The Accidental Instructional Designer: Learning Design for the Digital Age

The Accidental Instructional Designer: Learning Design for the Digital AgeBy Cammy BeanBook Review By Alisha BarnesHuddle up around the campfire for the thrilling and horrifying tale of...the Lady! Imagine, cranky ladies locked in closets at organizations all over the country, wearing hair nets like tired lunch ladies from a junior high school cafeteria slopping food onto plates. Hunched over their laptop computers, they listlessly convert boring PowerPoint decks into even more boring e-learning programs. It ain't glamorous, they say, it's a living.This portrait of the CBT Lady painted by author Cammy Bean brings tears to your eyes, not only from humor, but from remembering the pain of experiencing dreaded Computer Based Training first hand. Gone are the days of passing off enormous PowerPoint presentations or documentation manuals as training. With the development of fun and easy to use authoring tools, training can be both fun and informative without compromising either. Combining the right tools with knowledge of adult learning theory, your training can grab your learner's attention and leave a lasting impression. Cammy Bean explains just how to do that in The Accidental Instructional Designer: Learning Design for the Digital Age. This book is a great roadmap for becoming a better instructional designer.The book begins on a light note with various tales of how individuals became instructional designers by accident. Some individuals were the experts or to people in their department, others were awesome at creating PowerPoint presentations, and you can't forget those that were able to take a complex subject and explain it so well.yup, they all accidentally became Instructional Designers! Regardless of how you came to the world of Instructional Design, this book is your guide to making the most of your new found talent.Bean introduces her concept of the eLearning Pie and defines it as containing the critical aspects of a well-rounded eLearning. This concept involves individuals from all aspects of education. From instructors to graphic artists to programmers even project managers, they all have a part to play in the successful development of online learning.The four slices of the pie: Learning, Creativity, Technology and Business, are equally important in the development process. Each pie gets a breakout chapter with explanations and real-world examples. As you read, you begin to think about where you fit in and how you contribute to the development process in your organization. Are you an Instructor or SME (Subject Matter Expert) who provides the content? Are you the tech savvy, go to gal or guy for all things technology? Maybe you are concerned with whether the training meets the learner's needs? …