It’s a fact that eLearning has become an increasingly popular mode of learning – especially in the aftermath of the pandemic. And, with more organizations embracing remote work and work-from-home policies, fewer than 3% of knowledge workers ever want to return to in-person work. The inherent distractions and interruptions that remote work brings are a productivity concern for many employers – but it also presents a huge challenge for eLearning course designers. So, how do you combat learner disinterest and disengagement through your L&D design?

Learner Disengagement is a Fact

There aren’t many studies that focus specifically on how large the issue of learner disengagement is in the corporate world, per se. However, studies from the academic world[i] point to it as a real barrier to learning. 35% of online learners polled indicated they’re disengaged, compared to 19% in face-to-face learning environments. By extrapolation, remote learner disengagement:

  • Contributes to lost eLearning opportunities
  • Is a waste of L&D investment
  • Results in dissatisfied employees
  • Causes low morale among the workforce
  • Is responsible for lower productivity and efficiency

Learners confronted with learning content that lacks inspiration or motivation will immediately disengage. Boring, dry, drab content, such as text-only material, or endless amounts of PowerPoint slides – however, well-supported by colored bullet points and imagery – lead to boredom and disengagement. And that’s the bad news. But there’s good news too: Addressing the learner disengagement issue is possible. And all it takes is to focus on some ‘back to the basics’ eLearning design and development practices. The rest of this post will focus on some of those best practices.

Engagement Through Better UI/UX and Content Design

The key to re-engagement is in producing high-quality, useful content. And the secret to using that content is to adhere to good user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) design principles.

  • FOCUS ON CONTENT: When it comes to garnering engagement, content is king. Regardless of all the bells and whistles you may include in your course design, uninspiring content breeds disinterest. Here are some content-specific best practices to consider:
    • Personalizing your content to fit your learners’ needs
    • Keeping course modules short, crisp, and concise
    • Going easy on text-only, static, passive content. Instead, use a mix of media in your courses
    • Making content interactive, so learners must actively engage with it
    • Including images, videos, and animations, as part of your content, to deliver interactive and engaging learning experiences
    • Adding content that demonstrates real-life scenarios that can encourage learners to relate to, and better understand concepts. And adding interactive games to deliver learning experiences that learners find more fun and engaging.
  • FOCUS ON INTERFACE (UI) and EXPERIENCE (UX) DESIGN: The interface that learners encounter is a critical lynchpin to engagement. Great content that’s hard to access or navigate, leads to learner frustration, discontent, and poor learner experiences. Here are some UI/UX design-specific best practices to consider:

    • When designing course layout, don’t shy away from “white space”. Instead of cluttering content in proximity to each other, space it out so learners don’t find it strenuous and stressful to follow
    • Another stress point for many eLearners, is tiny font sizes. Small fonts, or exceptionally jampacked pages, can quickly turn learner appetite off.
    • Make eLearning courses easier to navigate. Stick with a simple user interface design; one that allows learners to move between modules easily, and that facilitates movement within a lesson – up, down, back, forward, skipping – more intuitive.
    • When learners find it difficult to locate specific content (e.g., to learn in the moment of need), they’ll disengage and look elsewhere for a solution. Give eLearners a more productive learning experience by designing conveniently located and effective find/search features.
    • While a good menu structure is a key design element, designers may also make logical use of breadcrumbs to help learners understand their location within the course; and help them navigate back to previously encountered content.
    • Technological design elements also contribute to engagement (or lack of it). UI/UX design elements, such as finger taps/swipes and the use of hand gestures to scroll through content might appeal to some users. On the other hand, other users may better engage with mouse-clicking and menu navigation.
    • Colors play a huge role in enticing engagement. Vary your color palette so learners know the information they’re looking at: e.g., Red = Must read; Blue = Informational content; Black = Core content. Whether you design color coding in the form of fonts (text) or backgrounds, the key to keeping learners engaged and focused is standardization.
    • A supplemental design element is the use of icons and symbols. For example, an Exclamation mark beside content may signal to the learner important content they must not ignore. An image of an ellipsis (three dots …) at the end of the content may signify more content is available. An icon depicting a globe might indicate more research available on the internet. This design approach is far more appealing (and less distractive) than spelling out guidelines each time: e.g., “Click here for more information”; or “Explore additional research at these websites”.
  • FOCUS ON COURSE ORGANIZATION: How you organize and present a course can also have a deep impact on learner engagement levels. Course organization must support your learning objectives (LOs). Adding unrelated (to specific LOs) content into the mix is a potential source of distraction. Also, how you organize content flow can determine whether learners engage or disengage. For instance, diving into the complex, critical subject matter before you cover the basics could leave learners confused and disinterested in proceeding with a course.

Course demographics also play a part in determining design features with potential engagement impact. For instance, organizing your content to target beginners, intermediate learners, or experienced users is good. This will ensure that learners with specific levels of pre-knowledge and expertise, more fully benefit from the course (i.e., novice learners won’t inadvertently dive into content meant for intermediate or advanced learners).

Bottom Line: Better content and design breeds better engagement

If you wish to combat chronic learner disengagement, then meaningful content and inspiring UI/UX design are your allies. Move away from text-only content into interactive, game-based, simulated, multimedia-based content. The more learners interact with your content, the greater their engagement levels will be.

And good user interface design is critical to ensure learners access and use that content. Ease of navigation and well-laid-out content that reduces eyestrain entice learners to interact with it. A clean, easy-to-understand course structure, with intuitive navigational features, also raises the user engagement quotient.

Ready for the next step?

KDG is ready to help you up level up your eLearning offering. Contact us today for a discovery meeting.