1. Text
2. Voice and other audio
3. Still images
4. Animation
5. Video
6. 3D environments

The online communicator needs to know when to use each of these elements and how, and in what combinations. Over the next few weeks, I’m going to be exploring these elements to try and shed some light on these issues. The first posting looks at text.

We start our tour of the elements that make up all our online communications with the medium we all take for granted – simple text.  What is it good for? In which situations does it struggle? How is it best presented online?

What text is good for

Text is by far the most flexible and pervasive of all the media elements. When carefully composed, it is capable of conveying precise meaning.

In most circumstances (where it not integrated into a video or animation), text can be absorbed at the reader’s own pace, which reduces the stress for the reader in a learning context and makes it much easier for those who want to skim content or hunt down a particular piece of information.

Weaknesses

Text is not as expressive as speech, because it does not convey tone of voice. For this reason, text messages can be easily misinterpreted.

Without considerable skill on the part of the author, text is not great at describing the physical appearance of an object or person (use photos or illustrations instead), actual events (use video), layouts (use diagrams or screen grabs in the case of software), or complex processes (use diagrams or animations). Text is also not ideal for describing sounds (use audio!).

Optimising text for online delivery

Text is harder to read from a screen than it is from paper, partly because the resolution of the screen is so much lower (less dots per character) and also because the light is projected rather than reflected. With scrolling and paging, it is also much easier for the reader to lose their orientation within an online document.

With these points in mind, best practice suggests that you:

• Limit your word count to half of what it would be in print.
• Use clear, descriptive headings to separate sections.
• Keep sentences short.
• Cover only a single point in each paragraph.
• Use bulleted or numbered lists rather than present a series of related items as ordinary prose.

Combining text with other elements

As a verbal element, text combines well with visual elements but clashes badly with a second verbal element such as speech. So, text plus still images works well, whereas text plus speech causes all sorts of confusion and overload for the user. The brain cannot process two verbal inputs simultaneously, so the user has to block out one element (usually the speech because this is conveyed much more slowly than text) in order to concentrate on the other.

How text is represented online

Text is represented digitally as individual ASCII characters of one byte each. For this reason, text is by far the most bandwidth-friendly element.

Portions of a piece of text can be emboldened, italicised or underlined. As a general rule, underlining should be avoided as it implies that the text is a hyperlink.

Text can also be formatted in terms of point size, colour, font, spacing, column width and alignment, although these aspects of typography are now more normally handled through what is called a ‘cascading style sheet’ (CSS), set up by a designer, leaving the author to worry about the content. Typography has an important impact on legibility and usability and so determines much more than the style. The following general pointers will help:

• Constrain column width to 5″ (12cm) to reduce the eye strain involved in tracking back to the start of each new line.
• Left align paragraphs in most circumstances.
• Limit the use of text that is all capitals.
• Present body text at 10 or 12 point.
• Maintain a high contrast between text and background. In most cases, black on white is fine.
• Use fonts that are optimised for the screen.

Be aware that, for the visually impaired, text can be read aloud by screen readers. To help screen readers work at their best, text should be formatted and displayed in accordance with the latest accessibility guidelines. In most cases this will be an issue for the person setting up the website rather than the author.

Coming next: sounds

Down the years I have formed many teams, companies and communities of practice. One popular model since the 1960s has revealed itself to be consistent in accurately predicting the behaviour of those groups. It has influenced my way of working and affected my responses when things did not happen quite as planned. I am referring to Tuckman’s model – Forming, Norming, Storming, Performing.

This came to mind again very recently. I often find myself defending the idea of devoting time online to setting up a code of behaviour and simply getting people to know one another a little. Once rapport and mutual interests have been established then it is time to roll up sleeves and tackle the “serious business” of working and learning together online.

Some organisations with a focus on tasks or results, often ban people from spending time on this type of activity. In communities of practice, virtual action learning sets and cohorts of learners for example, the simple courtesy of introducing oneself as a human person is seen as unimportant and trivial. I don’t think it is. When people interact online at a level beyond just a cog in the organisational machine, they always perform better and achieve faster and better results with maximum levels of peer support and contribution.

