I mentioned in my previous journal entry that I already have an idea of what my instructional design project would look like. I began to outline the flow of topics of project management as early as the first week of April and I finished the rough draft within several days. However, I reached a bottleneck after I considered how it would be taught to my target learners. 

I initially planned to conduct a Social Media-Based learning setup where I would utilize a social media platform and transform it into some sort of a course site. I thought about using a Facebook page as a venue for learning about project management where each post will contain a topic e.g. project characteristics, and the comment section is where the discussion between learners will take place. I extensively researched previous projects that used SMBL as a new learning methodology the way I envisioned and I found a couple of reliable ones. Putnik et al (2016) argued that the student's quality of work is increased by their interactions with their peers on social media and Zachos et al (2018) emphasized the positive impacts of Online Social Networks (OSNs) in the learning process, learning style, learner profile, OSNs as online learning platforms, and their utilization in higher education. Furthermore, Kumar and Nanda (2022) claimed that Facebook is a conducive social networking platform for both formal and informal learning as the learners can use it for group discussions and brainstorming activities, share multimedia materials, and facilitate interactions between them.

I was quite confident about it already but I realized that the cons of using it as a form of a Learning Management System outweigh its pros. First, although topics will be uploaded as posts, it would be difficult to organize them due to the limited features of the platform. Unlike a proper LMS where modules have their individual sections with specific areas for discussion forums and assignment bins, a Facebook page cannot provide this. Second, it would be difficult to integrate multimedia learning if social media is used as a learning methodology as text would probably dominate the presentation of information. Photos can be posted that contain the lesson but it would take a lot of time just designing them to ensure that there is a balance between textual and graphic elements. 

Third, learners will struggle with keeping a copy of the lessons for their own use. They can screenshot the post or save the photos but it would surely take a lot of storage space and deter the learners from actively engaging in the learning process due to the many efforts they would have to make to participate. I thought I could make a study guide to make the learning experience more organized and make it easy for learners to download the lesson. However, this made me realize that creating a printed material would be far more convenient than building an LMS out of a social media platform with a separate printed material to supplement it. This is where I began to conceptualize the creation of my Self-Learning Modules.

I spent a lot of time building an idea that I later scrapped. The mistake lies in me focusing too much on the modality rather than the actual instructional design. I was too keen on utilizing social media as a learning methodology that I failed to consider many aspects that later derailed my plans. After facing this setback, I immediately began designing SLMs with this experience in mind. I focused on presenting the content using instructional design principles e.g. Lamb’s (2005) guidelines on designing and developing printed materials and utilizing Open Educational Resources to supplement the discussion of project management. 

I felt more at ease with this strategy than the previous path I took. This experience taught me a lot of things but the most vital lesson I picked up was centering your attention on your project’s purpose. Furthermore, it is easy to be tempted to use a learning methodology that seems revolutionary due to its uniqueness but if one is not adequately equipped with the skills required to take it on, the project is doomed to fail.

Resources:

Kumar, V., & Nanda, P. (2022). Social Media as a Learning Tool: A Perspective on Formal and Informal Learning. International Journal of Educational Reform. https://doi.org/10.1177/10567879221094303

Lamb, A. (2005). Designing & developing resources: Print materials (Chap 7). In Building tree houses for learning: Technology in today's classrooms, 243 – 272

Putnik, G., Costa, E., Alves, C., Castro, H., Varela, L., & Shah, V. (2016).  Analysing the correlation between social network analysis measures and performance of students in social network-based engineering education. Int J Technol Des Educ 26, 413–437. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10798-015-9318-z

Zachos, G., Paraskevopoulou-Kollia, E.A. & Anagnostopoulos, I. (2018). Social Media Use in Higher Education: A Review. Education Sciences, 8(4), 194. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci8040194