Learning Experience Design: Theories and Frameworks

In Week 1 of the course, you’ll focus on developing a vision of the learner and of the learning context. You’ll revisit ideas from learner-centered design and the “designing for all learners” mindset we discussed in course one. Using a design process frame, you’ll consider the kinds of information you need to gather about your learner audience and context and identify approaches for analyzing this information. Finally, you’ll explore the role of learner personas in aiding decision making with project stakeholders.

In Week 2 of the course, you’ll focus on different theories and perspectives on learning, and consider ways that these theoretical ideas can inform learning experience design. You will review ideas from overviews of three major learning theories: Behaviorism, Cognitivism, and Constructivism. You will note how different learning theories lead to different ideas about what constitutes learning, and what kind of activities can support learning. You will also look at some perspectives and theories about motivation. You will review ideas about extrinsic and intrinsic motivation, and review Self-Determination Theory to identify different dimensions that can motivate people. All of these ideas can help you see how you might design learning experiences in ways that can motivate learners.

In Week 3 of the course, you will look at different learning taxonomies (i.e., Bloom’s Taxonomy, Fink’s Taxonomy) that serve as ways of describing knowledge so that we can design learning experiences that include activities for learners that will help them gain that knowledge. You will also look at learning outcomes and see the characteristics of good learning outcomes to help you develop the outcomes that will be the foundation for a learning experience. Finally, you will look at learning design frameworks, which describe specific conceptual approaches that help you as you are shaping a learning experience. These three concepts–learning taxonomies, learning outcomes, and learning design frameworks–-are all related, and you will see the interplay between these to help you describe and develop learning outcomes and learning activities for your designs.

This week, you will explore the initial phases of the design process that involve brainstorming activities and developing the initial ideas for a new design. You will begin by looking at tools for these ideation and brainstorming activities. We will discuss conceptual tools and how they help articulate and concretize ideas, especially for ideation and brainstorming, and then later for outlining the learning experience you are designing. You will connect to our earlier discussions about the iterative nature of design to see how these tools support design by helping you describe your ideas in order to communicate them to the team and stakeholders, get feedback, and use this to refine and generate new ideas. You will then have a chance to reflect on how these types of activities and tools fit with the LXD core competencies as you think about how you can build these types of skills.