The ease of using e-learning has made it the go-to method for many corporations and organisations. Whether via online or offline, e-learning can be pushed through anyone wherever they are. This makes e-learning a very effective tool for employee training or consumer learning.
Those who use Learning Management Systems (LMS) must make sure that the content they are delivering can be fully understood by the learners. This means that for overseas or foreign learners, content must be localized.
Below are 3 quick tips in order to create localized content that is digestible and also engaging for those overseas or foreign learners.
Legible Content
Remove colloquialisms from content that will be localized. This can be quite a challenge to express in an instant without further explanation. Steps should also be taken to remove terminologies specific to the country or origin. Social Security Number or National Identification Number should be completely removed unless absolutely necessary. Also take note of levels of education, the average reading comprehension that the content must have should be between grades 6 and 8. Simplifying content via shorter sentences and bulleted points are recommended.
Aid Display and Comprehension
Make sure that all characters can be displayed properly. Use Unicode (UTF8) encoding as a standard. Do note that most of the time when translating messages, it can cause the text to increase in size. Leave allowances for expansion around text and images. If there are text boxes that need to be filled out by users, design them so it will be able to accommodate different languages.
Review Confusing Images
A picture is worth a thousand words but if the words aren’t understood, it is pointless. Images are an effective way to communicate an idea but if your learners don’t understand the meaning behind them, there is no point. Local common hand gestures, for example, can be offensive in other cultures when it can be a sign of approval in a local sense. This can also affect road signs and currency. Make sure to use universal images that can be understood in whatever context they are put.
Take time to translate learning content. Eliminate cultural references or biases so that learning can dive into the actual learning and not get stuck with trying to comprehend your learning course.
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