FINAL BLOG ONTL 7201 PRODUCING DIGITAL CONTENT FALL
2015
Barbara J.
Anderson 11-28-15
This is the final blog for the Certificate
Program in Online Teaching and Learning.
I am excited to have completed this four course sequence, but I am very
nostalgic about all of my class experiences.
I will miss the work load that I have become accustomed to (about 1000
hours logged in for the four courses) and the interaction with my student peers
and instructors. All four courses have
been very different, but valuable to my ability to be a better teacher in
general and to learn how to facilitate, design, and build an online
course. All four courses are exemplary
as are the instructors who guided me throughout this process. The instruction, guidance, and facilitation
given by the instructors have allowed this journey to be exciting, productive,
and important for me.
Each course in the Certificate Program had
a different focus. I came to the first
course as a veteran instructor of 43 years with 8 years of experience teaching
in the online environment (with no formal training for it!). ONTL 6101-Introduction to Online Learning
re-introduced me to the mechanics of teaching. The seven principles for
excellence in undergraduate education should be the cornerstone for any college
course (Chickering and Gamson, 1987), including mine. Never having been on the student end of an
online course was a brand new experience for me. Learning to navigate the discussion board was
also important in understanding the importance of communication for building a
strong online community. My first
experience using group work online was challenging but productive.
ONTL 6201 Facilitating Online Learning
continued the interaction between students utilizing the Discussion Board and I
got more practice by being part of another group project. This second course was about facilitating
techniques for an online course. I
learned how to manage discussion board posts and responses which are an
important component of online classes. I
was introduced to the instructor function for a live Collaborate session. I think that Collaborate is an important
technique to be used in an online class to build a stronger online
community. I set up the session, loaded
a powerpoint presentation, and led the session for my classmates.
The third class, ONTL 7101-Designing
Online Courses has been the most challenging of the four courses. It was enjoyable finding all of the resources
to build my practice online course (Survey of Biology 1100 online), but it was
a great deal of work. I already have
been able to use some of those resources in my current online class to improve
it. In addition to finding resources,
much time and effort was devoted to evaluating the projects of my
classmates. Both the positive and
negative comments from my peers helped me to build a better design for my
course. At the end of the course the
Quality Matters rubric (Anonymous, 2013) was used to evaluate the design for
each other’s courses. This exercise gave
valuable practice in evaluating course design and student interaction which
assisted in building a strong online community in ONTL 7201. All of these experiences in ONTL 6101, 6201,
and 7101 have prepared me well to finish my journey in the Online Teaching and
Learning Certificate Program in ONTL 7201-Producing Digital Content.
In ONTL 7201-Producing Digital Content it
was exciting and validating to actually see the course that I had designed in
ONTL 7101 become a reality. Lesson 1
served as an introduction to get started in the course by reviewing my course
design and paper from ONTL 7101, committing to the Learning Agreement, and
writing an initial blog for ONTL 7201 including my expectations for the course.
In Lesson 2 I set up the “high structure”
for my course. This meant that I set up
the course menu to provide easy navigation for students (QM 6.3). I made the course entry page the
Announcements, made the course available so that is was visible to students,
and made a course banner (which I lost while revising the file manager at the
end of the course L-hoping to be able
to redo it!). These tasks supported 7201
course objective 1-set up course structure and 2-set up a course menu. All seven principles for successful
undergraduate education (Chickering and Gamson, 1987) should be considered at
every step in the implementation in the design of the course. Some of the QM standards match well to the
ONTL 7201 course objectives and/or lessons, while others are more general
throughout the practice course Bio 1100.
Standards 6.1 and 6.3-5 concern themselves with course technology and
therefore are applicable throughout the whole course, Bio 1100 online tools and
media support course learning objectives (QM 6.1), navigation is logical and
easy for students to follow (QM 6.3), students will be able to easily access
technologies needed for the course such as Blackboard, Collaborate, SimUText
labs, and Launchpad (LP/LC) quizzing (QM 6.4), and the technology used such as
Blackboard 9.1, SimUText and LP (2015) are current (QM 6.5).
