Microlearning is revolutionizing how digital content is being delivered and consumed. Competitive workplaces, busy schedules, the need for instant answers, and short attention spans have enhanced the appeal of brief, relevant information that is available on demand.

eLearning has become the preferred alternative, and in some cases, supplement to traditional learning, as it allows learners to pursue their academic interests in a self-paced manner. Especially short courses and training programs that facilitate microlearning are gaining more traction as learners are attracted to pertinent, concise, and aptly-structured learning material that helps them build specific capabilities and skills.

Let’s take a look at what Microlearning is all about, the reasons for its popularity, its benefits, and how best it can be used to create engaging/effective training programs.

What is Microlearning?

Microlearning translates to learning in bits, as opposed to conventional macro learning where students read through pages of content to learn a particular concept. While there is no standard definition for Microlearning, training materials/courses that facilitate this learning model has some telltale characteristics:

• Brevity
• Relevance
• Mobile-friendliness
• Available on demand
• Engaging
• Easy to assimilate, retain, recollect and apply
• Focused on limited specific learning objectives

Why is Microlearning popular?

Everything about microlearning is compact, quick, and precise, making it a refreshingly lighter alternative for learners seeking to enhance their skillset and subject expertise.

• With mobile devices becoming an integral part of life the world over, short chunks of knowledge accessible on your device, and just when you need them, can make a lot of difference.
• Lack of time, patience, and short attention spans in both youngsters and adults are a few other reasons that have fueled the popularity of microlearning. When pursuing an academic interest, there are concepts or skills that you need to know, but also additional information that is good to have. Microlearning is aimed at addressing just the “need to know” aspects. As a learner, you would likely have a bias towards a short-course that earns you a certificate in a specific skill or subject-specialty that you wish to master.
• Microlearning is structured in a format that is easy for the brain to process. Content is just of the right size for the learner to read through quickly and re-visit as many times necessary to fully understand it. Repeated learning automatically tends to reinforce it, making retention and recollection easier.
• The learning experience usually tends to be quite enjoyable as the short courses use different types of content including audio-visuals to facilitate better understanding and retention.
• Working towards a specific goal helps to set clear expectations. Microlearning is focused on one single learning objective and offers a tailored learning path towards it.

These are only a few reasons behind the popularity of microlearning, which reportedly matches the learning style of millennials as well!

Scope of Microlearning – Is it for you?

Despite being a hot trend, this learning model is not universally applicable. Learners must go through full-fledged, content-loaded courses, or training programs, in several scenarios, especially when they are studying to:

• Acquire fundamental or basic knowledge in one or more subjects.
• Specialize in a specific field.

Also, it is essential to note that not all topics can be taught or summarized in 3 to 5-minute modules.

Common Usecases

Microlearning is especially useful when:

• learners are familiar with the subject basics
• aspirants wish to progressively build their credentials via short programs that can be accommodated into their otherwise busy schedules.

It comes in handy when companies organize compliance and corporate training to make sure employees keep pace with the latest developments and regulations.

The model is also suitable to deliver relevant reference material, updates to existing content, and support information to the remote workforce as well.

Is Microlearning effective?

A recent study has revealed that Microlearning is indeed effective even at the Primary school level; the learning ability of students exposed to Microlearning improved by nearly 18%. Another study conducted at the Dresden University of Technology (Germany) in 2015 reveals a marked increase (over 20%) in retention rates when the training material was fine-grained (a piece of content followed by a question).

Benefits of Microlearning

Microlearning is beneficial to trainers and trainees. Let’s quickly recap its benefits without much repetition.

We’ve already seen that this learning model is beneficial to learners in several ways. It is flexible, short, engaging, focused, result-oriented, and effective. It also happens to be affordable as it purposed to meet just one or two learning objectives.

This learning model also benefits trainers, course creators, and employers as well.

• Training content can be created and delivered faster
• Edits and updates to reflect the latest information are easier and quicker too
• Resource requirements to create and deliver training content are vastly reduced
• Compliance, product training, performance support, job aids, and employee onboarding get easier

In short, microlearning enhances learner engagement and retention while also being faster and more cost-effective than conventional training.

Creating Microlearning Content – Best Practices

Brevity in terms of size and time are signature characteristics of microlearning content. The rest is all about making it engaging, relevant, and fun.

• Set clear learning objectives
• Trim the frills
• Get creative with multimedia
• Assess progress every step of the way
• Add a fun element with gamification
• Link out to relevant external resources for additional information
• Engage with stories, infographics, and real-life examples
• Include simulations/online demos if applicable

Microlearning is working wonders for large corporates. It could work for you as well, but only if you are a suitable candidate.

If you wish to create and deliver effective Microlearning programs, use a reliable Learning Management System (LMS) to build and offer your courses online. Loaded with comprehensive features and a diverse array of content formats, an LMS will prove to be a valuable tool in this endeavor. There are quite a few affordable and feature-rich LMSs such as ScholarLMS that may match your requirements and budget too!