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Emotional impact is inevitable in learning - plan for it, or risk defaulting to boredom
Add feeling-based objectives alongside traditional knowledge and skill objectives
Consider desired emotional states like confidence, enthusiasm, or curiosity
Let emotional objectives guide content development and design choices
Particularly crucial for change management programs where emotions run high
Now, let's explore why emotions deserve a place in your learning objectives...
Who learns without engaging?
There are few things more distressing to the earnest ID who really cares about outcomes than receiving feedback that their learners were not engaged — which likely also means the training was not effective. Who learns without engaging?
Engagement can be tricky. There may be any number of reasons why learners aren't engaging with content. Maybe the subject matter doesn't interest them, it's training they were forced to do, there's too much reading and not enough interacting, the screens lack relevant visuals, or the language is too formal and hard to process.
All of these can get in the way of engagement. But what if the problem isn’t the subject or the design, but the learning objectives that were set to begin with?
Learning is emotional
I don’t know a single instructional designer that doesn’t depend on the brilliance of Bloom’s Taxonomy (I’ll leave a link to this at the bottom for you to peruse) to set learning objectives, and rightly so. The taxonomy shows us how learning builds step by step, and gives us clear action words to measure what learners can actually do.
The question is whether it covers everything we should be planning for.
There is an emphasis on behavior, which makes sense because behavior is observable, identifiable, and quantifiable — easy to see and measure before and after. But are we forgetting that behind the behaviors are real people with wants, needs, opinions and emotions? Learning always has an emotional impact. If we don’t plan for it, the impact is likely to be boredom.
Learning objectives that smash boredom
Start by asking ‘What do I want the learner to feel after completing this learning?
Knowing this changes the way we design learning. The best writers picture the learner and the impact of each sentence on them. How will these words land? Will they accomplish the intended purpose?
The emotional objective can be as simple as to feel motivated, enthusiastic, less overwhelmed, or more confident, etc. Along the way, you might want them to feel curious, surprised or validated. These and more are worthy learning objectives.
Emotions are especially important in change programs, which are often met with fear and resistance. How can you design the learning component to help reassure people the change is good and to set aside judgement until they’ve given it a try? Or to turn fears that they won’t be able to adapt into confidence that they will? You are more likely to succeed if the emotional impact is in your learning objectives.
Having emotional objectives guides your design choices, from word selection to imagery. When you elicit the right emotions at the right time, you naturally engage learners and guide them to completion.
Three steps to try
So, to enhance engagement:
Think about what you want the learner to feel as well as know or do when they complete the learning
Specify this in your learning objectives, maybe in a separate section
Keep the desired emotional impact in mind as you design, develop and review
At Strategy to Revenue, we design from the learner's perspective. We consider the whole person when planning for outcomes—what they'll know, do, and feel. This human-centered approach creates learning experiences that deliver results.
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