You can always get better as an instructional and/or eLearning designer, no matter how much experience you have. Until the room is full, an eLearning course is still just raw material. And how would you know where to start the modifications? In that case, only the right people can show you the right direction. They are none other than your learners themselves, those who have already taken the course.

What Is Course Effectiveness?

Course effectiveness is the measure of how well a course has been designed, implemented, and evaluated. It is important to evaluate courses in order to improve them. There are three main types of course effectiveness: instructional effectiveness, student learning outcomes, and learner satisfaction. Instructors can use these measurements to improve their courses. Course evaluation is a process that should be done periodically for all courses in order to keep the quality of education high and provide feedback on how to improve the course.

Instructional Effectiveness:

Instructional effectiveness is a measure of how well instructional strategies are working to achieve the desired learning outcomes. There are many different instructional strategies that can be used in order to help students learn. One of the most popular instructional strategies is using multiple-choice questions, which has been shown to improve students' understanding of the material by reducing their anxiety and increasing their comprehension. Several Leadership and Management Courses can also be designed by including multiple-choice questions at the end of each lesson. This also enables learners to gauge their understanding of that particular lesson on their own.

Student Learning Outcomes:

The student learning outcomes are the desired results of a learning experience. They are the goals that learners should achieve from the course. It is important to know what students want to get out of a course before designing it. It is also important to know whether learners are satisfied with what they have learned at the end of a course, as this will help you understand if your course has met its objectives and goals.

Learner Satisfaction:

For a course to be effective it’s crucial to measure learner satisfaction. One way is by looking at the level of engagement they have with their training. The more engaged a learner is, the more likely they are to be satisfied with their training. For instance, the first sign of whether your Leadership Training is successful or not is the fact that how engaged your learners are and whether they are implementing it in their work process.

However, considering that your job is done once you launch the course is a wrong impression to have. Continuous post-evaluation of a course is equally important to make your course effective and efficient. Therefore, let’s have a look at some parameters that should be taken into account while setting up a post-course evaluation.

Some Parameters Of Post-course Evaluation To Make A Course Effective

1. Learning Expectations

Anyone who accesses an eLearning course has expectations about the course's learning goals and the subjects it will cover. Gaining awareness of these expectations may help you alter or enhance the way you promote your course and add more information that you may have, whether intentionally or not, left out. For instance, the right questions to ask are, “How closely did the course match your expectations? Or How pleased are you with the information presented?”

2. Content

eLearning materials must be interesting and entertaining. But most significantly, it must accurately represent the learning goals established by the SME (Subject Matter Expert). We usually assume that an effective instructional and eLearning course design will unavoidably end in this outcome, but we can never be certain of this unless our learners confirm it. The right questions to ask for the purpose of assessment are as follows:

• Did you think the course's material was adequate?
• Was the course's content understandable and clear?
• Based on your level of engagement during the course, rate the material.

3. Duration Of The Course

The length of an effective eLearning course is not necessary. A person can get sufficient knowledge of a subject in 20 to 30 minutes in a fast-paced atmosphere. With that being said, if your longer-than-average Leadership and Management Courses are interesting, it is still feasible to get a decent grade for them. The questions to ask for assessment are:

• How long do you think it took you to finish the course?
• Would you want a shorter, the same length, or a longer course?

Interactivity

The eLearning material should never be presented in a straightforward or flat manner. Although they are aware of this, instructional designers don't always stick to their guns, especially when they have to produce a lot of courses quickly.

Similarly, there is also the risk of incorporating too much interaction, which would render the course monotonous and repetitious, which is why a balancing act is crucial. The right questions to ask for assessment are:

• Do you believe you played a significant part in this eLearning session?
• Did you maintain your focus the entire time?

Overall Impression

When you return the assessments, you're likely to look at this area first. This variable will gauge the learner's overall impression. They can still give your Leadership Training course a good rating even if they felt it was longer than necessary or less entertaining than they had anticipated. Hence, it’s important to analyze quantitatively and qualitatively and then start putting up an update. The questions to ask for assessment are:

• What is the total quality of your e-learning experience?
• Give three reasons why this course was beneficial in your opinion.
• Provide three suggestions for improvements to this course.

Final Words

The best part of post-course assessments is getting comments you might not have anticipated. You should always use a post-course assessment since hearing from your target audience is instructive and encouraging. Organize an assessment group when the eLearning course is still in the beta stage of creation, before releasing it to the public, for even better outcomes.