Instructional Technology Training and Development (ITTD) offers professional development opportunities that explore diverse technologies and a variety of teaching and learning pedagogies to enhance instructional activities and daily operations. ITTD collaborates with the Extended Campus for all online course development and distance education partnerships. Instructional design and course development services for online programs are managed by the Extended Campus.
The course development models adopted by ITTD are "faculty as developer" and "faculty as SME."
In the “faculty as developer” model, ITTD instructional designers provide course mapping guidance, technical assistance, and feedback for the faculty member who builds the course in Blackboard.
In the “faculty as SME” model, the instructional designer builds the course in Blackboard after receiving content from the faculty member (Subject Matter Expert – SME). Instructional designers also provide course mapping guidance and feedback throughout the process. Each faculty member is assigned to a specific instructional designer for the development process.
Instructional Designers assist and advise with:
writing measurable learning objectives and aligning course elements with objectives
creating a course map
ideas for integrating active learning into an online course
technical assistance with Blackboard tools and assessments (tests, discussion forums, assignments, journals, etc.)
setting up the Bb Grade Center
video production
video captioning
creating interactive lessons using instructional technology tools (i.e. SoftChalk)
course banners
Online course development cohorts span for a period of 16 or 8 weeks and are coordinated through the Extended Campus. Faculty should be prepared to invest 10-20 hours per week during the development process.
ITTD offers interactive and engaging workshops, on-line learning experiences, as well as handouts and quick reference guides to help empower faculty. ITTD instructional designers facilitate a self-paced OL700: Teaching Online course designed to prepare NC A&T faculty to design and deliver quality online courses. Faculty participating in an online course development cohort also have access to an Online Course Development Guide that provides resources and tips for developing a quality online course.
Instructional designers review the course map and the first module at the beginning of the development process to ensure that the development process gets off to a great start. The second check-in and review occurs at the 50% point in the development process, and a final review is undertaken once development is complete. Faculty are encouraged to check-in weekly with their instructional designer to provide progress updates and request assistance as needed.
ITTD instructional designers are trained in applying the Quality Matters rubric and will recommend appropriate course design strategies throughout the development process.