Essential Guide to Visual Thinking for E-Learning

Here are two common challenges when building online training courses: knowing what content needs to be in the course and then having the right visuals to support the learning of that content. One way to overcome these challenges is to increase your visual thinking skills. You’ll learn to focus on the right content and then find the right visuals to support what you’re teaching.

What is Visual Thinking?

The essence of visual thinking is to convert your text-based information to images and text that show concepts and the flow of ideas. I like the way Dave Gray describes it as a way to “move beyond the linear world of the written word, lists, and spreadsheets and entering the non-linear world of spatial relationships, networks, maps, and diagrams.”

Dan Roam does a nice job drawing a distinction between our “verbal” and “visual” mind by using a fox and hummingbird analogy.

And this is where visual thinking is relevant to e-learning: most e-learning is on the fox side of things. We’re info-centric and lean on our verbal minds to push out information. Yet, e-learning is a mostly visual medium. So it’s ripe for us to use our visual minds to present information and concepts in a way that’s less dependent on text. This helps us move past bullet point lists.

How to Learn More About Visual Thinking

There are all sorts of great resources on visual thinking. Below are some videos to get you started and a few good book recommendations for those who want to dig deeper.

In the videos below, both presenters share how to get started with basic shapes and a consistent approach to capturing the big ideas and concepts. The videos also complement each other because while they’re similar they do use slightly different approaches.

Of course there’s an investment of time watching the videos, however they’re not too long and you’ll learn quite a bit. Just treat them like a visual thinking workshop that you get to attend for free.

Dan Roam Presents

I like the work Dan Roam does. Here are some free videos that are part of his Napkin Academy. He shows how all drawings start with five simple shapes and also provides a grammar structure that guides what to draw.

• How to Draw Anything (7:55)
• Essential Visual Grammar (5:42)
• Process of Visual Thinking (11:14)

Dave Gray Presents

Here are three good videos by Dave Gray, founder of Xplane. He expands on Roam’s basic shapes using a visual alphabet (glyphs) and explains how to know what to draw and when to do it.

• Visual Thinking Basics (17:11)
• How to Know What to Draw (16:47)
• How to Know When to Draw (12:42)

Good Books on Visual Thinking & Communication

I like videos, but I also like books. There’s something about holding them in my hand and making my own notes in the margin. Here are some good visual communication books to add to your elearning library.

• Any of Dan Roam’s books are good. I haven’t read Show & Tell yet but I’ve heard good things. It’s on my list.
• The Art of Explanation: Making Your Ideas, Products, and Services Easier to Understand. Many of you know Lee Lefever from his popular Common Craft videos. The Common Craft videos are a great transition from sketches to multimedia learning and there’s a lot to be gleaned for us e-learning designers in the way the videos are clear, simple, and entertainingly engaging.
• The Doodle Revolution. Sunni Brown does a great job getting us to think about doodling in a new way. I also love her practical challenge activities to instigate practicing what you learn. Here’s a great presentation that she gave at TED.
• Sketchnote Handbook: Illustrated Guide to Visual Note Taking. Learn more about Mike Rohdes in this podcast and by reviewing some of his sketchnotes. This is one of a Lee Lefever presentation.
• Beyond Words: A Guide to Drawing Out Ideas. I haven’t read this book, but it came highly recommended from a couple of people at a recent workshop.

The links to Amazon books may produce a slight commission.

Your Next Steps…

Learning about visual thinking is one thing. Actually applying it to your course design is another. Here are some suggestions to help you get started:

• Watch the videos above to get a good overview of concepts.
• Practice sketching some basic shapes. For the image above and the header image, I used an iPad and Cosmonaut stylus.
• Convert a bullet point slide in one of your courses from fox to hummingbird.
• Don’t worry about being perfect. You’ll get better the more you do it.

The key point in all of this is to train yourself to think visually. And then apply those skills to the construction of your e-learning courses. Keep in mind, e-learning is mostly a visual medium and unfortunately most courses are heavily text-based with deficient visual consideration. Thus, if you learn to think and communicate visually, you’ll only get better at building your e-learning courses.

Have you applied any visual thinking concepts to your e-learning courses? If so, I’d love to learn more about what you did.

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Free E-Learning Resources

Want to learn more? Check out these articles and free resources in the community.	Here’s a great job board for e-learning, instructional design, and training jobs	Participate in the weekly e-learning challenges to sharpen your skills
Get your free PowerPoint templates and free graphics & stock images.	Lots of cool e-learning examples to check out and find inspiration.	Getting Started? This e-learning 101 series and the free e-books will help.