Are you really building an LMS?
The Knowledge Anywhere site just published a “must-have” checklist, and it’s perfect. It’s so perfect that I’ll not only link to the whole article, but also quote their core list here. (The red text is my own addition.)
This is the Knowledge Anywhere “Must Have” List
The ability to add, edit and manage the following training types:
Online training- SCORM 1.2- and 2004-compliant courses
ILT Classroom training
Self-paced training
The ability to apply or enable the following details or characteristics of a course:
Course description – WYSIWYG HTML Editor
Course prerequisites
Course retake restrictions
Certificates of Completion
Course Levels –Required vs. Elective (Public)
Grading (If applicable)
The ability to add, edit and manage course catalogs, groupings or series by:
Assigning courses to course catalogs, groups or series based on predefined user roles
Share courses across catalogs and course series
Manage course catalog or series display date range
Make a course catalog or series public
The ability to add, edit and manage user groups, company divisions, business units and brands with:
Automated user enrollment or user import (Excel upload)
Automated user deactivation
Administration of registration codes for user enrollment
Creation or modification of user information/user profiles
Hierarchy for the training structure based on organizations, departments, user roles and location
Ability to mark a user complete
The ability to manage user progress and performance with:
Course reports –Course completions, course enrollments, etc.
Classroom enrollment reports –Course completions, course enrollments, etc.
User reports- Active users, certification completion, compliance completion, user login activity, user transcripts
The ability to communicate with users and collect and manage user feedback with:
Course surveys
System announcements
The ability for learners to access the following from their learner dashboard:
Courses and learning plans
Course transcript/progress page
Course catalog (for Public courses)
Profile/preference changes –Login information, language preferences, etc.
The ability to deploy the LMS on the cloud
So what’s the issue?
I’ll tell you.
If you do the math, what you’ll notice is that over 60% of that list is unnecessary if you’re building an online course instead of a full learning management system (LMS).
(The red text highlight those items which I think are not necessarily needed for most of the folks I talk to.)
WordPress solutions you might like for your online course: