AECT Standard 3 (Learning Environments)
Candidates facilitate learning by creating, using, evaluating, and managing effective learning environments. Indicators:
Creating - Candidates create instructional design products based on learning principles and research-based best practices.
Using - Candidates make professionally sound decisions in selecting appropriate processes and resources to provide optimal conditions for learning based on principles, theories, and effective practices.
Assessing/Evaluating - Candidates use multiple assessment strategies to collect data for informing decisions to improve instructional practice, learner outcomes, and the learning environment.
Managing - Candidates establish mechanisms (p. 190) for maintaining the technology infrastructure to improve learning and performance.
Ethics - Candidates foster a learning environment in which ethics guide practice that promotes health, safety, best practice, and respect for copyright, Fair Use, and appropriate open access to resources.
Diversity of Learners - Candidates foster a learning community that empowers learners with diverse backgrounds, characteristics, and abilities.
How I apply this standard in my professional practice.
I have often applied this standard in my professional work, as well as my academic work. Previously as a digital media specialist with the KU Center for Online and Distance Learning, I often created instructional products based on best practices for learning. I often helped instructors create videos using these best practices, such as keeping videos short or including their image to increase their social presence. I also helped them select the appropriate tools and methods for creating their videos, from using Camtasia, to reading a teleprompter, to using a light board. I often discussed with these instructors how to guide their media use in respect to copyright and Fair Use to ensure they are creating an ethical learning environment. As this shows, I often applied this standard in my work.
In addition to this, I have applied this to my academic work. In ELPS 718 and ELPS 818, I have course plans based on research-based learning principles and best practices. For one class, I created a plan to educate instructors about the use of a media production studio space. For the other, I was part of a team that created a plan for an online version of ELPS 712: Instructional Media Development. The plans described how the learning outcomes would be assessed and maintained in the future when implemented. In another class, ELPS 818: Games and Simulations for Learning, I was a member of a team that designed a prototype for a simulation intended to educate students about a strategy for answering job interview questions. Our plan was based on best practices and also described assessment and implementation plans for the simulation. Class projects like this demonstrate how I have applied this standard to my academic, as well as professional, practice.
Examples of my work for this standard.
1. GEOL 302 Light Board Lecture Video ( Video Link )
2. ELPS 718 Performance Improvement Plan ( PDF )
3. ELPS 712 Course Design Document ( PDF )
4. Interview Simulation Design Document ( PDF )
My favorite web resources for this standard.