I decided to build Phase 1 of my course for the content module assignment. My course is an orientation course for our incoming Canvas Tech Rovers, hosted on the Canvas platform. The CTRs complete Phase 1 three weeks prior to their official start date and it is designed to prepare them for the job. I approached the design of this module by thinking back on the CTR interviews. I recall during the interviews when I gave them the opportunity to ask questions at the end, two questions kept coming up: (1) What is a typical day like as a CTR? (2) What types of training will be provided?
Keeping these questions in mind, I decided to start Phase 1 with an overview of their role as a CTR. This is also where I embedded my digital story, which I will talk more about later in my reflection. Following the video is a “Meet Your Mentor” activity where the CTRs have an opportunity to meet up with an existing CTR that works in the same Faculty they are assigned to. Although all our CTRs have similar responsibilities, every Faculty have specific processes in place that is different from other Faculties; this is knowledge that needs to be transferred by existing staff at the Faculty.
After they have a better understanding of their role, they begin to start exploring the Canvas platform. There is a self-paced online training course created by CTLT that covers the basics of Canvas. Without re-inventing the wheel, I’ve incorporated these training materials into the course. Oftentimes when students are asked to self-learn by going through a list of documentation or training videos, it can become boring because they don’t see the relevance. Therefore, I asked the students to go through the training modules with specific scenarios in mind and consider when and how they would make use of these materials. The scenarios are later used in their case study assignment. After each training module, there is a knowledge check quiz that the students complete. Feedback is provided immediately upon submission of the quiz.
Following that is a case study activity where they choose one of the scenarios and come up with a solution to the proposed problem. This is an opportunity for them to try and apply what they have learned in a real life situation. This form of assessment will allow them to develop skills to “provide coherent explanations; generate plans for problem solution; implement solution strategies” (Anderson, 2008). These are skills that CTRs use on a daily basis when providing support to the Faculty.
In addition, I used a setting in the discussion forum where “users must post before seeing replies”. I did this intentionally so that students are not influenced by other’s opinions before posting their own, since the case studies are designed so that there can be multiple ways of approaching the problem. This will also spark discussion when the students read each other’s approaches to the same problem. They may come across ideas that support or challenge their own ideas. This peer to peer interaction encourages development of multiple perspectives as well as gains in cognitive learning and critical social skills (Anderson, 2008).
Lastly, there is a wiki assignment that all the CTRs contribute to. The goal is to build a Canvas resource page that not only existing CTRs can rely on but also for future CTRs to use and continue building on. It is a collaborative activity where everyone comes together to construct new knowledge. Canvas has a neat feature that allows you to easily change a “Page” to a “Wiki Page” which is a great for activities that involve collaboration, sharing, and content creation (Bates, 2014).
I have a good understanding of Canvas from a technical standpoint but this assignment really allowed me to think about the pedagogy and design side of developing a course. It also allowed me to reflect on the content covered in the different learning modules and how it applies to the process of designing an online/blended course.
For my digital story, I decided to use Powtoon to create my video. The main reason was because I’ve heard about Powtoon for quite some time now but never used it. The previous version was very basic and it didn’t look professional but it has improved significantly since then. I was looking for a tool that can produce something that is different from what the CTRs have already experienced as a student. For example, since they are all co-op students, many of them have already been exposed to lecture videos or how-to videos. I wanted to refrain from creating a power point with voice over that contains too much text and they may tune out from watching it (Siemens, 2003). Powtoon focuses on video animation which is often not used in formal lecture videos and I thought that would be more engaging. I like how Powtoon has a lot of existing “artifacts” and visuals for me to use without needing to create them from scratch. It greatly reduces the production time because I don’t have to create my own graphics or search for copyright-free images online. I’ve used Camtasia and VideoScribe before and I had to create a lot of the visuals or content myself. It took a lot longer to produce a 3 minute video using Camtasia or VideoScribe compared to Powtoon. I included the digital story in the beginning of Phase 1 of my course as a fun way to start off the course.
References:
Anderson, T. (2008a). Towards a theory of online learning. In T. Anderson & F. Elloumi (Eds.), Theory and practice of online learning. Edmonton AB: Athabasca University. Retrieved from http://www.aupress.ca/books/120146/ebook/02_Anderson_2008-Theory_and_Practice_of_Online_Learning.pdf
Bates, T. (2014). Pedagogical differences between media: Social media. In Teaching in digital age, Chapter 9. Retrieved from http://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/chapter/9-5-5-social-media/
Siemens, G. (2003). Evaluating media characteristics: Using multimedia to achieve learning outcomes. Elearnspace. Retrieved from http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/mediacharacteristics.htm