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Learning design4 min read
AI-assisted instructional design: what to automate and what not to
AI can halve the time it takes to produce a course. The secret is knowing where it adds speed and where pedagogical judgment is irreplaceable.
Producing a quality online course requires analysis, design, content development, assessment and testing. Generative AI has become an ally in several of those phases, but not all of them.
Where AI speeds things up
- First drafts of scripts, examples and cases.
- Question banks to review and refine.
- Reading-level adaptations and versions in other languages.
- Captions, transcripts and alt text for accessibility.
Where the designer decides
Defining learning outcomes, aligning activities and assessment, choosing the sequence and validating cultural relevance are decisions that require knowing the learners and their context. AI can propose there, but human judgment decides.
A workflow that works
Our approach combines prompt templates per phase, expert review at each deliverable and a quality checklist. The result is more speed without sacrificing pedagogical coherence.