Ed tech coach and instructional designer Erica Zimmer joins me to talk about eLearning Launch, an online instructional design academy started by Alexander Salas. We talk about Alex's supreme hustle skills, his teaching style, and the ways in which his courses differ from other self-paced courses out there.
Check out eLearning Launch at www.elearninglaunch.com. You can also follow eLearning Launch on LinkedIn.
Find Erica's podcast The Learning Journal - From Teach to LXD wherever you listen to podcasts and connect with her on LinkedIn.
The following transcript was auto-generated and may contain typos or spelling errors.
Leslie Early 0:04
Welcome to "That's Awesome ID!" My name is Leslie Early and each week I will be speaking with a different guest and learning about one thing they think is awesome in the field of instructional design. Today on "That's Awesome ID!!!" I have my special guest, Erica Zimmer. She's also a podcaster. She has her own podcast called "the Learning Journal: from Teach to LXD", where she talks about your transition from a teaching career into instructional design. Is that correct?
Erica Zimmer 0:41
Yeah, corporate instructional design. So I kind of do a little bit instructional design in K-12 right now. And I'm looking to go to corporate.
Leslie Early 0:50
Awesome. So you are the first guest on "That's Awesome ID!".
Erica Zimmer 0:57
I feel so privileged. This is such an honor.
Leslie Early 0:59
And basically the premise of this podcast, this little podcast, is you get to share something you think is awesome that's happening right now in instructional design.
Erica Zimmer 1:11
Yeah, so... Well, I have been working really hard at building my skill set. And I have discovered fun little, I guess, academy called elearning launch and I know that you Leslie are also involved in that and have taken some courses through there but I really wanted to highlight eLearning Launch because I feel like it is different than those other sort of instructional design academies out there. I feel like it's more affordable. He has different options for pricing. You can buy by the course you can do a yearly membership or you can do a monthly membership and he's always running specials. So you can get in on some really good deals. But what I really like about his stuff is he has two different types of classes. There's self-paced classes, and then there's these live cohorts that he launches. And I've done both, um, and what makes his different is he provides you with feedback, even on the self-paced courses. So you do a module, you have to do some work, you have to submit homework, and you're not allowed to advance until he says, "Yep, that's good." Or he provides you a feedback like, "Nope, try this again." And you move on from there. And so it's been a lot of fun because I, I think the feedback is the most valuable part. Like, we don't know if we're doing something good or not, unless someone tells us and I think it's been great. I'm in his Camtasia class right now. And I know you took that actually, I, I learned about it from you and it's fantastic. Like he really not only the mechanics of like, technically using the tool, he talks about the design and style of making video. He really walks through that, the whole, it's a whole picture kind of thing. Um, so yeah, I would say check out elearning launch. He's got some really cool things coming up. You know, he, he knows there's a lot of us out there that are, you know, teachers or people trying to transition into corporate instructional design. And I know that he's like, got something in the works right now where he's planning a whole sort of like, eight-week course for those of us looking to go into corporate. And I think, from what I understand, he's going to bring in people so other like well known instructional designers in there. And Alex is always creating free content. So like, even if you can't afford his, his name is Alex. Salas. So you can find him on LinkedIn, Alexander Salas. He has a couple different YouTube channels where he shares everything and anything on instructional design.
Leslie Early 4:22
Yeah. So he has a couple different channels he's got he's always got new content coming in on eLearning Launch. The thing that I wanted to add on to that is the feedback is great, but I think he also calls it the "no quiz zone". So yeah, it's so... in other self paced courses, usually you do a lesson you take a quiz, you move on, and that's pretty much it. But he is more about project-based learning. So you do the lesson. He gives you an assignment for an actual project that you need to complete and then you submit that for feedback and get feedback that way. So I think that's great, because quizzes, not necessarily the best, the best way to reinforce learning.
Erica Zimmer 5:12
Right? And as instructional designers, we know that quizzes is just checking like, do you know something right now? But it doesn't really know if we know how to apply that skill. And that knowledge, right? And so his stuff is making us apply what we just learned to create something. And a lot of these pieces, we're creating our perfect portfolio pieces, like he's having us do professional work, and really having us do things that can go into a portfolio and he's trying to help build that whole...
Leslie Early 5:44
Absolutely.
Erica Zimmer 5:45
...piece for us.
Leslie Early 5:47
one of the videos...
Sorry, one of the videos I made in that Camtasia class has gotten so much feedback from people on LinkedIn. I had an interview this morning, someone asked about it. And so, you know, people, people pay attention to these real world examples that you're making. And I think that's the value of his style of teaching in his courses is that you come out of it with an actual work example for your portfolio.
Erica Zimmer 6:17
Yep. And if you guys haven't seen Leslie's video, go find it on LinkedIn. It's amazing. She did a really awesome job.
Leslie Early 6:25
Oh, stop it.
Erica Zimmer 6:26
And you're really good at voiceover which is I'm jealous. I want to learn how to you do that.
Leslie Early 6:32
Um, I don't know if...people can't see the video but I'm basically sitting in a closet. I use my clothing as...my clothing is my egg crate basically on the wall back there.
Erica Zimmer 6:47
I love it. That is so true. Having the right places to do a lot of these things and tools.
Leslie Early 6:56
Yeah, yeah. So um, So that's basically it. That's a Alexander Salas. So his last name, I'll spell it just just in case, s-a-l-a-s. Alexander Salas on LinkedIn. You can also find him at elearninglaunch.com.
Erica Zimmer 7:14
And oh, and he's got a special for the yearly membership right now. It's normally like $799. And he's running it for like $399 right now, which is a huge deal. So, and he's got content on there, like, I mean, it's a pretty new, I'd say academy, but he keeps adding content, like he just added an augmented reality class. So if you have the yearly membership or you pay by the month you get access to all of it, and it's such a good deal.
Leslie Early 7:49
Yeah, definitely, I am going to continue to take all of things.
Erica Zimmer 7:55
Me too. I'm like, "What am I doing next?" Like, I'm just gonna go down the list and do it all.
Leslie Early 8:00
Right. All right. Well, that is pretty awesome. So thank you for sharing that with us. Oh, where can listeners find you or connect with you?
Erica Zimmer 8:12
Sure. LinkedIn, you can find me, Erica Zimmer. So think my LinkedIn URLs linkedin.com slash i-n. I don't know why they do that. Slash Erica Zimmer. All one word.
Leslie Early 8:27
Okay.
Erica Zimmer 8:28
Cool.
Leslie Early 8:29
And don't forget "The Learning Journal". I mean, yeah, "The Learning Journal".
Erica Zimmer 8:35
Yep. Yep. And hopefully I'll have another episode out soon.
Leslie Early 8:39
Okay. All right. Thank you very much.
Erica Zimmer 8:42
Thanks, Leslie!
コメント