If you're building instructional materials, training programs or other forms of education, you know how important it is to create engaging and interactive learning experiences.
With the right tools and techniques, you can create high-quality eLearning courses and presentations that help your team (and you) achieve set goals.
This blog post will look at some of the top Chrome extensions for instructional design — so you can create effective and engaging eLearning content.
From adding multimedia elements and creating custom animations to creating assessments and measuring learners' progress, these Chrome extensions offer a range of powerful features to help you create the best content possible.
The best Chrome extensions for instructional design in 2023
Scribe
Gomo Learning Suite
Explain Everything
Readily
Handwriting Interactive Teaching Tool (HITT)
MindManager Snap
MindMeister Quick Access
Figma
What are Chrome extensions for instructional design?
Chrome extensions for instructional design are tools that help instructors, trainers and other leaders create engaging and interactive eLearning courses, materials and presentations.
These extensions provide a range of features and capabilities, like the ability to add multimedia elements, create custom animations, and create assessments to measure learners' progress.
What is instructional design?
Instructional design is the process of creating educational or training materials and experiences in a way that's effective and engaging for learners. Instructional designers use different tools and techniques to create educational content that's tailored to the needs of specific learners and helps them achieve learning objectives.
There are certain features and capabilities that you need in a tool to build these materials. These key features include the ability to:
Add multimedia elements like videos, images, and audio.
Create custom animations and interactions.
Create custom assessments to measure learners' progress.
Easily integrate with other eLearning tools and platforms.
Provide flexibility and customization options to create unique and tailored learning experiences.
These features allow instructional designers to create engaging and interactive content that's scalable, editable and flexible — without losing too much time or spending top dollar.
Additionally, being able to easily integrate with other eLearning tools and platforms allows instructional designers to create seamless and cohesive learning experiences that help learners stay engaged and motivated throughout the learning process.
The best Chrome extensions for instructional design
1. Scribe
Chrome Store Rating: 5/5
Scribe is a collaborative documentation Chrome extension that captures your screen, turning any workflow into a step-by-by-step guide — complete with text and annotated screenshots.
If you've ever had to crudely draw on a screenshot to highlight a step or stop and start a screen recording: Scribe is here to save you time, effort... and your sanity.
Here's how it works.
Create beautiful, visual instructions without lifting a finger. Use it for onboarding, training or just answering quick questions. Scribe is fast, flexible and best of all, so easy.
And with Scribe Pages, you can combine Scribes with videos, images and more to create instructional design documentation or templates, like this one.
Kickstart your instructional design with a fast, easy and free tool like Scribe.
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2. Gomo Learning Suite
Chrome Store Rating: N/A
The Gomo Learning Suite provides an all-in-one solution for creating and hosting engaging and responsive multi-device learning content.
The suite includes Gomo authoring and Gomo hosting, which work together to streamline the content creation process and ensure that your content looks great on any device.
With Gomo, you can create stunning learning experiences with ease, without having to worry about the technical details of multi-device publishing. Get started today and take your instructional design to the next level!
3. Explain Everything
Google Chrome Rating: 3/5
Explain Everything is a game-changer for instructional design. It integrates seamlessly with Slack, allowing you to add files directly to your online whiteboard without having to switch between multiple platforms.
With Explain Everything, you can collaborate in real-time with voice chat on any device, anywhere.
The platform is a true all-in-one solution, providing you with a whiteboard, voice chat, recording, video editing tools, and web video link sharing. You can turn an infinite canvas into a mixed-media playground, creating engaging and inspiring learning experiences.
Whether you use pre-made templates or start from scratch, Explain Everything is the perfect tool for instructional designers who want to streamline their workflow and bring their projects to life.
4. Readily
Chrome Store Rating: 5/5
Readily helps instructional designers capture their thoughts and ideas visually. The tool is designed for all kinds of visual thinkers, including students, teachers, programmers, designers and anyone who enjoys reading online.
With Readily, you can easily highlight and annotate web pages, without having to switch between multiple platforms. The core features, including unlimited highlight colors and unlimited highlights, are free and always will be.
Additionally, Readily offers a sidebar infinite Excalidraw canvas, drag-and-drop highlight to canvas, and Excalidraw library support.
The data is stored locally in your browser, giving you complete control over your information. The extension is fast, private, and easy to use, making it the perfect tool for capturing and recalling information. With upcoming features like shared canvas, Notion/Obsidian integration, encrypted sync, and full-text search, Readily is sure to become an indispensable part of your instructional design workflow.
5. Handwriting Interactive Teaching Tool (HITT)
Chrome Store Rating: N/A
HITT, the Handwriting Interactive Teaching Tool, is a cutting-edge digital platform designed for instructional design in handwriting education.
It works in tandem with the latest editions of Handwriting Without Tears student workbooks and provides a comprehensive range of multimedia resources, such as digital letter and number formations, animations, music, and instructional videos, to help educators deliver engaging lessons.
HITT saves educators time by reducing prep time with its ready-to-teach lessons and flexible presentations that can be tailored to fit the unique needs of the classroom and engage different learning styles. It is compatible with any interactive whiteboard or projector and includes interactive digital workbook and teacher's guide, multimedia options, cross-curricular connections, and customizable lesson plans.
With HITT, teachers can deliver dynamic lessons with ease and little to no preparation required.
6. MindManager Snap
Chrome Store Rating: 4/5
Mind Manager Snap allows you to quickly and easily capture information from the web and add it to your MindManager maps and diagrams.
This extension makes the process of organizing and sharing information more streamlined, as you can add links, text, and images to your maps with just a simple right-click.
This saves you time and effort and ensures that your content stays safe and secure in a cloud-based queue until you're ready to add it to your map.
The integration with MindManager, a powerful mind mapping and visual work management software, enables you to transform scattered ideas and data into dynamic digital mind maps, flowcharts, org charts, timelines, matrices and more.
With Mind Manager Snap, you can enrich, expand and improve your instructional design projects in new and exciting ways.
7. MindMeister Quick Access
Chrome Store Rating: 4/5
MindMeister Quick Access is a valuable instructional design tool for users who want to increase their productivity, improve collaboration and make accessing and creating mind maps more convenient.
The Chrome extension provides quick and easy access to MindMeister mind maps, allowing you to open and filter your maps directly from the Chrome toolbar, create new blank maps with ease, and work together with others on projects in real-time.
By offering these key benefits, MindMeister Quick Access is an excellent solution for instructional designers who want to work more effectively and efficiently.
8. Figma
Chrome Store Rating: 4.5/5
Figma is a valuable tool for instructional designers seeking to streamline their design process. The Figma for Chrome extension provides several key benefits, including the ability to connect to Google Calendar, add relevant Figma and FigJam files to events, and display these resources directly in the calendar event for easy access by all participants.
This extension makes it easy to stay organized, prepare for meetings, and ensure that everyone is on the same page.
The Figma for Chrome extension is a must-have for instructional designers who want to work more efficiently and effectively.
Choosing the right instructional design Chrome extension
Chrome extensions for instructional design provide a range of powerful tools and features that can help instructional designers create engaging and interactive eLearning courses and presentations.
From adding multimedia elements and creating custom animations, to creating assessments to measure learners' progress — kickstart your training programs with this list of instructional design Chrome extensions in your arsenal.
Save 20+ hours a month explaining, training & answering quick questions. Send a Scribe instead.
