Learning

I’m sharing my reflections here as I go: ideas I’m exploring, questions I’m still sitting with, and things that have helped me understand more about how to design learning experiences that help people to make connections.

Learning

What is ‘learning design’?

I see learning design as sitting in the midst of a range of allied skillsets and jobs: learning science, cognitive science, neuropsychology, user experience design, design thinking…

Learning consultancy

Ethics of learning design

“What makes teaching a moral endeavor is that it is, quite centrally, human action undertaken in regard to other human beings. Thus, matters of what is fair, right, just, and virtuous are always present.” Fenstermacher, G. D. (1990).

Learning

NZATD 2025: When to test e-learning

I like to run my user testing at the same time as the stakeholder review. Not just to cut down the number of iterations, but for another reason.

Learning Featured

NZATD 2025: How to test e-learning before launch

We need both these types of evaluation during our design and development process, if we want to deliver resources that actually teach the learners what we are trying to teach.

Learning

Establishing context

When people ask me to design a learning intervention, they often already have a solution in mind. It’s generally a fairly simple one: a workshop or an e-learning module. Sometimes they ask for blended learning, but if so, it is usually one particular format: an e-learning module followed by

Learning

NZATD professional membership

Every part of this process was worth it for me.

Learning Featured

Creative solutions and feedback

My most creative work is usually the result of unusually challenging sets of constraints. It’s digging in, and really understanding all the requirements, that make space to come up with something unique.

Accessibility Featured

Accessibility Toolkit

In late 2023, I was at a workshop with other learning designers, and we were discussing accessibility. Of our group of six professionals, only two of us felt confident we knew where to start. So I wrote an introductory guide.

Learning

NZATD 2025: Technology to support engagement in workshops

What I’m writing about here is the format we used for the session, which was a bit of an experiment around using AI to drive engagement in a live session.

Conference Sessions and Seminars

NZATD 2025: Miranda Verswijvelen

My key takeaways: Let learners feel something. Let them make decisions that matter. Let go of the idea that there’s always one right path. And look up Miranda’s Story Avocado and tools for writing dialogue and choices in more detail.

Conference Sessions and Seminars

NZATD 2025: Natalia Wi

One thing that really impressed me about Natalia’s session was how she provided not only a clear explanation but also a demonstration of how good practice looks in action.

Conference Sessions and Seminars

NZATD 2025: Geoff Ngataierua and Angela Page

A reminder that if we want to include te ao Māori concepts in our work meaningfully, without just using them as window dressing, we need to take the time to think hard about what we are trying to achieve, and what the concepts mean in Māori, rather than what the translations mean in English.

Conference Sessions and Seminars

NZATD 2025: Jane Bozarth’s keynote

We are not training nurses so that nurses will have more success in the abstract; we are trying to help patients. We are not training long-distance drivers so that they alone will be safer; we are helping to protect everyone on the road.

Learning

NZATD 2025: Dan Te Whenua Walker and John Faisandier

Dan’s story highlighted for me the degree to which the learners we are trying to connect with are human beings with much richer stories and their own personal motivations. John Faisandier’s session was about how to help and empathise with people when we don’t know what is going on for them.

Learning

Using empathy mapping to improve learner engagement

Once I have created an empathy map, I take the learning objectives that have been agreed for the project, and I use the pains and gains as a lens to improve the activities I'm planning.

Learning

Subject matter experts, survivorship bias and learning design

If the only people to make it to SME level are the ones who throw themselves in and have excellent knowledge retention, and they are rare, then even if the SMEs have an excellent understanding of the types of learner they were in the past, they will naturally fail to connect.

Learning

Interactive checklists for activation and reflection

The aim is to present the learning objectives in a way that sets them up to be ready to learn what the module is teaching. Because they have already thought about how they measure up, they are then looking to fill their own competency gaps.

Learning

L&D titles in te reo Māori

I've been looking into job titles the last month, trying to find the Māori names for roles in the L&D industry. I've found some really great lists, although there are some contradictions (graphic designer, project manager, learning designer).

Learning

What Ebbinghaus means for designing learning interactions

However, when we’ve just forgotten something, it turns out that it’s easier to relearn, and each time we relearn something, we forget it at a slower rate than the time before.  So when we’re designing learning activities, we should be thinking about forgetting.

Learning

What makes a great learning game?

Survival of the Best Fit is a game that teaches about algorithmic bias. It is a fabulous way to understand how algorithms can reinforce and accentuate structural inequalities. I was struck by the ease with which very poor datasets can enter AI training.

Learning

Theory into Practice

A one-hour webinar showing how my SLAM model brings together insights from leading researchers to create an easy-to-apply tool that helps the user to design effective learning interventions.

Learning

Why do demonstrable learning objectives matter?

The importance of the learner being able to demonstrate their learning seems obvious. We’re not psychic: we can only base our assessments of others’ abilities on what they do or say, not what’s going on inside their minds.

Learning

Navigation is not interaction

People love learning. We love activities. But we want activities with a point. No one wants to be a pet mouse running in a wheel, or a pigeon, pecking again and again for each new piece of corn.