“When do I get my certificate?” It’s one of the most common questions we receive from learners who’ve taken our Articulate 360 training courses. Whether it’s for a classroom session or an e-learning course, learners LOVE certificates! And with good reason. Certificates act as tangible proof of achievement, showcasing the skills and knowledge learners have gained throughout a course. They’re a bit like getting a gold star sticker, but for grown-ups!
Adding certificates to your e-learning courses not only keeps learners engaged, but also makes them feel accomplished. Many Learning Management Systems, like Articulate Reach 360, offer built-in certificates when learners complete a course. If your LMS does not support this feature, or if you simply want to incorporate a certificate into your Articulate Storyline 360 course, we have you covered! Let’s explore this “as heard in training” question: “How do I add a certificate to my e-learning course?
First, Make a Plan
Before you start adding a certificate to your course, you’ll need to plan a few details.
First, you’ll want to consider the slide size of your Storyline 360 course. Because your certificate will essentially be another slide in your course, the size of your certificate will be the same as the slide size of your project. In other words, you need to consider that if the learner decides to print the certificate, it may not fill an entire 8.5” x 11” sheet of paper.
Next, decide what you want to have displayed on your certificate. Most certificates include the:
- Learner’s name
- Name of the course
- Date of completion
Others may include the certificate’s issuer, which could be your organization or a specific person within it.
Some of these elements (like the course name and certificate issuer), are static and can be added directly to the slide using a text box, image, or logo. Others (like the learner’s name and the date), are dynamic, so you’ll need to come up with a plan for gathering and displaying that information.
Once your planning is squared away, you’re ready to start building the necessary components on your certificate slide. So, let’s explore how to do just that!
Create the Data Input
We’ll start with creating the data input for the learner’s name. If you haven’t collected the learner’s name elsewhere in the course, you’ll need to create a slide where they can enter this information using a Text-Entry field.
Tip: The Text-Entry field should be on a separate slide from your certificate slide, as the certificate slide should only display information.
Let’s demonstrate this with an example. Here we’ve created a slide where the learner can enter their name and the current date. Then, when they select the Next button, the certificate slide with their information appears.
Let’s peek under the hood in Storyline 360 to find out how this was done!
- To create a Text-Entry field where the learner can input their name, go to the Insert tab and select Input. From there, select Text Entry Field (under the Data Entry section).
- Draw the text entry box on the slide, and change the “type your text here” prompt to provide instructions to the learner.
In our example, the learner is instructed to enter their first and last name in the text box. When the learner enters their name, Storyline 360 stores it in a text variable.
Tip: It’s a good idea to name your variable. To do this, select the “Manage project variables” button in the Triggers panel and rename your variable from the default “TextEntry” to something that tells you (the developer) what that input field was (such as “Name”).
- Repeat this process by adding a field for the learner to enter the date (or any other dynamic information) on the certificate. And remember to rename variables after you create them; this greatly reduces the chance of errors along the way!
Build the Certificate
After creating text entries for any dynamic information, you can build your certificate slide.
- Add any design elements you’d like, such as a background image or your company logo.
- Add static information, like the title of the certificate, the course name, and the issuer.
- Leave some blank spots where dynamic information collected in the text entry boxes will be displayed.
To incorporate those dynamic fields on the certificate, you’ll need to insert text boxes with variable references.
- Select Insert | Text Box, then draw the text box on the slide.
- With your cursor inside the text box, head back to the Insert tab, and this time select Reference.
- In the pop-up window, select the variable you’d like to display.
Your slide now displays the name of that variable. But don’t worry, once a learner types something into the text entry box, your reference will display what they typed!
Bonus tip: In our example, we also included a Text-Entry box for the date, which was then referenced on our certificate slide. But if you want to automatically pull the date from the learner’s device, you can use JavaScript! While Articulate doesn’t provide support for JavaScript coding, they do have some best practices and examples you can check out to get started!
Provide a Print Option
Some learners may want to download or print their course certificate. Giving them this option is a breeze with the Print slide trigger in Storyline 360. Here’s how to do it!
- Select Insert | Button, and then draw the button on your slide and label it.
- Add a trigger to the button to print the certificate slide “when the user clicks Print button.” (In our example, the “Print Certificate” button is in the upper left corner of the certificate slide.)
We believe it makes sense to place the print button directly on the certificate slide, but it requires one additional step: we must also add a trigger to hide the print button when the user clicks it, and that trigger must be first in the trigger order.
You can think about it like this: The learner will click the Print Certificate button, after which Storyline 360 will hide the button and print the slide. This way, the printed version will not include the Print Certificate button. If you don’t like having the print button right on the certificate, you can move it to anywhere in the course; simply adjust your trigger to print the slide that contains the certificate.
Love our example? Feel free to download the exercise file and explore it further. If you’d like to review more step-by-step instructions, go ahead and check out this short video!
Have you created certificates for your e-learning courses another way? If so, please share your thoughts with us, we’d love to hear them! As we often say, there’s always more than one way to do something in Storyline 360!
Don’t Forget to Check Out the Quick Links!
For more on the Storyline 360 elements we explored here, check out the following posts from Articulate and The Articulate Trainer blog:
Storyline 360: Dynamic Variable Placeholders
Storyline 360: Print Slide Trigger
Storyline 360: Working with Data-Entry Fields
Storyline 360: Working with Triggers
Storyline 360: Working with Variables
Happy Articulating!
~ Elizabeth
Certificates are a great motivator for some people. I think it is a great idea to incorporate them into a course. Can this be added as a block for Rise 360?
Hi Paula! So glad you found this helpful! Yes, you could insert a custom certificate as a Storyline 360 block in Rise 360. For a seamless look, we’d recommend turning off menus and controls on the player, as well as having a button to move from the input slide with their name to the certificate slide.