• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content

David Lindenberg

  • Blog
  • Contact

elearning

Limiting and Persisting Choices in Storyline

January 17, 2018 By David Leave a Comment

I recently read Michael Hinze’s Limiting Choices – a Storyline Question, which was a response to a question in the Heroes community where a member wanted to limit learners to making exactly 3 out of 8 choices and then display the choices on the following slide. If you aren’t already, you should follow Michael’s work on his blog, on Twitter, and in the Heroes community.

When I saw his post, I immediately thought of a course I worked on several years ago where I did something similar (in Storyline 1), so I thought I would share how I tackled the problem. The course had a few extra twists, the first being the need for two columns of items to select, but only one set that needs to persist to the next slide.

The first slide has a list of strategies for doing a particular task. The learner reads through the list and selects a check mark if he/she has used the technique. They can check as many or few of these as they like.

strategies selected with check marksstrategies have used and want to practice

 

 

 

 

 

Then the learner must select 3 strategies in which they will practice the technique. These are the yellow stars. So this is where the limit comes in – exactly 3 – no more, no less.

Let’s start with the check marks. I created True/False variables for each of the check marks and set the default value to False. I created a Normal (grey) and Selected (green) state for each check mark. I also created hotspots for each check and star.

check mark triggers in StorylineNext, I added the following triggers to each check hotspot. The first trigger toggles the Checkbox trigger between True and False. The default value is False. If the learner clicks a check, the variable changes to True and the second trigger takes affect, changing the check from grey to green. If the learner clicks the check again, the third trigger changes Checkmark back to False and the color of the check changes back to grey. Each check hotspot has these three triggers, so the learner can select as many or few of these as desired. The check marks serve as a type of review for the learner. Have I done these things or not? These do not persist to the following slide.

Now, on to the stars. I created True/False variables for each of the stars and set the default value to False. Each star has two states, Normal (grey) and Selected (yellow).

Storyline triggers for the stars.Next, I added triggers to each star hotspot. The first three triggers are the same as those I created for the check hotspots – a toggle that changes the value of the variable, and triggers that change the state of the stars between Normal and Selected. Again, the learner can select as many or as few as they want. But, I only want them to select three stars. So I added another variable, Total, to keep count of how many stars are selected, and two additional triggers that either add 1.00 to Total if True (selected) or subtract 1.00 from Total if False (not selected). The Total variable is a numeric variable with a default value of 0.

Storyline triggers for Next buttonFinally, I add two triggers to the Next button. I add a layer to the slide as a gate screen. If the Total variable is greater than 3 or less than or equal to 2, the layer displays with a message reminding the learner to select three starred items. Then, when they select three items (when Total = 3), they advance to the next slide.

So that takes care of the requirement for only 3 items. The next challenge is making sure the selected 3 items appear on the next slide.

selected strategies with yellow starsFor slide 2, I copied the 8 strategy text boxes and the 8 stars. I removed the Selected state from each star and added a Disabled state. I set the initial state for each star to Hidden. I also added a Chosen state to each text box with a dark rectangle to better highlight which strategy is chosen.

Storyline star trigger for slide 2For each star I added a trigger that changes the state of the star to Disabled if the associated variable is equal to True. Variables persist throughout a course, so when you select your three stars on the previous slide, the variables associated with those stars changed to True.

Storyline trigger for strategy textI also added a trigger that changes the state of the strategy text to Chosen if the associated star variable is True.

Another twist in this course was the request to have the learner think about and type in their plan for practicing each of their starred strategies.

selected strategies and planning tabstext entry for plan 1For this I added a 3-tab interaction to the slide. Each tab displays a layer. Each layer has a text entry box for learners to type their plan. When the learner is done entering their plans, they click Submit. Their entries are stored and displayed in a review slide at the end of the course via a reference variable (e.g., %plan1%).

I’ve included a demo and the source file (SL 360) if you would like to take a closer look.

Launch Demo

Source File

Filed Under: elearning, Tutorials Tagged With: gate screen, limiting choices, persistent choices, Storyline, variables

3 from 1: Multiple Storyline Builds from One Idea

January 15, 2018 By David Leave a Comment

While completing my 12 Days of E-learning Sharing series where I shared twelve reusable interactions and templates, I frequently came up with an idea and then thought of multiple ways to build it in Storyline. One of the challenges in e-learning design is not building the same thing over and over in different (or even the same) courses.

So I thought I would start an occasional series of posts where I take an idea and show three different methods to build it in Storyline.

Idea
Break a slide into diagonal wedges and have each wedge contain additional content emanating from the bottom center of the slide.

dial green sectionBuild #1 – Dial
I’ll start with the example I used in the 12 Days post. In this example, I built a dial interaction to reveal more content. Each wedge has a selected state that reveals more content when the dial turns to a certain position. The wedges are grouped into a button set so that only one wedge can be in the Selected state at a time.

 

click and reveal section 2Build #2 – Click and Reveal
The obvious and easiest choice is to make this interaction a click and reveal item. Each wedge has a selected state that reveals more content when the learner clicks on a particular wedge. The wedges are grouped into a button set so that only one wedge can be in the Selected state at a time.

