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In this episode of The eLearning Coach Podcast, I speak with Kevin Thorn about a hot topic in our field—how to write eLearning storyboards. Kevin teaches storyboarding classes and is an award-winning eLearning designer with over 30 years of experience in the training industry, with the last decade in eLearning. His experience in instructional design, storyboarding, eLearning development, LMS implementation, illustration, graphic design, storytelling, cartooning, and comics makes him unique in the industry. Kevin is the “chief nuggethead” and owner of NuggetHead Studioz.
WE DISCUSS:
- What is a storyboard.
- How to create an eLearning storyboard.
- Kevin’s storyboarding process (the storyboard workbook)
- Benefits of using storyboards
- The design hats of the learning experience designer
- Who writes the storyboard
- Problems with designing and developing at the same time
- The moving parts in an assessment
- Depicting global access and isolated access
- Approaches to visual storyboarding
- Value of thumbnail sketches
TIME: 26 minutes
RATE: Rate this podcast in iTunes
TRANSCRIPT: Download the ELC 035 Transcript .
RESOURCES:
- Storyboard Like a Pro: On-demand course in at Mastering Instructional Design
- Nuggethead Studioz (Kevin’s website)
- Storyboard Depot (Storyboard templates including one from Kevin)
- Storyboard and Project Documents by Kevin (on eLearning Heroes)
- Storyboards for eLearning (article)
- The Art of Writing Great Voiceover Scripts (article)
Thanks for the podcast. Great information for ID newbies like me.
Hi Brandy,
First, I would like to invite you to sign up for my free 12 lesson email course about a career in instructional design. You can sign up here: http://breakingintoid.com.
In answer to your question, responsibilities vary. There are companies with large teams where the job functions are constrained and for eLearning, one person does the design up to storyboarding and then hands the storyboard over to developers. Of course, a lot of communication and some iteration is necessary, but that is one approach to the work. Another tends to happen in smaller teams or one-person departments, where the person is responsible for everything, from an analysis to creating prototypes, storyboards, and producing the end product.
Keep in mind that instructional design does not equate to eLearning. An IDer might design and/or develop training for classroom programs, mobile learning, video, podcasts, infographics, job aids, or might conclude that training will not fix the problem that the client (either internal or external) is having. That’s one of the wonderful things about this work–it’s really varied. I hope this helps!
Best,
Connie
Hi,
I am loving your podcast. I am new to studying instructional design and your podcast has been very helpful in allowing me to understand more about what IDs do.
A question I would love for you to discuss is the role of an instructional designer. In this podcast, you guys discuss storyboarding and getting documents and other media ready for developers.
My question is: In the world of instructional design, do you usually specialize more on design and then hand things over to a developer?
In my studies right now, we have an introduction to digital media tools such as Photoshop, Premiere Pro, Adobe Animate, Camtasia, Jing, etc.
But, we are also studying instructional design concepts and human performance improvement. I am confused about how these all come together in reality.
Do you typically need to be able to perform all of these? Or focus more on one aspect? All three of these topics seem like a field of their own and I worry that it would be hard to be proficient at all.
Are they typically separate?
Any insight into this would be terrific.
Thank you,
Brandy
Hi Linda,
It’s great to hear how you storyboard and I’m sure others will learn from your tips. Thanks for sharing.
Best,
Connie
I like how you’ve pointed out several times that there isn’t a cookie cutter approach to storyboarding that works for all. I think it all depends on what your audience needs are and what makes sense for the designer.
In my organization, it makes much more sense to create a PowerPoint storyboard that closely resembles the actual course (with images and activity builds etc.)
As an eLearning Instructional Designer and developer, I have a background in graphic design and illustration and expertise in using Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop (as well as other CC 2015 programs). For me, I’d much rather have a reviewer (SME, stakeholder etc.) tell me at the storyboarding phase that a graphic doesn’t work.
Since I use an eLearning template, I format my graphics (and activity buttons and images) to work with the template at the storyboarding phase. I find that to be a tremendous timesaver when it comes time to actually develop the course. So I probably do about 85% if not 90% of the work, at the front end of a project.
I cannot imagine developing eLearning without the Storyboarding process (and the scoping, needs assessment, and partnering with stakeholders phases that precede the Storyboarding process).
Thanks, Rick. It seems like this discussion has relieved the pressure for many IDs trying to neatly fit things into a certain pattern. Our jobs are so diverse, it’s impossible to do things the same way every time.
Best,
Connie
Awesome that you figured it out on your own! Glad this was helpful, Donna.
Connie
THANK YOU for presenting this topic. I learned the value of storyboarding the hard way. I wasn’t adequately managing my time until I implemented a storyboarding process. In fact, I was storyboarding before I knew it was called “storyboarding”. I just knew I had to implement a timesaving process. Also, it was refreshing to hear that it’s ok for the process to vary depending on the project – mine certainly does. Topic well done!
Connie,
This is a great discussion. So often clients have a picture in their head of what a storyboard is or should be. This points out that they are functional documents whose design is documented by their use. I really appreciate the ideas on how to create storyboards that best serve the needs of IDs.
Keep up the good work.
Hi Barbara,
Thanks so much for your comment. I wasn’t quite sure if those points were clear and you got it completely right!
Best,
Connie
Thank you so much for this helpful discussion. Hearing two professionals discuss storyboards and how they choose to fulfill this important part of instructional design was enlightening. It points out how important it is to storyboard in detail, however you chose to do it. It also points out there really is no correct answer for the how-to aspect of stoyboarding.