Role of the Learning Designer

What is learning design?

There are a lot of ways to think about design but ultimately design is a creative challenge. All creativity is problem solving within a set of constraints. Design is one of these creative pursuits which seeks to solve a variety of problems through a set of available tools and different ways of communicating. So using this construct, learning design is setting the problem as learning, and then seeking to design a solution by understanding the motivations and experiences of the learners and instructors and then using the available media and medium to facilitate that learning.

Learning design is a process, as opposed to a task.

It’s not an individual or singular thing, and you you can’t simply apply learning design to a course. Learning Design is the process of producing and crafting that course. Design isn't something that can be applied to a course, because it is the way of doing it.

The process of design includes developing an understanding of the audience, of the project constraints, the medium and the intent — all of which shape the final product. Design is the act of thinking about the whole, of negotiating and shaping the experience that the learner will have and the space in which it will happen.

What does a Learning Designer do?

Describing exactly what a Learning Designer does is a challenge. Being the instigator of a process means that they are required to do a lot of things, but a large of component of the job is to know what the other people in the process can and need to do.

A lot of the work is spent on the relationships and collaboration that is required to happen between subject matter experts, graphic designers, media production, videographers, technologists and teachers.

Another thing that a Learning Designer does that is critical to the process is be an advocate for the learner. A lot of the design of the course, reviewing of material, development of media is based on placing the learner at the centre of the process and doing the work for them.

These aspects of the role - collaboration and advocating for the learner - drive a lot of the decision making and day-to-day tasks that a learning designer would do. From facilitating a workshop, reviewing content, planning a learning activity, to shooting a video - what they do is based on these two areas. They provide a way to connect staff and resources, they push for change in order for the learning experience to be better. The tasks themselves change over time and as the course is developed what is required will change – that's the beauty of the role is that it changes, that it has many aspects and areas to utilise your skills and challenge yourself and develop new ones.

An outline of the tasks are outlined in the Course Development Process.