How can you deliver microlearning when learners don’t want it? Designing microlearning for socially oriented learners

What do you do when employees want sustained, in-person, dialogic learning opportunities, but the realities of their work prevent participation in such learning events? Microlearning can offer an important solution to this conundrum but also requires careful navigation between design recommendations, learner preferences, learning objectives tied to work tasks, and assessment. This concurrent mixed methods research study uses identical convenience sampling to answer the research question: How is employee learning impacted by microlearning design decisions made to address fundamental contradictions presented by learner preferences and workplace contexts? This study focuses on the case of microlearning lessons on inclusive teaching in a professional development program for faculty at a small comprehensive university in the southeastern United States. Eleven participants’ reflections, contributions to asynchronous discussions, responses to a post-program survey, and submissions on pre- and post-lesson assessments were analyzed through qualitative coding and descriptive and inferential statistics. While quantitative data analysis revealed significant participant learning aligned with lesson objectives, qualitative analysis revealed that learners also engaged in learning beyond these learning objectives. Complementing extensive literature on microlearning for procedural learning, this study provides new insights related to needs assessment, suitable learning objectives, social dimensions, and assessment of microlearning and offers recommendations for designing and assessing microlearning when adapting it to learners’ preferences and workplace contexts.