WGU D292: Learning Experience Design Foundations II

Where D292 Fits in the Learning Experience Design Program

D292, Learning Experience Design Foundations II, is the second of the two foundational courses in WGU's learning experience design sequence. It carries three competency units and sits in the first term of the M.S. in Learning Experience Design and Educational Technology, with Learning Experience Design Foundations I as its stated prerequisite. If Foundations I taught you to understand the learner and define the instructional problem, D292 is where you design something for that learner and show the design would work before anyone builds it.

Direct answer: D292 is assessed through submitted performance work, not a proctored multiple-choice exam, so passing comes down to producing deliverables that answer every rubric prompt explicitly. Build one coherent instructional problem and carry it through ideation, storyboard, mockup, and usability test plan, then reread each rubric line and confirm your document literally says what it asks for. Most returned submissions fail on completeness and specificity, not on knowledge.

The people taking this course are usually working adults already close to the field: K-12 teachers moving into curriculum or edtech roles, corporate trainers formalizing what they have been doing by instinct, and instructional designers who want the credential to match the job. That matters, because the course rewards practical judgment more than memorization. You are being asked to think like a designer who has to hand a plan to a developer and have it be buildable.

D292 also earns its keep across the rest of the program. The problem statement and design artifacts you produce here inform later coursework, so sloppy work now becomes rework later. Treat it as the moment you set your own template for how you design.

What the D292 Performance Assessment Actually Asks You to Produce

Per WGU's official course description, D292 picks up at the third, fourth, and final phases of the Design Thinking process and covers rapid prototyping. The competencies listed in the program guidebook map cleanly onto what you submit:

• Ideation. Generating solutions to an instructional problem using Design Thinking and the practical application of learning theories — not one idea, but genuinely distinct options you can defend.
• Storyboarding. Creating a storyboard that communicates your intended instructional design strategy and the content for an e-learning solution, screen by screen.
• Low-fidelity mockups. Producing a "look and feel" mockup of an e-learning module that incorporates visual design principles and usability best practices.
• Usability test planning. Planning a usability test that details how data will be collected and analyzed and how the usability of the solution will be evaluated prior to deployment.
• Course planning. The guidebook also lists an opening step where you discuss your course planning tool report with your instructor and build a personalized course plan together — do this early; it is not optional filler.

Notice the through-line: one instructional problem, then progressively more concrete artifacts. Evaluators are checking whether your storyboard reflects the idea you chose, whether your mockup reflects your storyboard, and whether your test plan would actually evaluate the thing you designed.

Difficulty and How Long It Realistically Takes

D292 is not conceptually brutal. There is no heavy math, no proctored time pressure, and the source material is readable. What makes it a medium-difficulty course is the revision loop: performance assessments are graded against detailed rubric aspects, and a submission that reads well but skips a required element comes back marked not passed on that aspect alone.

Many students report finishing D292 in roughly one to three weeks of focused effort, with the storyboard consuming the largest single block of time. Students who already build training materials at work often move faster; students new to design tools usually spend an extra few days just getting comfortable producing a clean mockup. Plan for at least one revision cycle rather than assuming a first-attempt pass, and give yourself calendar room for evaluator turnaround before your term ends.

If you want a sense of how a comparable deliverable-heavy course feels, the pacing here is closer to D184 Standards-Based Assessment than to a memorization-driven objective assessment.

A Study Plan Built Around Deliverables, Not Chapters

Preparing for a performance assessment is a different sport. You are not building recall; you are building a product. Structure your prep accordingly.

Days 1–2: read the rubric before the course material. Open every task rubric first and turn each aspect into a checklist item in a blank document. That checklist becomes your outline. Then read the course material with the checklist beside you, noting which reading answers which rubric line.

Days 3–4: lock your instructional problem. Pick something you know firsthand — a workplace onboarding gap, a specific skill your students consistently miss. Concrete beats impressive. Write one measurable learning objective and refuse to change it after this point, because every later artifact has to trace back to it.

Days 5–7: ideate, then narrow. Force yourself to sketch several genuinely different approaches before committing. Your options need to read as distinct solutions, not three flavors of the same slideshow. Use active recall here: close the material and explain out loud which learning theory justifies each option and why. If you cannot explain it without notes, you do not understand it well enough to defend it in writing.

