Instructional design in the wild

Drinking from the fire hydrant: thinking about providing instructional structure and clarity

Today’s post isn’t strictly about “teaching with tech” as my newsletter title suggests, but the root idea remains. Lately, I’ve been thinking about the question: what happens when your instructions aren’t quite explicit or clear enough?

We proudly hang the municipal water calendar on my refrigerator (because, as my husband tells me, we can learn from it). This year, the March ca¹lendar topic was about fire hydrant flushing and consisted of the following bulleted list, also known as (and less-frequently talked about in the instructional design world) the instructional aide:

My town’s tips for managing hydrant flushing season. I promise I didn’t take this photo with a potato even though it looks that way.

I don’t know if it’s just me, but when I read “3. Fill a bottle with water and store it in the refrigerator to use for drinking or cooking” I imagined someone filling a water bottle…from the fire hydrant. Like so:

Thanks, ChatGPT, for helping me generate this off-putting image.

Something tells me this isn’t what our municipal employees were suggesting.

Also, is this the third step? Am I supposed to wait until the water looks rusty and then go out to my hydrant to fill the bottle? 🤔 Questions abound.

Improving instructional structure and clarity

Naturally, as an instructional designer who’s always thinking about teaching and learning (is this normal?), I thought about how I’d improve this.

First, I’d create more structure around the content. They’re giving you two types of information here: background on what to expect during hydrant flushing, and tips on how to change your behavior to accommodate potential water supply issues.

Then, I’d refine the instructions to provide a little more clarity (so no one’s filling their water bottle from the fire hydrant). Here’s how I’d structure the list:

---

Hydrant Flushing

What to expect each March and October

• Changes in water pressure: A temporary drop in water pressure is normal.

• Discoloration: Water may appear rusty or cloudy. It is not harmful.

• Discolored water will clear up after a few hours.

Helpful reminders during hydrant flushing season

• Prep drinking water beforehand: Before the hydrant flushing period, fill a bottle of water to use for drinking or cooking and store it in your fridge.

• Avoid washing white laundry while hydrants are being flushed.

• Flush your hot water tank: When any water discoloration returns to normal, flush your hot water tank.

---

Structuring the content in this way allows for people to bucket the content into what they’re thinking about vs. what they are doing. I also changed the numbered list to a bulleted list purposefully: we aren’t supposed to follow step-by-step instructions here, so the numbers aren’t necessary.

What happens when technical instructions are unclear?

While some technical issues can be attributed to poor UX, unclear technical instructions can also lead to less-than-ideal situations. A user might give up after a brief rage clicking session, for instance.

When designing technical instructions for a new user, it can sometimes be difficult to “forget” what you know as an expert user to write for a nontechnical audience. In order to avoid misinterpreted instruction (like the man trying to collect drinking water from a fire hydrant), it’s helpful to:

• Avoid technical jargon.

• Read through your instructions and follow the exact steps as written.

• Ask a newer user for feedback, or to try the instructions.

• Consult an LLM like ChatGPT or Claude: explain a little bit about your end user and their technical knowledge, and ask if there’s anything unclear about the instructions you’ve provided.

Instructional design in the wild: closing thoughts

I honestly feel like I come across bits of poorly designed instruction regularly, like the water calendar example here. The thought also crossed my mind while watching the tropically-set pre-flight safety video on a Delta plane last year, although that might be a topic for whole other post.

What are some examples you’ve seen recently?

1. I do recognize that the phrase “it’s like drinking from a fire hose” often comes up in teaching and learning when we are overwhelming new learners with content. It may seem like I slightly misremembered this phrase when creating the subtitle for this post. However, I’m actually referring to picturing a dude drinking from a fire hydrant, so. It was actually on purpose.