As these thoughts ran through my head, I looked for some more recent authority than Tuckman. I wandered into the realms of virtual teams and discovered the book “Virtual Teams” by Jessica Lipnack and Jeffrey Stamps (1997).  Here are some of the nuggets I found: 

Etiquette of behaviour – team charter
“To work smarter virtual teams need to build explicit models with common categories and the right relationships”. page 190

“Creating Time together” I believe that you clearly expedite team processes by investing in beginnings – you will recoup time many times over” page 145

So here is my parting thought for those who believe virtual workgroups need nothing more than a work-based agenda to discuss:

Why do people commonly exchange photos online, if they will never ever meet face-to-face?

Finally, I found this article to be well worth reading: http://ezinearticles.com/?does-team-building-actually-achieve-anything?&id=1862658

It may be easier to say what NOT to do. There is a risk that the old superstitions of trainers resurface online and so stop webinars, virtual meetings, remote action learning sets and so on from being effective.

We cannot afford to adopt the “Trust Me; I’m a Doctor” stance. Having learners sit back while we fill their heads with ideas, beliefs and concepts drawn from an expert is the Nurenberg Funnel approach, and it’s never been known to work! Nor does, ”Tell them what you’re going to tell them; tell them and then tell them what you’ve told them.” People do not learn online purely by listening passively. Nor can we just leave “electronic wallpaper” for people to find either. People do not move spontaneously from theory to practice. You cannot post your mission statement to a discussion board and expect people to internalise it and be guided in their actions.

Effective adult learners must:
-absorb information
-reflect on what it means for their life or work
-make it fit alongside their previous knowledge and experience
-plan how to use this information.

So we should be using online tools to facilitate. Let’s create an online environment that aligns with the practical activities of work – filled with stimulating sounds, images, challenges, games, simulations, toys, case studies, checklists, job aids or indeed anything that gets them trying things out in a practical way.

Trainers, drop your egos and your “expert” personae at the front desk as you enter the virtual building. Concentrate on helping learners to record, make sense of and share their experiences. Support them as they construct their thoughts, ideas and beliefs. Encourage line managers and colleagues to be present and help the learner to apply and generalise their learning to new contexts within a business setting so learning is ongoing and permanent.

So instead of behaving like a trainer, create and manage resources for learning, and then keep out of the way until you are needed.

And that is how things are. We have come to require and expect instant and accessible information at the time and place we need it. It is inconceivable to imagine me, or anyone for that matter, going on a Basics of Pressure Cooking course before we use our pans. It does not fit my personal style to study the manual cover to cover before I begin to make soup. I’m a just-in-time, not a just in case learner. In the event, I was fortunate to find the leaflet for my pressure cooker. A diagram on page two clearly showed that some kitchen gremlin had inserted the valve upside down, and once corrected, the cooker behaved impeccably and my soup and sanity were secured.

An online learning community might be brought together through web-technology to develop skills and form new concepts. The curriculum ought to be dynamic and flexible. It is not just tutors who design and manage it, but learners too. The tutor is mediator and monitor, while students set the questions and challenges, provide the feedback, swap ideas and seek answers together. A successful community is recognisable by high levels of activity, motivation and spontaneity. If learners are productive and supporting one another, then they are playing a part in sustaining the community. Success comes when students feel part of a group which is learning something useful and relevant to their success at work, or which will add to their personal and educational qualifications.

It’s now ten years since Valorie Beer wrote “The Web Learning Fieldbook – Using the WWW To Build Workplace Learning Environments”, New York: 2000 Jossey-Bass. In it she identified 7 success factors for successful communities of learners. They remain valid today, and we have drawn upon them as well as the work of others to develop onlignment’s own 20th century checklists for online tutors and moderators.

Here is a very concise summary of Beer’s view of what makes an online community tick.

1. Collaborative Projects:
Working together, learners can test their beliefs and ideas on one another. Online collaboration removes some of the technofear and isolation associated with working by yourself through technology.

2. Mentoring:
The instructor or expert has a key role to play in keeping learners on track, helping with problems, and giving feedback on progress.

3. Moderated discussions:
Through structured discussions in forums, students can discuss content and support and challenge one another. The instructor may give periodic feedback to keep things focused, but should not dominate. Forums must set and operate an agreed code of conduct for interaction.