Days 8–12: storyboard and mockup. Work screen by screen. For each screen, state what the learner sees, what they do, and what instructional purpose it serves. Keep the language plain enough that a developer with no context could build from it. For the mockup, low fidelity is the assignment — legible layout, deliberate hierarchy, and defensible visual choices beat polish.

Days 13 and beyond: usability test plan and self-review. Specify who tests, what tasks they perform, what data you collect, and how you will analyze it. Then do a spaced pass: leave the whole package alone for a day, come back cold, and reread it against your rubric checklist as if you were the evaluator. That gap in time is what makes you notice the missing sentence.

Mistakes That Send D292 Submissions Back for Revision

• Designing an activity instead of a solution. A single worksheet or one interactive quiz is usually too small. The course asks for an e-learning solution with structure and flow.
• Losing the thread between artifacts. A mockup that contradicts your storyboard, or a test plan that evaluates something you never designed, is one of the fastest routes to a revision request.
• Naming a learning theory without applying it. Calling a design "constructivist" proves nothing. Show the specific design choice the theory produced.
• Vague learning objectives. If the objective is not observable and measurable, nothing downstream can be evaluated against it.
• Over-polishing the mockup and under-writing the rationale. Rubrics reward explained reasoning far more than visual flourish.
• Treating usability testing as a satisfaction survey. The plan needs concrete tasks, collected data, and an analysis method — not "I will ask if they liked it."
• Skipping the instructor conversation. Course instructors will tell you exactly where submissions in this course typically fall short. That conversation is free information, and the guidebook builds it in as your first step.

D292 Readiness Checklist

• Can you state your instructional problem and one measurable learning objective in two sentences, without notes?
• Can you describe multiple genuinely distinct solution ideas and defend why you chose the one you chose?
• Can you name the learning theory or instructional framework behind each major design decision and point to the screen where it shows up?
• Can you hand your storyboard to someone unfamiliar with your project and have them explain the learner's path back to you?
• Can you justify each visual choice in your mockup using a specific design or usability principle?
• Can you explain what low fidelity means and why it is appropriate at this stage of prototyping?
• Can you lay out your usability test — participants, tasks, data collected, analysis method — in a single clear paragraph?
• Can you point to the exact sentence in your submission that satisfies each rubric aspect?
• Can you trace an unbroken line from your original problem statement through to your evaluation plan?

D292 FAQ

Is D292 an objective assessment or a performance assessment?

D292 is assessed through performance work — submitted deliverables evaluated against rubrics, rather than a proctored objective exam. The competencies listed in WGU's official program guidebook are all things you produce: ideation, a storyboard, a low-fidelity mockup, and a usability test plan. Always confirm current requirements on your own course page, since WGU updates course versions over time.

How many competency units is D292 worth?

Three competency units, according to the official WGU program guidebook for the M.S. in Learning Experience Design and Educational Technology, where it appears in the first term alongside Foundations I and D293 Assessment and Learning Analytics.

Do I need to finish another course before D292?

Yes. The guidebook states that Learning Experience Design Foundations I is a prerequisite for this course, so the sequence matters going in. Coming out, later courses in the program build on the design thinking you practice here, which is a strong argument for doing it carefully rather than quickly.

Do I need professional design software to pass?

No. The course asks for low-fidelity storyboards and mockups, which are about communicating structure and intent. Standard document, slide, or free wireframing tools are sufficient as long as your output is legible and your reasoning is explicit.

How hard is D292 compared to other WGU education courses?

Many students describe it as manageable but detail-sensitive — the challenge is rubric compliance rather than difficult content. If you have handled a deliverable-heavy course such as D636, the workload will feel familiar.

What should I do if a task comes back not passed?

Read the evaluator comments literally and fix exactly what is named, without rewriting sections that already passed. Revision requests in this course are usually about a missing or under-explained element, and a targeted fix resubmits faster than a full rebuild. You can browse more School of Education guides or the full library of WGU course guides while you wait on feedback.

For official course details, always check the current listing on wgu.edu, since program versions and requirements change.