"Mindtools" Concept Map (created with www.bubbl.us)
Website showcasing Design Challenge 1 ("Paragraphs") and Design Challenge 2 ("Presentations")
Game Design Storyboard: "Reading Around the Diamond"
This course built upon ideas I had learned in 9484 and 9471. Designing a strictly online course will naturally involve more limitations than having face-to-face or blended options, and this course helped me understand how to overcome those limitations to design effective instruction.
The course stressed how designing online instruction begins with clear, well-thought-out objectives that will result in learning that is meaningful, that is, active, constructive, intentional, authentic, and cooperative. The textbook, William Horton’s “E-Learning by Design,” introduced three types of activities that online course designers can use to support meaningful learning: “Do,” “Connect,” and “Absorb” activities. During this course, I completed tasks that familiarized me with all three types and learned how to consider which type of task would be most effective for a specific objective and how to combine activity types when designing my online instruction.
The course also covered the use of “Mindtools” in online instruction. Mindtools are computer-based tools or programs that are used or adapted to help learners engage in critical thinking and higher-order learning. Mindtools can be utilized in numerous ways by a course designer to produce instruction that results in meaningful learning. For example, computing devices enable active learning by allowing learners to access or create microworlds, which encourages experimentation and manipulation. Please refer to my “Mindtools” concept map artifact to see more such relations. Building that concept map for this course was a good exercise in using a mindtool (bubbl.us) for meaningful learning.
The course assignments and projects helped me understand how to put e-learning design ideas to use. Firstly, I was able to practice more of the Mager/ABCD method of writing measurable learning objectives that I had learned in course 9471. For the design challenges, I used Google Sites to create Do, Absorb, and Connect activities, including a guided analysis for my students who are learning paragraph writing in English (see “Website” artifact above). I also developed rubrics for assessing the activities and prototypes for activities I would need to build in HTML5. Finally, I developed a storyboard for an online game that would help my students learn paragraph structure. For this task, I had to go step by step through the design process, starting with clear objectives (More ‘ABCD’!) and then developing a storyboard to demonstrate how the objectives would be met and the flow of the learning activity. I worked to achieve a balanced design as per the “Balanced Design Lens,” while also balancing the fun aspects of the gameplay. It was a thorough activity for learning the design process, and it was interesting to build the instruction as a game.
This course taught me to consider instruction, sequencing, scaffolding (including worked examples for expert modeling), as well as visual design. After completing the course, I have a good understanding of how to develop effective online instruction, starting with clear learning objectives and the use of suitable mindtools to engage students in meaningful learning.