E-Learning, NOT Web-Page Templates!
June 6, 2008 12:00 AM
As you say, putting them at the top does NOT take up any more room than the bottom. Putting them at the top allows you to extend the bottom of the page below the screen so you can scroll the page. Several times I have had client pages that were a screen and a half tall or even 2 screens tall to show a special diagram or a long listing of some document. Nav buttons at the bottom would have required scrolling just to find the buttons, at the top they are always in the same place.Re. flow, yes that is true - you are at the bottom of the page (keep in mind this is culture dependent and Asian courses would be different). But still, research shows that after the first several screens it does not seem to matter much to the learner in terms of preference or in terms of speed in going thru the course. Just as long as the buttons are consistently located.There does not seem to be general consensus among researchers beyond what I have stated above and that we need to do more research. Courses are changing now from simple page turners which supported the above paradigm to more scenario based courses which may have different controls entirely. I personally supply key navigation along with mouse and allow learners to use some of the arrow or page keys. This makes things go even faster and then it matters not where the eye is.
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