Key strategies and benefits of learner-centered design

22 Mar

When setting out to design effective learning programs, aim to create engaging learning experiences that motivate learners and provide opportunities for them to connect with and digest the material in a variety of different ways.

Now, you might be asking yourself why is the learner-centered approach fundamental to successful learning design? Well, that’s simple. In an educational experience, it is the learner who assimilates information and who we hope will be transformed by knowledge and practice. It is not the content or the teacher or the workplace or any other context that must do the transforming. For this reason it makes the most sense to orient learning around the learner. To some of you, learner-centered design may sound obvious. But the truth is that learning has not historically and, in many cases continues to not, keep the learner at the center of programming, curriculum, and design decisions.

A learner-centered approach is meant to help you design for successful learning experiences and environments by tailoring it to your audience. So where does it start? With developing a strong understanding of the learner.

The road that leads to learner success is ultimately one that meets their learning needs. At Pure & Applied, our goal is to help you develop the assets necessary to create online learning experiences targeted to your learners and help them achieve their goals. With that, we’re here to share 4 key advantages for adopting a learner-centered approach in developing your next online program.

What is a learner-centered approach?

The Model for learner-centered interaction

According to Jonassen et al. (1995), the model for learner-centered interaction discusses the importance of considering four key elements:

context of material: to be relatable to the learner,
construction of material: to build off of the learner’s previous knowledge,
collaboration with the material: such as scenarios that can help the learner test and analyze their understanding when working through the material to arrive to conclusions and
conversation on the material: helping learners better understand new and previous knowledge to effectively reach a higher level of learner success.

Learner-centered approach in context

To place this approach in context, if a course is designed in a learner-centered way, it means that a significant amount of time was invested into research to understand the needs, prior knowledge, motivations, interest, contexts, strengths, skills, and jobs-to-be-done of our learners in the initial planning phases to then influence the course design and development. The collected knowledge we develop about our learners is often referred to as a learner profile.

In contrast, an alternative to a learner-centered course is a content-centered course or instructor-centered course, which was once a more common or preferred approach. Content-centered design focuses on the best way to share the content according to the subject matter expert or according to a set of standards, without focusing too much on who the learners are and how they might benefit to receive it. It often follows a one-way communications model that involves an instructor or expert creating a list of topics and learning objectives to work with. On the other hand, the most important component of a learner-centered approach is to first understand what students can and want to learn in relation to the course or program.

Implementing a learner-centered approach to learning design

Now, how can we incorporate this into the learning development process? A few examples of implementing this approach in course design is through the use of research-based engagements with learners, such as conducting interviews, surveys, focus groups, design thinking activities and referencing existing data about their preferences, to name a few examples. You can also conduct a learning analysis that profiles who your learners are, what their previous knowledge is, what their learning objectives are and what your business objectives are for the project. This analysis allows you to get to know your learner and find creative ways of achieving the learning objectives.

Insights derived from a learning analysis that profiles the learners will help you determine how content and information is usually best received by your intended learners, such as gaining statistics on what kinds of multimedia content and topics already appeal to them. The learner-centered approach asks the designer to make decisions on the basis of the learner, for example:

Including knowledge checks throughout as formative evaluation – to test the learner informally throughout the course, gauge where they are in their learning and adjust the material or teaching approach as you go to align with their needs and interests
Using learner profiles to assess the learner’s previous levels of experience enabling the designer to sense what an appropriate level of desirable challenge might be
Using relatable characters to the learner in problem-based scenarios – these help the learner understand through real life case examples and storytelling, working through a problem while flexing their critical skills and apply concepts in a way they might behave in real life. This strategy helps learners to better grasp and engage with the material while finding a solution to the problem.

Here are a few more signs of a learner-centered approach. The learning experience:

incorporates examples and stories in course content and material that are meaningful to the learners (cultural references, local references, beliefs, perspectives, media, etc.)
adopts a tone that is familiar and accessible
includes multimedia and graphic design that appeals to their aesthetics
provides use cases and application opportunities that are relevant
offers prompts and reflection questions that really make learners think through the content.

Benefits of learner-centered design

Educational content is more engaging when tailored to an intended audience. By taking the time to understand the learner in the design and content development process, we can engage them more directly to benefit their learning needs and preferences. This engagement promotes the learner’s investment in the learning itself.

Ultimately, learner-centered design helps learners feel seen and connected to their learning. The value of this sense of inclusion cannot be underestimated in producing better learning outcomes. A lack of diverse representation at the level of stakeholder engagement in curriculum design and educational content development can leave learners feeling excluded from learning experiences. To counter this, we can also include culturally relevant aspects to our learner-centered designs (Rhodes, 2018).

Incorporating elements discussed above can help create a learning environment that allows learners to take ownership of their knowledge and apply it.

References:

Chou, C. C. (2004). A model of learner-centered computer-mediated interaction for collaborative distance learning. International Journal on E-learning, 3(1), 11-18.

Rhodes, C. M. (2018). Culturally responsive teaching with adult learners: A review of the literature. International Journal of Adult Vocational Education and Technology (IJAVET), 9(4), 33-41.