First Time Visitor’s Guide
What This Blog is About
In one phrase: Building Engaging Learning Experiences through Instructional Design and E-Learning
I’m an instructional designer developing online learning, so that’s primarily what I write about.
- Instructional Design: This is what I do all day, and I’m always trying to learn how to do it better.
- Higher Ed: The courses I create are graduate courses, so I’m interested in higher education.
- K-12 Education: The participants in those courses are mostly K-12 educators, so I’m interested in what’s important to my audience too.
- Corporate E-Learning: Even though I’m in education, I know I can learn a lot from corporate e-learning. Besides, I’m employed by a for-profit company.
- Lifelong Learning: It didn’t start out to be a goal for my blog, but I’ve discovered that these tools help my own lifelong learning. I write about my discoveries: what works, what doesn’t, what I’m thinking.
- Technology: I write about technology, especially as it overlaps with any of the above areas.
- Bookmarks: The Daily Bookmarks Posts are resources I find interesting or useful. You can view and search the complete list of bookmarks on Diigo or del.icio.us.
On my Post Series and Recurring Themes page, I’ve collected some popular topics. This includes my liveblogged posts from the TCC 2008 conference and my series on instructional design careers. The top posts in the sidebar to the right are another great place to start reading.
If you want to learn more about me, check out my bio.
Talk to Me
One of the great things about blogging is how many wonderful people I have “met” and learned from through online connections. I don’t want this to be one-way communication; I love the conversations. Please comment on any post if you would like to add to the conversation, disagree with what I wrote, or just ask a question. I read every comment, honest! In fact, you can start right now by commenting below this post.
Comment Policy
Fortunately, I have very few problems with comments here. I do delete spam comments and reserve the right to delete sales pitches. I don’t like hard sells, so please don’t use my blog for that. Vendors and businesses are welcome to comment if they contribute to the conversation.
You are welcome to respectfully disagree with anything I say; I won’t delete or edit your comments. Some of the best discussions I’ve had here have resulted from differing opinions and perspectives. I don’t have all the answers.
I do sometimes edit comments to fix broken links. Any other edits to comments will be clearly noted as my changes. (For example, I removed someone’s email address and phone number from a comment because he requested it; he didn’t realize it would be publicly visible.)
How To Comment
If you’re the first one to comment on a post, you’ll see “No Comments” at the bottom of a post. If the conversation has already started, you’ll see how many comments there are. Click either “No Comments” or “[#] Comments” to open the comment form. If you are on the page for a specific post, rather than the main page for my blog, you’ll already see the “Leave a Comment” form.
Enter your name, email address, and URL in the spaces provided. URL is optional, but if you have a blog, I’d love to have the address so I can learn more about you. That will be publicly visible. Your email address will be hidden to everyone but me. I promise not to share that email address with anyone. I may use it to let you know I’ve replied to your comment though.
If you’re new to commenting, why don’t you try it out at the bottom of this page and get some practice?
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Welcome to my blog! If this is your first time here, check out the 
Hello! I came across your blog and am sooo glad I did! I am a grad student in Instructional Technology and will graduate in June ‘09. I went straight into the degree after finishing my bachelors in General Studies with a concentration in Liberal Arts/Humanities (mostly visual art courses), and simply chose this degree because I felt ill equipped for the job force and thought a masters would be helpful. So, now here I am about to graduate and I am very confused as to what I am actually qualified for. The classes I’ve taken have all been like what seems to be very common sense stuff with a little technology and software thrown in there. I have little experience with actually creating instruction other than powerpoint!! I’ve already started looking up positions online, but all of the job descriptions and requirements seem way out of reach. Do you have any advice or any idea where I should go from here? Is it possible that I am just not aware of what I have gained since I haven’t been put into a “real life” situation? Also, do companies typically train people coming into a position? Thanks so much for your help!
-Summer
Hi Summer,
Last October there were several discussions about how to get some more practical experience with relevant tools as a new graduate.
First eLearning
Starting Authoring Tool
Help, I have an Instructional Design Master’s Degree and I Can’t Create E-Learning
If you don’t have a portfolio yet, start creating one now. In this economy, a portfolio is a way to demonstrate what you can do when you don’t have any experience. I’m not going to pretend that this is a great time to be starting out in any field, but you can at least give yourself a head start by creating a portfolio. If none of your courses have given you the opportunity to create realistic projects, you might try to find a nonprofit group where you could volunteer to develop some training. Volunteer work would give you something more to put on your resume too.
You might also want to check out the Ask Liz Ryan online community. This is a general networking work/life group that is a good place to get advice. It’s not specific to any field, but you can ask questions about basically any part of the general hiring and job search process and get answers from managers, recruiters, and HR folks.
Hi Christy I would love to link my blog to your blog and learn more about e-learning. My company, which I am still trying to grow, offers non-credit courses online. Thanks for putting together such an informative blog!
Barbara
Hi Barbara,
I remember you from our conversation a year ago. I have to say, I don’t see that your website has improved in the last year, at least as far as making it clear that you accept and offer self-paced courses rather than only instructor-led. You seem very focused on the instructor side of things.
I’m afraid I don’t do link exchanges, but I’m glad you’re enjoying my blog.