 

slider section 1Build #3 – Slider
The slider is similar to the dial interaction, except the learner is sliding for the different wedge states vs. turning a dial.

 

 

pick one choice 4Bonus: Build #4 – Pick One
I duplicated the Click and Reveal slide and used the Convert to Freeform > Pick One interaction. Each wedge is a choice with only one wedge being the correct answer. The part that took the longest (which really wasn’t very long) on this one was customizing the feedback layers.

 

The main difference on these four slides is the bottom center area. The dial interaction obviously contains the dial. The click and reveal contains instructional text. The slider contains the slider and instructional text. And the pick one contains instructions and a custom submit button.

In future posts I’ll show additional examples of this 3 from 1 concept. My goal is to help people see beyond the “one, right way” to build things, or to always take the easy, repetitive route of developing in Storyline. I’d love to hear your thoughts on additional ways to develop the slide in this post or any other creative insights.

Launch Demo

Source File

Filed Under: elearning Tagged With: click and reveal, dial, pick one, slider

Comic Book Starter Kit

January 9, 2018 By David Leave a Comment

comic book sample slidesComic book designs are great for e-learning projects. They engage people through the art of visual storytelling. For some great examples of using comic book designs in Storyline, check out E-Learning Challenge #11: Design a Comic Book Theme for Your E-Learning Course.

To that end, I thought I would create a comic book starter kit in Storyline. Rather than making a bunch of high-end graphics and importing them into Storyline, I built these directly in Storyline with the existing shapes and buttons. The idea being that someone new to Storyline or new to a comic format can easily manipulate the images. The only “outside” influence is the use of comic book style fonts that I downloaded and installed.

The kit includes panels, callouts, shapes, buttons, font examples, and backgrounds in a variety of colors.

The comic book font that I used as the sample text is Crimefighter BB. You’ll need to download and install it to view the source file properly in Storyline.

Launch Demo

Source File – SL360

Source File – SL2

For additional resources, checkout the free course assets page in the ELH community.

Filed Under: elearning Tagged With: comic book, comics, kit, Storyline

12 Days of E-learning Sharing

December 24, 2017 By David 2 Comments

wrapped presentTo celebrate the end of one year and the beginning of the next, I thought it would be fun to share some templates and assets that you can easily customize to fit your e-learning projects. Starting December 25th I will share one e-learning template or asset (built with Storyline 360) per day for 12 days. I’ll share the demo and the source file for FREE.

Each day I’ll update this post with the latest share, so check back often!

Day 1 (December 25): Nested Tabs Interaction
Day 2 (December 26): Medical Meet the Team
Day 3 (December 27): Slide Out Tabs
Day 4 (December 28): Custom Video Player
Day 5 (December 29): Character Drag and Drop
Day 6 (December 30): Interactive Timeline
Day 7 (December 31): Dial and Reveal
Day 8 (January 1): Custom Buttons
Day 9 (January 2): Pick One Scenario
Day 10 (January 3): Meet the Team Tabs
Day 11 (January 4): Expression Generator
Day 12 (January 5): Step-by-Step Interaction

Filed Under: elearning

Building Closed Captions in Storyline 2

November 6, 2016 By David 5 Comments

cc-sample-slideThere are multiple ways to build closed captions for your e-learning projects in Articulate Storyline.  I prefer using variables to build my closed captions, such as Matt, Tom (creating CC and adding CC), and Tracy have done.

I like all of these solutions and have used various parts of each to build closed captions. One item I’d like to address is when you have slides with multiple layers. What happens when you have an audio track on the base layer AND three additional layers each with their own audio tracks? How do you keep the closed captioning in sync with each layer?

In this post, I’ll show you one way to handle that and provide you with a source file to use as a starting point for your own projects. Let’s take a look at all of the parts. [Read more…] about Building Closed Captions in Storyline 2

Filed Under: elearning, Tutorials Tagged With: accessibility

E pluribus unum: Building a single-slide template

October 15, 2015 By David Leave a Comment

Of late, I’ve been focusing a lot on single slide design. I recently shared a video menu template and then revamped it into another video menu template. For this go-round, I decided to create a single slide template that could be used as a “get to know the company” motif for use in an onboarding course. This started out as a full-blown course template, with each menu item linking to a separate slide. The beauty of building in Storyline is that you can always find multiple ways to create the same thing. In the end, because I’m on this one-slide kick, I went that route.

I went for a clean and minimal design. It’s short and sweet. I really like using washed out background images and layering them with transparent shapes (in this case the purple menu and content blocks).

corporate-timeline

For some good examples of making your own background images, check out this E-Learning Heroes challenge.

I’m including the source file if you would like to tinker with this template.

Launch Demo

Source File

Filed Under: elearning, WOL Tagged With: Articulate, Storyline, template

  • Go to page 1
  • Go to page 2
  • Go to Next Page »

Copyright © 2023 David Lindenberg · Genesis Sample On Genesis Framework

  • Blog
  • Contact