How do you connect digital content with learning activities?

Linking digital content to learning activities involves aligning them with objectives. Clearly define what you aim to achieve through the activities. Then, select digital resources that support those goals – videos, articles, interactive modules. These resources should reinforce the concepts, skills, or knowledge you want learners to acquire. By ensuring a strong connection between content and activities, you create a cohesive learning experience that enhances comprehension and engagement, making the learning process more effective and impactful.

The personalization principle tells us that in digital/virtual environments, trainings need to be less formal. The same rigid, visually uniform, predictable courses are the training equivalent of a verbal axioms- information goes in one ear and out the other, with very little impact on the learner. Sometimes we need sacrifice a little “polish” or consistency for the sake of the real goal: LEARNING. This can be a hard sell to stakeholders- but that’s why they need designers- to be experts in what they aren’t- adult learning.

Integrating digital content with learning activities has become an essential aspect of education. Digital content, includes resources such as videos, podcasts, e-books, and various online materials, offers students a wealth of information to support their learning. As educators strive to engage and motivate students, it is crucial to understand the role of digital content in enhancing the learning process and its impact on student outcomes.

Effective use of digital content in learning activities involves varying sources to enrich the learning experience. It is also important to understand how students interact with these materials, design activities that consider their needs and backgrounds and use relevant and appropriate technology. Whether in remote, hybrid, or face-to-face instruction, digital content enables a level of flexibility and personalization previously unavailable in traditional classroom settings. Thus, educators should adapt to these changes, find innovative ways to implement digital content and support student learning. Last but not least, digital skills go hand in hand with critical thinking and identifying what is quality content and what is not.

Learning is a social process. It thrives on interaction with humans. Presently, it will thrive even more on human-machine interaction with AI advancements. Therefore, engagement improves when planning lessons or designing a course as we include collaborative tools and activities. Personally, I like challenging groups of three (k-12) students and having them create digital artefacts. It can be a collaborative mural, a short video or a PPT-type presentation with more images than words to make them communicate their message and engage their classmates. Having a co-created rubric to set the activities' standards, goals and focus also helps create a collectively coherent outcome. It is also great to encourage interaction in the end.