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Why Use Articulate Storyline to Update & Upgrade Your Existing Courses

If an organization has a repository of courses that have been developed using an old authoring tool such as Adobe Flash, then it must surely realize by now that the time has come to upgrade them with new tools according to modern eLearning standards. Many articles have already been written on how Adobe Flash has been rendered “dead” by the eLearning community at large, for its lack of support for mobile devices. While opting to upgrade and renew these legacy courses, one also needs to look into the other aspects of the course that can be improved.

In this blog, we will see how Articulate Storyline makes it easy to upgrade and revamp online courses, apart from converting legacy courses to responsive.

1. Use it As a Tool to Improve the Instructional Strategy

“A good online learning course not only shares information, but also captivates learners.”

Old courses hardly gratify the modern audience. Part of the reason for this failure can be attributed to the outdated instructional strategies used in legacy courses, that fail to make any sort of impact on the modern audience. But thanks to Articulate Storyline, the legion of instructional strategies it supports makes it possible to offer an immersive learning experience keeping the learner captivated and the engagement levels higher.

Online learning when designed with sound instructional strategies has the potential to bring organizational excellence and improved learning behavior. Here are some strategies Articulate Storyline supports (thanks to its easy to use functionality and inbuilt assets) that assist in improving the quality and instructional approach of existing courses.

– Scenario-based Learning
– Gamification
– Guided Exploration
– Simulation-based Learning

2. Modify Existing Courses with Ready-to-Use Templates

When it comes to updating existing courses visually or in terms of outdated content, many organizations feel locked into either spending too much time updating or creating new eLearning altogether. The former, i.e., modifying an entire course slide by slide, takes time. Doing it from the scratch is a time-consuming process as it involves designing new slides and interactivities. To make lives easier, Storyline’s built-in library comes with a number of templates which allow designers to simply import them and quickly modify and revamp the existing course.

The templates featured in Storyline are ready-to-use which means that designers do not have to develop everything from scratch. Organizations can save huge amounts of development time and money using these templates. They have full-fledged functional interactivities – such as click-on-tabs, drag and drop, FAQs – that can be customized easily.

Organizations want their training material to reflect their branding. There are cases when an organization’s branding changed drastically from the time a course was developed. Therefore, companies who wish to make their existing courses conform to the latest organizational branding, can make use of the inbuilt GUIs (Graphical User Interfaces) in Storyline, to customize them as per the branding requirements.

3. Develop and Integrate Interactive Videos for Better Engagement

Old eLearning courses without videos no longer cut the mustard. It is a known fact that videos support user interaction and make eLearning modules interesting and engaging. Modern learners expect more. They expect better engaging content and highly visual interactive approach. Using videos in your existing courses can bring magic to your content and leave a lasting impression on the learners.

Interactive videos developed using Storyline open up a wealth of potential for existing courses. Designers can not only embed videos but also combine them with scenarios and quizzes to illustrate the context in a better way.

4. Create Flash-like Animations and Interactivities

Interactivities are the heart of a good e-learning course. They are good tools to facilitate knowledge and get to learners to participate in the learning. There is no denying that tools such as Adobe Flash were able to create stunning animations. In fact, were it not for the lack of support for mobile, designers today would still be designing courses using Flash.

However, Storyline has stepped into Adobe Flash’s shoes and established itself as an ideal alternative for the creation of multimedia content such as animations and interactivities. Storyline, unlike Flash, comes with built-in templates that allow courseware designers to create high quality Flash-like animations and interactivities rapidly, with minimum effort. Moreover, the output of Articulate Storyline is mobile-friendly which is a good advantage for multi-device modern learners.

5. Develop Multi-Device E-learning Courses for Modern Learners

From smartphones to desktops, modern standards denote that the course should seamlessly be optimized. The biggest problem with existing legacy courses is that they do not function properly on mobile devices. A particular hazard is the blank spaces that these existing courses would leave when viewed on a mobile device.

Multi-device learning becomes all the more important for today’s learners as they prefer learning on the go and in the form of short microlearning modules. Especially workers who are out in the field may want to access information at a glance on their immediate device (i.e., a smartphone/tablet). Storyline comes to the rescue by offering a “dynamic” solution where learners can view the course on any device they have in their hands. It also frees designers from creating courses in different views. With Storyline, they only have to create one responsive course which can be a viewed on multiple devices such as smartphones, tablets, laptops etc.

Would Storyline be better to convert, refurbish your legacy courses? Absolutely. Smartphones and tablets rule the game today. Facilitating learning on the go, improving knowledge retention, and offering engaging content have become the top priorities of any training manager. The robust features Storyline offers makes upgrading existing courses an easy job, allowing designers to create high-impact online learning. Companies which have invested in this domain (rekindling their existing courses) are reaping the benefits multi-fold, not only giving a new lease of life for their old courses but also making them instructionally sound, engaging, and accessible.

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