What makes a successful e-learning innovation application? 

Many of you will now be in the midst of preparing your e-learning innovation program application. There is a lot too it – and really a successful application needs a successful project to underpin it.

I thought it would be useful to remind you about two presentations from Tas-eday09: from Clint Smith and Brad Beach. Click here for their powerpoints.

Clint gave eight tips:

suss out the funding body
make sure you fit the right category
research
delivery – count e-posteriors
innovation – explain the change
design – provide an e-solution
scope your content, and
embedding – plan for growth.

His pointers are spot on … here is an example, from tip 3 research:

show you’ve done the “R&D”: explain why it will succeed
ready to go: got the skills, got the plan, and
main outcome is a successful e-learning delivery solution.

If you can’t say yes to each of these then think carefully about your readiness to apply in 2010. 

Brad’s presentation is making a project work for learners, the client and your organisation. This is something to have foremost in your mind when preparing your application. Here are his list of dos and don’ts for a good project.

Don’t

pick a technology which is too hard to deal with
pick a project based on an interest in a particular technology
pick a project and then look for the teacher
stop thinking about the students/industry

Do

have a risk strategy
have a realistic timeframe with manageable outcomes
be clear about the project outcomes for all parties

Time spent revisiting, or looking at for the first time at, these presentations would be well spent.

And finally, if you’d like to watch the excellent top ten tips, it is available at vimeo (http://vimeo.com/3157299).

Do you have a project idea, but aren’t sure how to pull together an E-learning Innovations application?

Check out the February e-Gems webconferencing session to hear about the key things your E-learning Innovations funding application needs to address, such as priority areas, funding categories, risk strategies, the project management plan, impact and sustainability, and budget.
This national session is in addition to the face-to-face and online state and territory-specific information sessions being held throughout the country in February.

E-learning Innovations funding and support, provided by the Australian Flexible Learning Framework (Framework), helps registered training organisations around Australia to develop innovative e-learning solutions and better support the training needs of business and industry. For more information, visit http://flexiblelearning.net.au/innovations.

Presenter:
Sue McShane has been involved with the Framework since 2007. She worked as a senior project officer for the Industry Engagement Project in 2007-2008 and ran the national series of ‘writing a business case for e-learning workshops’ in 2008. Sue worked as the ACT Innovations Coordinator in 2008 and will be working as the ACT E-learning Coordinator in 2010. Sue also teaches tourism at the Canberra Institute of Technology. Her hands-on approach to e-learning and experience as an online and face-to-face trainer makes her hints for writing a business case for e-learning invaluable.

Date: Thursday 18 February 2010
When: 12:30pm - 1:30pm AEST
Where: http://tinyurl.com/2010-egems-fundingfrenzy

Full URL for session (copy the complete link):
https://sas.elluminate.com/m.jnlp?sid=675&password=M.A7D53AA304F8CA6C068468280E7AB

The world’s first iMoot runs from Thursday 4^th to Sunday 7^th February.  Operating 24 hours a day, iMoot will be run as an online e-conference with forums and elluminate sessions bringing together Moodle practitioners and administrators from around the world.

For more information on iMoot 2010, or to register for the conference visit http://imoot.org.