Teaching With Plain Language

Ben submitted the following about clear communication, so important in e-Learning, especially if there is no live instructor!

"Experts sometimes forget that their learners may not be used to technical jargon being utilized on a regular basis.Explaining concepts by using plain language is a great way to avoid misunderstanding and confusion among your learners. Using speech or text that is conversational and easy to understand is key - no jargon or over use of technical terms. 

Here are two explanations of the same concept:

1.  An overly technical explanation…

'...Undetected data corruption, also known as silent data corruption, results in the most dangerous errors as there is no indication that the data is incorrect. Detected data corruption may be permanent with the loss of data, or may be temporary when some part of the system is able to detect and correct the error...'

2.  A plain language explanation…

'Have you ever started typing, had your fingers on the wrong keys, and just wound up with 'dp,r dpty pg honnodj?'

Sometimes computers can make a similar kind of mistake, and write data to a file in the wrong way. It can be difficult or even impossible to figure out what the data was supposed to [be], and it winds up being unusable.'

The second explanation is easier to read, understand, and is more conversational."