Are you unsure where to start building your first hands on experience? This document will guide you through the decision process to enable you to proceed with building your lab from the rest of the Skillable documentation.
This article is for anybody that does not know where to start when building their first hands on lab or would like to review the high-level steps when building labs as a reminder. Some of the tasks are listed as optional but to build a full Skills validation experience all steps would need to be completed, however, often when building your first lab you will complete the required steps and then add on the optional steps afterwards.
Best Practices for Creating Your First Lab
To get the most from this document the clearer the idea you have for building a lab the better. If you are completely new to this process the best approach would be to start of with a lab you maybe already have, or for some content that exists that you would like to create a lab for. The more you know about the required outcome the easier the design process is.
Tasks to Complete
To have a lab published, and available for users there are several tasks that need to be completed. When reviewing the list below notice a significant number of the tasks can be optional. The list seems extensive but be aware some of the tasks are very quick to complete but have been listed for accuracy of the process:
Create a Lab Series
Create a Lab Profile
Build the environment
Configure the environment (optional)
Create the instructions (optional)
Build questions into the instructions (optional)
Build Automated Activities into the instructions (optional)
Enable scoring (optional)
Review the Lab Profile settings
Publish the lab
Add the lab to the LMS/LXP
Looking at some of the optional tasks they relate to features in Skillable Studio that you might not wish to use, for example for learning labs it is possible that scoring is not a requirement, and some customers do choose to not use our instructions, which does remove significant functionality but is why Skillable Studio can work the way your organization wishes too.
Before Starting to Build the Lab
Before you can start building the lab within Skillable studio you have to have an idea of what the lab is designed to allow the learner to achieve. It is possible that some ideas will evolve as part of the lab build process, but you should at least know the following:
What is the high-level objective or outcome of the lab?
What hands on environment/software will the learner be working in or on? For example a Windows computer with an application or a Public Cloud platform as examples.
What does the potential starting environment look like for the learner? For example is the application installed, are there resources already created in AWS?
At the end of this document is a detailed decision tree for the questions that need to be answered to start buyilding your first lab.
Building Your First Lab
Building a lab within Skillable Studio requires 4 core tasks, these are:
Create a Lab Profile - This could be from one of the Skillable templates or a custom creation by the Lab Developer
Configure the Environment- Update the VM, Container or Cloud to represent the starting environment that the learner will be initially connected to on lab startup
Create the Instructions - Create the instructions that the user will need to complete the lab tasks, this can use any instruction design methodology
Add Skills Validation Activities - If required add questions, automated activities and even enable scoring to validate a users capability and generate skills data
Lab Building and Publishing Workflow
Once you have established the environment the work can then begin on the other tasks of building a lab. This flowchart highlights a possible workflow. It is highly likely as familiarity develops with Skillable Studio and the possible delegation of duties between Lab Developers, Lab Authors, and QA, you will evolve your own workflow.
Building Your First Lab Decision Tree
The following detailed decision flowchart highlights the questions you need to know the answers to before you can start building the correct environment within Skillable Studio.
Related Topics
See the following individual articles for detailed instructions on the tasks you need top complete.