Lesson 3 included providing structure for
my content presentation for Bio 1100 online.
Course objective 3-creating standard learning module templates was
matched with content of this lesson. So
in this lesson I used learning modules to create the lesson structure
(including a table of contents) with place holders for content, assignments,
and assessments.
I really felt like I was implementing my
course design as I began working on Lesson 4 which involved actually adding
content to my module structure for Lesson 1-Introduction, Lesson 7-Evolution,
and Lesson 9-Populations (CO 4). I
worked on this lesson for three weeks.
In the first week I added content to Lesson 1-Introduction. This included articles on being an online
learner as well as various tutorials to assist students in the use of
Blackboard, Collaborate, etc. The
content was designed to help students have a good foundation from which to
start the Bio 1100 online course. In
addition, I learned to construct a File Manager as part of the Control Panel –
Files tab. This was completely new to me. It is valuable as a method for storing and
organizing important files for use as the course is taught and revised. Late in the ONTL 7201 course I went into the
File Manager to add more files and do a final organization. Quite by accident (or more probably due to
lack of my skill) I deleted most of the graphics and some of the links
throughout my practice course. I have
restored most of it, but with much time required to fix it.
In the second week of Lesson 4 I added
content to Lesson 7-Evolution. Articles,
websites, and videos were added to support the topic of evolution. I gained practice and skill in adding
clickable links to these items and embedding videos. As much as I could, videos were set for
closed captioning so that text would appear on the screen for students with an
auditory disability (done in all three of my lessons). Where this could not be done, a written
transcript was provided for students (QM 8.1-3). Pages were designed neatly and with enough
white space to avoid distractions while reading. Content was provided for students on group
work, the group experiment on pollution, and journal assignments.
In the third week of Lesson 4 I added
content to Lesson 9-Populations. Again
background articles, websites, and videos were included to support the
objectives and instruction for the population lesson. Consideration was again given for
accessibility issues for closed captioning and clear pages.
Many of the QM standards can be applied to
entering content for the three parts of Lesson 4. Again accessibility issues in QM 8.1-3 were
considered and implemented for the three lessons by using closed captioning
where available for videos or including a transcript (twice) and by keeping
pages clean, clear, and with a lot of white space to minimize
distractions. QM standards 2.2-5 concern
themselves with lesson learning objectives.
All objective used measurable verbs from Bloom’s taxonomy at levels
1-6. All help satisfy the course
objectives (aligned) and are stated clearly with content methods to achieve
them. Objectives are appropriate for a
freshman level nonmajors biology course for these lesson topics. QM 4.1-6 are appropriate to these lessons as
they speak to instructional materials which in this case refers to content. I included print and video materials that
would allow students the information required for them to achieve the learning
objectives. Students were made aware of
the purpose of each content item, they were current, and resources were
identified as required or optional. I
tried to select a variety of content resources such as articles (visual),
website (read/write), interactive (kinesthetic), and videos (visual and
auditory) so that all learning styles could benefit to access needed content
information. QM 6.2 includes using tools
that actively engage students. I believe
this is true for many of the resources that I selected. For this content section I believe that 5 in
the seven principles for successful undergraduate education concerned itself
with encouraging students to spend time on task was addressed.
Lesson 5 addressed student-student
interactions which matches with CO 5. In
this lesson I wanted to include methods for students to interact, communicate,
and build a stronger online community.
For my Bio 1100 course plan I included Discussion Board activities in
each of my three lessons and a small and large group project. This lesson also addressed learning principle
2 about student interaction as required for successful undergraduate education. I included 1-2 lesson specific discussion
board topics for each of my three lessons where a student would be required to
make an original post and then respond to two peers. In Lesson 1-Introduction this also included a
student introduction by each class member.
