8-page paper will give you a solid start. Plus, the References section is a gold mine of rabbitholes for you to fall into.

Websites

• Safari Online Books – OMG I love this site! It satisfies my need for nerdy computer books and nerdy instructional design books including the books I list above. They have every ATD book here and also have tons of instructional videos. Look for the $199/year special around Black Friday.
• Coursera’s Learning How to Learn – This course from professors Barbara Oakley and Terry Sejnovsky have really good information about getting better at learning complicated things. While in some places the materials violate some of the guidance from Clark & Mayer (see books above), I can forgive it because the information is so good.
• Dr. Chuck’s Python for Everyone – This video course has some really nice instruction on programming. Be sure to watch his explanation of conditional execution (even if you don’t know or care) to see some expert explanations.
• Pixabay – Public domain photographs and vector drawings. This is a good place to go for copyright-free images for your training materials.
• Lorem Ipsum – Use this when you need filler words to demonstrate a layout but you don’t want reviewers to get hung up on the content (spoiler alert! They ALWAYS get hung-up on the content!!!).
• eLearning Brothers Cutout People – This site has some good cutout people that you can use as on-screen coaches. They also have some great templates for all of the major elearning authoring tools.

Applications

• Zotero – This is my go-to application for knowledge management. I use it to store research papers during my literature reviews. It automagically creates bibliographies in whatever format your school requires using a plug-in for Microsoft Word or LibreOffice (free software office suite – I used it for my slides).