Less external pressure to perform and more intrinsic motivation in e-learning

At primary school, you will be taken by the hand. Each next step is explained to you. If you get stuck, the teacher or master is always there for you, to ask questions, to motivate you to get on with the task, or to comfort and cheer you up if you really don't want to go any further.

As we get older, we are increasingly expected to do all of this ourselves. We are expected to find our own way in the education system, discover for ourselves which course of study suits us, make a plan ourselves to complete our studies, and keep our motivation high ourselves.

As long as we are in an educational institution, support is often still available. But what about learning in the workplace? Especially when it comes to e-learning? Often, there will be yet expect more from us in terms of independence, intrinsic motivation, and skills in the field of time management, for example.

However, the figures still show that a large percentage of e-learnings are not completed. And that's not surprising, of course. Because we ask quite a lot from our employees.

How can you support your employees as optimally as possible so that they experience less external pressure to “finish” the e-learning? should 'round' and, on the contrary, experience more intrinsic motivation and complete the e-learning on its own wanting laps? How do you ensure that they feel seen, heard, understood and valued as a 'student' in your e-learning?

Set clear expectations

Just to refer to “the past”... maybe the teacher or master wrote clearly on the board what had to be done every day. Later, you may have written this on a to-do list yourself. But no matter how old you are, it's nice to know exactly what's expected of you. Therefore, set clear expectations for the students in your e-learning.

• How many hours are they expected to spend on e-learning per day or per week?
• What are the conditions for passing the e-learning assessment?
• Is the student expected anywhere else? Live? Online? And if so, how often and at what time?

Make sure that all this information is immediately available in advance and can be accessed at any time.

Be proactive

Is a student lagging behind or is he or she struggling in e-learning? The sooner you contact him or her, the better.

Research has shown that when students fail an online course, it is often because they fell behind and were unable to catch up (20% said it was the reason they failed an online course).

Many students are not likely to take the initiative to ask for help themselves and need a teacher or trainer to show them how to catch up or explain parts of the course content they don't understand so they can move on. So don't stay anonymous, but give students the feeling that you're there for them and that they can come to you with questions and doubts (or just to share interesting ideas or inspiration with you, of course!).

Create a sense of “together”

Social Learning is learning from and with each other. By effectively applying the principles of Social Learning, students do not feel alone; for example, they can ask questions and ask for feedback at any time, and are therefore much less likely to give up.

It is therefore advisable to set up one or more channels that allow students to contact each other and continue to experience the connection during the e-learning. For example, you can set up a virtual community and encourage students from the start to share ideas, give each other feedback on their contribution, share new ideas, and post valuable information.

Research has shown that experiencing connection while learning increases intrinsic motivation.

Provide sufficient guidance and support

It is a pitfall that quickly lurks: assuming that our students “already know” something.

Don't do this! If your students already know something, they can simply skip it. But it's your responsibility to provide them with all the guidance and tools they may need at any time. Therefore, make sure you have sufficient support.

For example, support may include indexes, glossaries, formula sheets, templates, assessment schedules, examples for projects and papers, and short videos to supplement background knowledge. Also, add multiple rounds of feedback so that students know if they're on the right track.

Not sure if everything is so clear? Ask your students! They are your most valuable source of information and can often tell you exactly what they need when (and what may be redundant).

Also, make sure that students can ask questions at any time to prevent them from getting stuck. This can be done, for example, via the chat function of the online learning platform, via email, via a discussion forum, via a community, etc.

So plenty of opportunities to make e-learning super interactive, connecting, user-friendly and motivating and thus stimulate the intrinsic motivation of your students!

User-friendliness is also a top priority at Pluvo. Are you curious about how you can optimally support your students by offering e-learning on our platform? We'd love to show you what the options are! Contact us via chat.