In Lesson 9-Populations I included a group discussion post with a
response to one other group. One of the
forums on the Discussion Board was for “Course Questions.” If a student had a general question where the
answer could also benefit other class members, then it should be posted in
Course Questions. Either the instructor
or other class members could interact to provide the answer. I also decided to incorporate some group work
into my Bio 1100 course. In Lesson 9 I
incorporated a small/short group project involving a web search for information
on local deer populations. This ended in
a group discussion post. Group work was
also introduced in Lesson 7 and continued through Lesson 9 (actually would end
in Lesson 11) for a large group project involving a group experiment on
pollution. Students would use the group
tab to join a group, make choices, communicate their products such as the
experimental design drafts, post results, and submit a group lab report. QM standards 1.8 (student introduction) and
5.4 (requirements for student interaction) are addressed in the student
interaction section. I created rubics
for both individual and group discussion formats.
Lesson 6 for creating assessments in the
form of tests and surveys was important for one of the methods for assessing
student knowledge (CO 6). For Lesson 1 I
created a survey on math skills needed
for coursework. This is valuable because
it will give me a way to determine needed remediation early in the course for
these skills, even though students must satisfy a math prerequisite before they
are allowed to enroll in the course. For
tests and surveys links were made available within the lesson module and on the
assessment menu tab for easy student navigation. I produced two types of testing assessments
in my content lessons 7-Evolution and 9-Populations. Each included a formative assessment called
Launchpad (LP/LC) which was an automatically graded online quiz from the
textbook publisher where students could have immediate results based on text
content reading. The other type was a
summative assessment in the form of an instructor generated and graded essay/short
answer quiz after all lesson activity had been completed. Students were provided with a list of 8-12
possible questions for each lesson. The
instructor then chose two questions for the quiz for each lesson using
Blackboard for taking the quiz.
The second week of assessments was Lesson
7 which was involved with creating assignments to engage and assess students
with the content resources to provide a deeper learning experience (CO 6). Along with developing content resources, I
found designing and incorporating assignments to be one of the most challenging
units of the course (7201). Assignments
were housed in both the lesson module and an Assignment menu tab so students
could access assignments in either location.
In Lesson 1 the assignment was called a Scavenger Hunt whereby students
needed to incorporate introductory course information in order to complete the
assignment. As an incentive bonus points
would be given to students who submitted the assignment quickly. The Learning Agreement would also be
submitted as an assignment in Lesson 1 before students would be allowed to
advance to Lesson 2. In Lessons
7-Evolution and 9-Populations assignments were designed to actively engage the
student with the content. Lesson 7
assignments included completing a worksheet for the video Natural Selection and the Rock Pocket Mouse, completing a SimUText
interactive lab called Darwinian Snails,
and completing a journal entry specific to main evolutionary concepts. Lesson 9
assignments included a group websearch and assignment on local deer populations,
a SimUText interactive lab called Isle
Royale on predator-prey interaction, a 2 part assignment on human
population using a worksheet for PRB information from the World Population Data
Sheet and a PRB video on human population, and a journal entry on basic
concepts about populations.
Both test and assignment assessments
included successful undergraduate principle 6 (high expectations), 5 (time on
task), and 3 (active engagement) which are all important in achieving high
levels of learning These two parts are
measured by QM standards 5.1 and 5.2 whereby active engagement and learning
provide achievement of learning objectives.
Choices like SimUText interactive labs and interactive assignments for
videos, data sheets, etc also promote active learning. QM standards 3.1-5 are also addressed with
text and assignment assessments.
Assessments included a variety of different types to measure learning
objectives, rubrics are included where appropriate, and students have many
opportunities to demonstrate their level of learning.
