Writing phase
Goals and deliverables
This phase deals with writing all steps and adding these to the course design. This includes not just the texts for the article steps and discussions, but also those of supporting the video steps. Some time will go into the assessment texts, as formulating good quiz questions, answers and feedback are not always the easiest elements to think up. Many steps also need images to make the learning experience visually more stimulating. At the end of this phase, all texts and images are finished: we are ready to move all materials online and start the final stretch towards course launch. This phase takes roughly 6 weeks to complete.
Deliverable 5: Course steps
Before you start writing the actual steps, examine the general considerations below. Also, mind the following terminology in your writing:
General considerations
These are some general principles to keep in mind when writing steps:
1) Titles should be kept short (50 characters or less), non-generic (so not Video about Academic Integrity or Text on Energy system failures), unique, not using Title-case and ideally part of the narrative. Good examples for inspiration:
a. Meet our clinical linguist
b. How to deal with stress?
c. The 7 ways to become happy
d. Are you a procrastinator?
2) Longer articles should be cut up by subheaders and images to improve learning experience.
3) The first paragraph in each step will always be in bold (automatically), so make sure that the core of this step can be found there.
4) Almost all steps have a box with copyright. This should be University of Groningen, University of Groningen / UMCG or the partnership that designed the MOOC. We allow everyone to use our materials for free for non- commercial purposes, but nevertheless it is essential to show that it has been developed by our organisation.
5) Video, Article and Audio steps require a short description. These will not be visible in the course, but help search engines find the step. Using many content words in one or two sentences to summarize the step work best. E.g.
a. In this video, Prof Oldehinkel deals with the effects of fair of failure.
b. Energy systems are essential in dealing with the energy transition.
6) Check if you used British English or American English consistently (organised instead of organized; centre instead of center).
7) Try to write from the learners perspective, so use “you” rather than “we”.
8) Design for learners with English as their second language: e.g., simplified vocabulary, active voice.
9) We write Week 1, Week 2, etc with a capital. However first week and second week are without. This is a FutureLearn standard.
10) We also require that each Article and Discussion step contains an image at the top for stylistic reasons. Longer Article steps also require one or two in-text images to break it up and improve the learning experience.
11) Besides a caption with the title of an image, each image requires a so-called alt description that literally states what is in the image for learners that are visually impaired. An example:
· Caption text: Mona Lisa >> Alt text: Young woman smiling
· Caption text: Interaction >> Alt text: Two women talking
12) For advise on how to find images, look here.
Let's start writing!
Below you can find more details on how to write each step type. We advise you to create a Course Design document and add the empty templates for each Week, Activity and Step. This makes publication on the FutureLearn platform much easier during the next phase.
