Hard Fun

It's time to come back to this blog. I'm on my last class for my masters degree and I think I can at least use my final project as a focus.

But in the meantime, I came across Rick Nigol's blog entry on what lessons he learned from using Wii Fit. He matched them to the same goals that should designers should strive for in creating e-learning courses.

• Personalized and goal based
• Coaching and immediate feedback
• Flexibility
• Simple, intuitive navigation
• Hard fun

It's important to me to be continually reminded on what elements make for a good e-learning course. I'm not doing any ID work at my current job -- yet, but I can see where the deficiencies are in the projects that are being developed. So I learn from examples and non-examples.

I especially like the last bullet, hard fun.

Learning something doesn't need to be a chore or so boring where the only 'interaction' is clicking on a "Continue" button. Learning should be challenging and relevant. It should make you think and not be afraid to fail. You should be able to take whatever facts and concepts that are presented and use them in a meaningful manner. It shouldn't be easy, because face it, life never is. But it should be fun.

I will keep this phrase in my mind as I start to develop my own courses.