In eLearning, How Can You Improve LMS Engagement?

Engagement is the holy grail sought by all players in e-learning: training organisations, companies, associations, schools... and you can understand why when you see completion rates for non-mandatory courses! But are the LMS platforms on the market going about it the right way to create learner engagement? That's what we're going to discuss here!

The 3 dimensions of engagement

A quick conversation between training professionals is enough to realise that the meaning given to the word "engagement" varies enormously. It must also be said that some use this confusion to promote more or less relevant solutions on the subject.

Depending on who you ask, an "engaged" learner can mean a satisfied learner, an enthusiastic one, or one who is focused on what they are doing.

At Didask, we base our assessment of engagement on the following 3 measures:

1. Initial interest, measured by the % of people invited to the training who choose to enrol.
2. Completion, with 2 measures that can be used: the % of learners who completed the training, or the average completion rate across all enrolees.
3. Satisfaction, using the Net Promoter Score (NPS), perceived usefulness questionnaires, or other questionnaires to understand how learners experienced the training.

This allows us to track learner motivation from start to finish, throughout the training. Let's now look at the different ways LMS platforms can improve these 3 measures.

LMS platforms primarily explore sources of extrinsic motivation

Today, the levers used by LMS platforms to strengthen learner engagement primarily target what researchers call extrinsic motivation. Extrinsic motivation is the interest a learner has in aspects of their learning experience that are not related to the content of the training itself. For example, making training mandatory is a source of extrinsic motivation that increases a learner's engagement scores without them necessarily being any more intrinsically motivated by the training content itself (keep the word "intrinsic" in mind — we'll come back to it).

Among the levers most commonly used by LMS platforms, here are 3 you will no doubt recognise:

• The first is gamification — incorporating game-like mechanics into the learning experience: anticipation of earning rewards, achieving objectives... These mechanisms spark learner curiosity and encourage them to spend more time on the training. Duolingo is a classic example of successful gamification.
• The second is leveraging the need for social belonging and contribution to the group. As social beings, we enjoy being recognised as a full member of a group, and social learning activities — such as completing a task together or voting — satisfy this need.
• The last lever is simply the artistic direction of the training — its aesthetic choices and intentions. If this is particularly well crafted, with a clearly recognisable identity, learners will experience aesthetic pleasure that encourages them to spend more time on the training and return to it more often.

These additions have undeniable benefits on the 3 learner engagement measures described above... but it must be acknowledged that they are not enough in 2 scenarios.

The first arises when learners attend training reluctantly, because the subject doesn't interest them or because they don't think they need to train. In this case, the additions you make are too gadget-like and will not compensate for this fundamental disinterest.

The second scenario arises when the training is poorly designed from a pedagogical standpoint: too long relative to the objective, not very interactive, disconnected from learners' needs. A typical example would be a visually stunning course, rich in video and GIFs, but containing so few exercises that retaining even a fraction of the messages conveyed is an achievement. Let's remember that engagement is only a means to facilitate learner progress, not an end in itself: if learners are motivated to follow a pedagogically ineffective course, they won't get much out of it...

Intrinsic motivation to the rescue

We mentioned earlier the idea of being intrinsically motivated. Researchers use the term intrinsic motivation to describe the interest one has in the actual content of a training and the learning experience it offers: discovering new information, feeling yourself progressing, anticipating the benefits the training will bring to your everyday life, etc. Unfortunately, this is often where the majority of LMS platforms fall short...

One might think that intrinsic motivation depends solely on the learner and their aspirations. That is partly true — being spontaneously interested in the subject undeniably helps. However, at many moments, course designers can spark learner motivation... by playing on their curiosity.

Indeed, curiosity is a powerful driver of intrinsic motivation. A study by Kang et al. (2009) showed that revealing information that most arouses learners' curiosity activates the brain's reward circuit at an intensity comparable to that achieved when giving them money!

Curiosity arises when the learner perceives a gap between their current state of knowledge and what they think a situation could offer them. We explored several ways to spark curiosity in our December webinar.

How is motivation generated in the Didask LMS?

In the Didask LMS, we stimulate learners' curiosity in several ways. First, at the heart of our format: we use active pedagogy, which prevents learners from underestimating their need for training and creates a sense of "suspense" when solutions are revealed. With each action a learner takes, they receive personalised feedback explaining why their answer is appropriate or incorrect. This active format maintains learner curiosity, as they cannot fall into the illusion of mastery — they must regularly put their knowledge to the test.

We also differentiate pedagogical formats according to learners' cognitive challenges at any given moment in the training. We address challenges such as "Deconstructing biases", "Memorising new information", "Applying in context"... and the challenge of "Motivating"!

Behind the "Motivating" challenge lies a set of modalities, each with their own specificity. Two examples: one format asks learners to identify situations that are currently problematic for them and that justify the relevance of the training. This activity allows learners to articulate the benefits they will draw from it — this approach is more effective than describing benefits in a top-down way ("at the end of this training, you will be able to...").

Another option is to show a video of already-trained peers explaining what the training enabled them to do. This allows the learner to experience vicarious success, which strengthens their confidence in their ability to progress and complete the training — confidence that in turn increases their engagement.

For even greater engagement, as explained in this article by Empowill, it is very important to have a follow-up and support process for your learners before the training, to ensure it can meet a real need.

But these are just a few ideas — there are more yet to be invented. Advances in cognitive science research and artificial intelligence in LMS platforms will help us get there. In any case, you now have a clearer picture of the different dimensions of engagement, and of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. To create engagement effectively, it is important to equip yourself with the right tools — particularly an LMS — and to train your trainers in these specific challenges!

To continue reading on the topic of engagement and LMS, here are some recommended articles:

• E-learning: generative AI in the service of learner engagement
• Digital learning: 5 golden rules for disengaging your learners
• The great history of e-learning platforms
• Adaptive learning and Generative AI: the winning combination for online training!
• LMS: 3 misconceptions to put to rest once and for all
• Beyond ChatGPT: Generative AI in the service of pedagogy
• Why EdTech must distinguish between engagement and learning
• AI & eLearning design: I compared ChatGPT and Didask — the verdict is clear!