At the conclusion of this blog post you will be able to:

So at what point did the practice of having lengthy Objectives describing exactly what the learner will be able to do at the conclusion of the course become the gold standard de-facto approach to elearning design?

Trust me I took the bait and ran with it for years, in fact I even went so far as to have a 'Blooms Taxonomy' list of about 100+ verbs hanging up in my my cube. You know the one's I'm talking about ("Identify, Explain, Utilize, List, etc...). but then I started asking myself; Self! Is there a better way of doing this? Are these Objectives really necessary? I mean will the whole e-Learning universe explode if I don't have an "Objectives" page?

I think I just kept doing it because at some point someone said that it was the thing to do and I just went along with it. Well I'm getting older now and in my old age I tend to go against the grain more. I don't want to be like everybody else. I don't want to follow a million rules. I want to be creative! I want to surprise people. Most great inventors are those who think outside the box and do the unconventional thing when everyone else is being conventional.

Now me spouting off about being different and how you don't necessarily need crafted lengthy objectives is one thing, but me justifying it's validity is another, so here's my attempt.

When e-Learning was in its infancy more explanation was needed to educate the learner. I mean self-paced learning was new to the user, thus familiarity was comon-place and this familiarity included clear objectives at the beginning of the course, much like is done in a classroom learning environment.

Well, over time e-Learning has become familiar to the user and research has justified straying from how you do things in a classroom, not to mention that technology and improved bandwidth have catapulted elearning into the stratosphere. e-Learning must now buck the trend, it must capture the learners imagination and interest and one way to do this is to breach tradition and expectations.

Let me pause for a moment and say that I'm not 100% opposed to objectives, and that they do belong at the beginning of the course, but I think an overall more all-encompassing objective at the begining may be a better option than a detailed itemized list. For example:

Rather than this:
Upon completion of this training you will be able to:

• Identify How to cook noodles
• Describe the different ingredients that compose a good spaghetti sauce
• Explain the different pots and pans needed to cook spaghetti
• Identify the order to add ingredients
• Mix the ingredients together and plate the spaghetti

You might do something like this:

• This course will provide you with the tools necessary to create an awesome pot of spaghetti.

What I'm saying here is that you don't need to list all of these items. In fact listing all of these things could distract or turn off the learner from the get-go! If there's an item they already know or are not interested in then they now know up-front that they are going to be exposed to it. Not a good start to the course!

Don't do things in a course just because everbody else is, or because your SME or boss is expecting it. In fact I'm going through this right now. I created a course that had a more generic overall objective rather than listing detailed objectives. As a matter of fact I didn't even use the word 'objective' anywhere in the course. As sure as ants at a picnic my boss has put me in check on this. Her feedback included this predictable nugget: "There's no clear learning objectives at the beginning of the course". I think my boss is just expecting them and when they are not there they freak out. I will now spend about an hour justifying my design and trying to convince her that these objectives are not necessary. I may lose the battle, but I'm going to fight this battle over and over. My next course won't have them either and I'm sure I'll have to fight the fight again.

I encourage you to fight this fight, argue your decision and don't let SME's and bosses detract from your creativity. Heck, point them to this post and tell them: "See, if it's in a blog it must be OK". Take a risk people, think outside the box and be a risk taker.

I'm out like the objectives in my next course!