Orientation to Birth Center

After beginning my instructional design journey, I very quickly began to see opportunities for better design all around me. One of those was opportunities was during a hospital stay after the birth of my second daughter. After she arrived, I was given several stacks of papers explaining what would happen now. Procedures, tests, and decisions had to be made. As a second-time mom, I was fairly confident in my awareness and the decisions that I would make for my baby. I did not forget, however, how overwhelming it was to be experiencing childbirth for the first time. Looking at the packets, I realized that they were not user friendly, bordered on information overload, and contained complicated medical terms that would intimate anyone.

So, I challenged myself to create a patient experience that is welcoming, empowers patients, and is easy enough for tired parents to walk through.

The learning objectives of the course became to be able to recognize and make decisions about seven key events in the Family Birth Center. Fresh from having experienced it firsthand, I created such a course with a very unique learner in mind.

The solution to my challenge was to create a decision-based course. First, I broke down complicated procedures into easily understandable pieces. Then, I asked the learner to make a decision based on that information. Each decision was a real one that they would make while at the Family Birth Center.

Learning theory tells us that the best instructional design for adult learners will have direct, real-world application. In this case, the experience of childbirth is as real as you can get. It also tells us that situational learning should result in consequences for the learner. AKA - learners should be presented with situations and told what the consequences will be.

So, instead of simply giving patients a packet of information, I allowed learners to make a choice within our course first. This helps parents to be aware of and empowered to make these decisions when the time comes.

One challenge that I had while creating this course was in knowing that as parents, we cannot always plan ahead. It's nice to think that learners can take this course well in advance of their hospital stay, but I know better! So, I turned the information in this course into a slide deck that includes QR codes to websites with additional information. This way, parents can quickly review the information and use their cell phones to find out more in an instant.

Creating this course was enjoyable because I was able to do what the best instructional designers do - create with their learner in mind.

Results Coming Soon!