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like the plot of a story,

A set-up or introduction: What’s the hook? Why is instruction/training important? In our fast-paced work environments, learners need to be engaged quickly and to relate the instructional story to their own lives.

Learning modules need to be scaffolded to create more and more learner competence and independence.

Assessment activities should allow for the right amount of challenge to allow learners to engage in critical thinking skills, but the climax needs to flow naturally from what’s gone before.

instructional designer should be constantly evaluating his or her objectives/design/instructional methods and course-correcting along the way to the development and implementation phases.

asks whether all the content moves the plot forward

Anything that doesn’t support the plot should be eliminated. So too in instructional design, the designer should eliminate information that’s merely nice-to-know and should keep only need-to-know information.

just as stories can benefit from the judicious use of narration, designers should consider what knowledge and skills learners need to be able to solve a problem. What are the facts, concepts, and principles needed to support learners as they carry out real-world problems? What processes do learners need to be aware of to consider how they fit into the big picture of their work environment? Throwing learners into the middle of the action without any support or context can leave them feeling frustrated.

passing the instructional story out to reviewers allows designers to escape “designer blindness” and to see the story from the eyes of the audience.

Stories also can be great ways of presenting instruction to learners:

Human beings are natural storytellers We pay attention to stories: we want to know how a story ends We can readily attach our own meanings to stories Stories are generally easier to remember than a long list of bullet points

Learners can be involved in a story in a virtual environment or as part of a scenario or case study.

While multimedia can enhance a story, all the CGI in the world won’t resurrect a plot that’s a stinker.

Having a learner articulate the concepts and principles identified by a story can help learners build their own mental models of what’s important. Similarly, having learners tell their own stories can allow them to synthesize concepts and principles and apply them. Learners can use technology to enhance their stories but it’s not a requirement for