In Lesson 8 I was concerned with
establishing mechanisms for instructor-student interaction (CO 7) which has
been found to be very important for student perseverance and success in course
completion. I had several tools
available to use to provide this type of interaction including: announcements, email, a conferencing tool
like Collaborate or Blackboard IM, my instructor contact information, and my
instructor introduction at the beginning of the term. I populated the menu item for Instructor with
my contact information including my phone number and email. I wrote a Welcome announcement to make
students feel welcome, give directions on how to get started, how to contact
me, and how to access tech support if they had technology issues. Blackboard IM would be useful for us to use
for chat, but it was unavailable to us this term. I chose Collaborate for my conferencing tool
which could be used for a live classroom session (Lessons 1 and 7) and/or for
virtual office hours or group work.
Announcements and Collaborate live sessions accomplish
instructor-student interaction for the one-many method of efficiency. Email, on the other hand allows individual
personal communication between instructor-student using the one-one
method. Each of these methods is used
for a different situation when instructor-student communication is
required. Undergraduate success
principle 1 addresses student-faculty interaction and 4 addresses prompt
feedback. Prompt feedback for email or
course question responses should be within 24-48 hours and assignment grading
should be completed within one week.
Prompt feedback is important so that students can gauge their learning,
correct their mistakes, and then move forward in their learning. QM standard 1.7 suggests that an instructor
introduce themselves to their students early in the course as an early part of
faculty-student interaction. I started
the Introduction thread on the Discussion Board and gave my introduction first
and then invited students to each add their introduction. QM 5.3 refers to feedback policy. This is also stated in the syllabus and
orientation.
The last content lesson of ONTL 7201 was
Lesson 9 where both the syllabus and orientation were constructed over a two
week period of time (CO 9). I created
both a pdf (printable) and modular version of the syllabus for Bio 1100
online. I included such items as: course objectives, course lesson topics,
course materials, course format, major assessments, grading policies,
assignment schedule, and various course policies and student help
information. A separate course
schedule/calendar with current due dates would be furnished when the course is
actually taught. In the second part of
this lesson I constructed an orientation for Bio 1100 online to include: a course introduction and structure, time
commitment requirement, communication methods to be used, policies on
netiquette, late work, extra credit, incompletes, S-F, withdrawal, plagiarism,
and accessibility, and methods of interaction with students.
The syllabus and orientation address QM
standards 1.1-1.6 on class instructions to start, purpose and course schedule,
netiquette, policies, prerequisites, and needed skills. QM 2.1 refers to the need to include course
objectives. QM 5.2 refers to the
expectation that students should have to engage in active learning. QM 5.4 states the requirements for
student-student interaction. QM 6.3
states the importance of clear logical navigation throughout the course. QM 7.1-4 addresses learner support in regard
to technology, accessibility, and academic areas. QM 8.1-8.4 addresses accessibility. All of these QM standards are addressed in the
syllabus and/or the orientation for Bio 1100 online.
I am pleased with the practice course that
I have produced during ONTL 7201. I am
thankful for all of the prior knowledge and experience in ONTL 6101, 6201, and
7101. Without the expert leadership of
my instructor Barbara Mandel in ONTL 7101, actually implementing the design in
ONTL 7201 would have been somewhere between just overwhelming and
impossible. With her expert guidance, I
took small steps in a big plan of building an entire online course. Because of that method I have been able to
successfully build three lessons for my Survey of Biology 1100 online
course. This design will greatly improve
that class and help to make my students to be more successful in achieving
course and lesson objectives, form a strong online community, and be persistent
in course completion and satisfaction.
This has been a long, but important journey form me. Because of these four ONTL courses I have
become a better teacher in many aspects, have re-invented my teaching, and feel
quite confident in my ability to design a good online class. Thank you.
References
Anonymous. (2011). Quality matters
rubric standards 2011-2013 edition with assigned point values (online)
retrieved August 6, 2015
Chickory, A. and Z. Gamson. (2007). Seven principles for good practice in
undergraduate education (online) retrieved August 5, 2015