4. Mutual Trust:
This applies to the reationships amongst students but with the instructor too. When face-to-face, learners judge the mood of others and their own status in the group by reading body language as well as verbal cues. Online facilitators must provide more explicit instructions and feedback. Written comments need great care and diplomacy otherwise they run a high risk of causing offence and so damaging self-esteem and trust.

5. Common objectives:
With a powerful shared goal in sight, learners will work together. For a community to prosper every memebr must have the same focus regardless of their job role, status or qualifications.

6. Contact with instructor:
Positive reinforcement is essential, whether in the form of recognition or of constructive criticism. The community plays a part but the instructor is responsible and accountable for information and guidance.

7. Access to individual support:
When the community cannot satisfy a need, then an individual should be able to gain timely help from the course tutor. It is part of the skill of the facilitator to balance the needs of the individual alongside the needs of the group.

These questions came to mind for three reasons. One was because we’ve just created a set of checklists for e-moderators. The second reason was because I’d come across the book – The Checklist Manifesto – How To Get Things Right http://www.amazon.com/Checklist-Manifesto-How-Things-Right/dp/0805091742. The third reason was that I stumbled upon an article I wrote in the early 1990s about performance aids.

My own article reminded me of the work of a very clever yet modest man, Peter Pipe. He it was who created a classification for performance aids, tagging them as one of 5 different sorts, which became known as Pipe’s Types. He mentions checklists as one of a group of performance aids he called “Prompts”. This group also includes recipes, labels, diagrams, rules, coding and mnemonics. Feel free to download the whole picture from http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3063607/Pipes%20Types.pdf.  If you want to see Onlignment’s e-moderators’ checklists then just ask.

Atul Gawande’s book talks about how we all manage complexity to some degree in the modern world. It’s easy to get things wrong. The headline example is from a hospital in the USA where a CCU specialist wrote down five things that doctors must do to avoid infection when they insert catheters into major veins.The advice includes basic things such as washing hands with soap and wearing sterile barrier clothing. These steps are so obvious that it seemed patronising to use a checklist, but you could reckon on one line in nine being infected and doctors were routinely skipping crucial steps. A five-point checklist was given to nurses and with the backing and authority of senior management they checked off each step as doctors did their work, and badgered them if they missed anything. Within one year, infection had reduced from 11 percent to zero. After 2 years it was estimated that the checklist had stopped 43 infections, prevented 8 deaths and saved 2 million dollars.

Other examples with similar success rates abound in Gawande’s book. He shows how, while Government spent days mobilising itself, before Hurricane Katrina had even reached land Walmart stores were over-stocked with essentials such as water, flashlights, batteries, and canned food. He relates how a rock band’s insistence on having a bowl of M&M’s with all the brown ones removed was a cunning test of whether attention had been paid to details that might make the difference between life and death!

We should heed the message that the volume and complexity of knowledge today goes beyond the capacity of any individual’s ability to manage it consistently without error. Even we whose job is to train and support must acknowledge two fundamental weaknesses:

1. With minds in constant overload, we easily overlook routine and banal matters
2. Experts have a tendency to skip steps even when they remember them if past experience has shown that they usually don’t matter.

If you need persuading think about Captain Sullenberger and the crew of US Airways flight 1549. By rigidly adhering to their checklist procedure, they covered the “never does but one day might” issues and so achieved the “Miracle on the Hudson” landing. Checklists and clear communication among teams are essential for eliminating errors and improving performance whether in the construction industry, aviation, surgery or, dare I say, the design of instruction and information processing. We aren’t perfect. Systematic approaches make us better.

Final thought in case you feel checklists are too basic for you to use – When hospital staff were shown the benefits of using a checklist, many said it would take too much time and would not improve safety. Guess what percentage said yes when they were asked, “Would you want the checklist to be used if you were having an operation?”

1. Make it real
2. Interact
3. Make space for learning
4. Practice, practice, practice
5. Keep it simple
6. Start strong and end strong
7. Be part of the conversation

• “We’re just waiting for some others to arrive. In the meantime, let’s use the text chat.”
• “I’m going to go quiet for a few moments while I set up this application.”
• “Take a few moments to answer the question. When you’re done, I’ll go through your responses.”