In the digital education world, staying on top of the latest design techniques is crucial for eLearning professionals, course creators and educators alike. Our ability to make sense of visuals in the blink of an eye vastly helps our capacity for learning complex concepts. In this blog, we explore graphic design for eLearning to help you transform your eLearning courses into visually striking, effective and user-friendly learning experiences.
Why Graphic Design Matters in eLearning
People are hardwired to process visual information at incredible speeds. In fact, MIT neuroscientists discovered that the human brain can identify images seen for as little as 13 milliseconds.
Visual explanations have shown to make the understanding of mechanical and chemical systems much easier. Another study points to how visual aids help motivate students, clarify content, and avoid monotony in learning, among other positive outcomes.
There is no denying how important visuals can be for learning – this extends to improving eLearning effectiveness.
To leave things as “visuals matter in eLearning” would be a gross oversimplification. It’s not enough that your eLearning courses have pictures. There has to be structure behind it.
This is why it’s more appropriate to say “graphic design matters in eLearning,” as applying its principles results in the following:
• Stimulates learners
Coherent graphic design stimulates the imagination of learners. Through the help of visuals, the capacity to absorb, comprehend and analyse new information can be pushed beyond initial limits.
There is also a link between the human brain being stimulated by visual information and making emotional responses. Striking images leave lasting impressions.
• Minimise cognitive overload
Trying to learn anything when it is only presented and explained through text in a short amount of time is challenging.
Our brains need to take the extra steps to process the language, highlight the most important parts, and attempt to unpack ideas inside our heads. Visuals are shortcuts our minds can take to the ultimate goal of understanding.
• Help build mental models
Graphic design for eLearning can assist learners in visualising layered systems. Charts make it easier to grasp large organisational structures. Graphs connect items to show proportions and trends. Line diagrams illustrate steps and processes.
• Avoid overabundance of visuals
Following graphic design principles also means having restraint when using visuals. You should not be just bombarding your learners with picture after picture on every page of every training module.
You need to ask yourself and your course designers such questions as:
- Are these visuals relevant to the lesson?
- Are these visuals only tangentially related?
- Are these visuals practically the same as the others without adding anything new?
- Are there too many visuals on the screen?
Graphic Design Techniques for Better eLearning Courses
With an appreciation for how graphic design can improve your eLearning program, it’s time to get into the techniques you can apply to achieve such a goal. There are five fundamental aspects to focus your efforts on:
1. Layout
Graphic design does not just pertain to images. It also concerns how text is visually presented and organised with graphical elements. This is why the layout is integral to how easy (or hard) it can be for learners to absorb information in an eLearning course.
Some of the best practices for an engaging layout include:
- Make use of white or negative space. It is the absence of any element—text or visual—that dictates where the learner’s attention should be directed.
- Isolate a point to underscore its importance.
- Use bulleted lists to highlight key principles.
- Group and arrange similar elements together.
- Position crucial info at the start and the end.
- Use paragraphs when necessary, as there are concepts you can’t boil down to a single sentence. Where possible, however, keep paragraphs brief so as not to overwhelm readers.
2. Typography
The font you use plays a significant role in how well learners take to your eLearning course.
After all, they will spend most of their time reading.
Consider the font style, size and colour, as these aspects all factor into readability and engagement with learners. Keep the following in mind:
- Font style sets the tone for text. Stick to clean and crisp fonts to convey a professional tone.
- Even if the course you design leans toward a fun and creative approach, you can’t go wrong with a sans-serif font such as Arial or Verdana.
- You can use multiple font styles for contrast, but keep it to just two styles.
- For font size, 14 and 16 are the standard point sizes for body text.
The ultimate objective for your font choice is ensuring legibility. Forego flashy fonts that distract and make reading any harder.
3. Colour
If used properly, colour can enhance your eLearning courses. Depending on the combination of chosen colours, you can make a course aesthetically exciting or a complete eyesore.
Fortunately, you don’t need an art degree to get a feel for what colour palette looks good for your course. There are plenty of free online resources that provide complementary colour schemes for you to emulate, such as Colour Combinations Tester, Coolors, and Color Hunt.
A few pointers when picking your palette include:
- Three colours should be sufficient to give an eLearning course a distinct look without going overboard and confusing your learners.
- Follow the 60-30-10 rule. The neutral colour should be used 60%, the complementary colour 30% and the remaining 10% should be for the accent colour.
- Contrast is critical, especially for fonts. Fonts should never blend in with the background so they become hard to read.
4. Graphics
There are plenty of ways to implement visual media like illustrations, photographs, and animations to spice up your eLearning course. Here are techniques you can use without having extensive graphic design experience:
- Crop stock photos — Stock photos generally have a professional quality to them. They are useful for scene-setting. However, they are generic. You can make them more appropriate for your particular needs by cropping parts that don’t fit what you are going for.
- Remove backgrounds in images — The same principle as cropping stock photos applies to this tip. You can take an attention-grabbing element from a generic image and use it in a different context or pair it with text or another graphic. You can use an online tool such as Clipping Magic or the ‘remove background’ features of Microsoft Word or PowerPoint.
Add flair to basic charts and graphs — Simplistic visual representations of data have their place, but colourful and creative charts and graphs will be much more memorable for learners. Instead of solely relying on templates, you can add images and icons with a dash of colour to liven up boring old diagrams.
5. Navigation
Graphic design affects the ease at which learners can navigate your eLearning course. You know you did well with how you designed course navigation when learners can intuit their way through it.
- The core tenets of improving navigation are simplicity and consistency. Keep labels short with phrases like “Next Page” or “Exit Course”. Place buttons and links in the same areas so learners don’t have to spend time looking for them on every page in your course.
- Graphic elements like lines, arrows and icons can communicate directions succinctly and lead the eye through a page. Take advantage of visual shorthand symbols to streamline navigation and maintain a clutter-free look.
- Include a progress bar that learners can easily view. A visual representation of how much time is left in a course can help manage expectations, act as a checklist for topics covered and pace self-learning sessions better.
Integrate Graphic Design into eLearning
Visuals support the informational content in your eLearning courses by making the experience more engaging and digestible for learners. Graphic design principles, meanwhile, ensure visuals are presented with reason and relevance and avoid redundancy. Such principles are realised through proper layout, the right choice of typography and colour, creativity in employing and editing images, and straightforward navigation.
If you need expert guidance for integrating graphic design into your eLearning courses, Wahoo Learning has just the team of instructional designers for you. We are highly experienced in designing interactive and immersive courses with effective visual media baked into the process. Contact us today.
