This post is the reflection portion of my ETEC 524 Assignment 2 Part 1. For this assignment I was tasked with creating a unit of learning within an LMS environment. Below is how I approached the assignment.
Overall Approach
I have designed an online faculty development course for Rady Faculty of Health Sciences (RFHS). This course is intended to be an introduction to assessment that will provide the foundation for more advanced work in assessment. I carefully considered the needs of my audience throughout the design of the course.
| Audience Characteristic | Design Decision |
|---|---|
| Multiple Campuses – RFHS is spread between two different campuses on different ends of Winnipeg. This makes face to face delivery difficult to coordinate. | Online Delivery – The course will be delivered online. |
| Learner Diversity – RFHS is comprised of 5 different colleges including dentistry, medicine, nursing, pharmacy, and rehabilitation sciences. Currently, the colleges are not all using the same LMS. Some are using Brightspace and others are using a custom version of Entrada (Elantra). | Neutral Platform – I chose Google Classroom as the LMS to avoid the appearance of favoritism. Part of this design decision is more politics than pedagogy but there are also a number of other benefits of using Google Classroom I will outline below. |
| Emphasis on Interprofessionalism – One of the reasons for forming RFHS was to encourage interprofessionalism. | Group Discussion and Collaboration in Formative Activities – The activities have been designed to encourage discussion between participants. Ideally learners will be able to learn from participants in other disciplines. |
| Busy Adult Learners – Learners will likely be working full time while taking the course. | Simple, Clean, and Coherent Design – the course has an intentional minimalist design with a lack of visual clutter. I used Google Classroom defaults based on Material Design. Material Design is visually impactful, mobile-friendly, accessible, and based on industry best practices (“Material Design Accessibility,” n.d.). Limited External Technology – I intentionally limited external technology and kept activities within the LMS and integrated G Suite apps (Google Docs, Google Forms, Google Slides, YouTube). The reason for this was to limit the cognitive load on learners so that they can focus on the content instead of learning new technology (Mast, 2018). Assigned Deadlines – To help student keep on track I assigned due dates to activities and assignments using Google Classroom. This allows learners to sync these dates with their calendar and set reminders. |
| Specific Learning Goals – Learners are taking the course for a specific reason. They want to create better assessments for their learners. The course needs to be directly applicable to their professional context. | Applied and Authentic Assessments – after completing the course learners will have produced something they can immediately apply to their workplace. Authentic assessments incorporate important cognitive and social skills that are aligned with the contexts and prior knowledge of learners (Beck & Hatch, 2010). Authenticity in assessment directly addresses adaptability and transfer of knowledge in educational programs (Billett, 2012; James & Casidy, 2018). Learners are encouraged to explore topics and questions directly from their workplace. |
| Shift Workers – Many of the Faculty in RFHS are shift workers that work professionally in clinical settings. | Asynchronous Learning – The course has built in flexibility for learners to complete when it is convenient for them. Synchronous activities and lectures have been avoided. Mobile Friendly – The content of this course can be accessed from mobile devices. |
| Culture of Continuous Quality Improvement – It is expected that work within RFHS is continuously improved. | Iterative Design – The course has an iterative design and feedback collected during the formative activities will shape the overall direction of the course. This can be seen in how the introductory activities are revisited later in the course. One of the affordances of using Google Docs is that content can be dynamic. If it is linked in several spots it will constantly be up to date. This was important for Challenges activity. |
| Accessibility is important | Built in Google Accessibility – Google Classroom and G Suite Apps have accessibility features readily available for learners (“Accessibility for every student,” n.d.). This was another reason to avoid external tools that might not have similar support for accessibility. Writing for Screen Readers – Content was formatted using heading tags to support screen readers. |
References
Accessibility for every student. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://edu.google.com/intl/en_ca/why-google/accessibility/?modal_active=none.
Beck, L. M., & Hatch T. (2010) Authentic Assessment. In: C. S. Clauss-Ehlers (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Cross-Cultural School Psychology (pp. 135-137). Boston, MA: Springer.
Billett, S. (2012). Authenticity in Learning Activities and Settings. In N. M. Seel (Ed.), Encyclopedia of the Sciences of Learning (pp. 388-391). Boston, MA: Springer.
James, L. T., & Casidy, R. (2018). Authentic Assessment in Business Education: Its Effects on Student Satisfaction and Promoting Behaviour. Studies in Higher Education, 43(3), 401-415. doi:10.1080/03075079.2016.1165659
Mast, K. (2018, October). Multimedia in E-Learning; How it Benefits, How it Detracts and the Dangers of Cognitive Overload. University of Arizona Campus Repository. Retrieved from https://arizona.openrepository.com/arizona/bitstream/10150/556151/1/Mast-ConfPaperMMElearn.pdf.
Material Design Accessibility. (n.d.) Retreived from https://material.io/design/usability/accessibility.html#hierarchy.