I decided to do a bit of both for Assignment 5.

ETEC 565A – Assignment 5 – a Scenario for the LMS selection criteria

The University of Z has been using a home-grown LMS for the past 15 years; while the LMS has served them well, it is missing a modern look, learning analytics, and other features for creating a better online learning environment for its students. It does do very well with regard to course management features such as, various course and assessment related reports, and, a gradebook that has all the features required for the specific and unique grading requirements of the University.

The University has wanted to move onto an off-the-shelf solution instead of keeping up with the development and upgrade of their old system. It is aware that there are different requirements for different groups of users.

The learning and teaching focused teams are wanting more features that would support online learning, such as better online content creation, structuring the course online and flexibility to structure the course as needed. At the same time, they want to ensure the online environment is accessible and is inclusive for all students.

The course coordinators who manage the day to day activities in the LMS are wanting to ensure the course management, such as various reporting, their specific grading practices are not lost by adopting a new LMS. They would also like to see more features allowing them more options and flexibilities for managing communication with students. They also would like to see more reports on how students are using the system to help them track students and identify anyone potentially at risk for failing their courses.

The lecturing staff is not happy about changes, as they are busy, so they want a system that is easy to use and easy to learn. The new LMS preferably would take up less of their time once they learn how to use it.

The academics (both course coordinators and lecturing staff) are wanting more support to be available to them, more training and help around migrating to the new platform. Some of them are rather reluctant about all these changes.

The students want an LMS that looks more modern and easy to use. They also want easier access to the LMS via mobile devices so that they can access the information on the LMS while they are on the go.

The IT department wants a system that requires less maintenance, is secure and allows easy customization via building internal tools and plug that into the new LMS to meet their own University’s unique requirements. 

Your team has been asked to come up with criteria for a replacement LMS that would support all the stakeholders.

ETEC 565A – Assignment 5 – a Case study for Social Media

 Adam and Chelsea are a couple who both teach in the social sciences. Adam teaches in the high school for Grade 10 Social Studies while Chelsea teaches third-year undergraduate Political Studies at their local University.

It is the general election year in the country so, there are talks on TV, lots of discussions online and posts online about the election campaign from each party.

Adam has to cover political science in his social studies class. For Chelsea, this is the first time she’s teaching during the election year, as she’s only moved from a teaching assistant position to be the instructor in the last year.

Both Adam and Chelsea wanted to make use of these real-life events and examples in their classes but are a little unsure how to go about it.

How would you advise Adam or Chelsea (you may pick one) to bring these events into the classroom by utilizing social media? What can they do, how do they approach this and what are the other considerations they might need to be aware of?

ETEC 565A – Assignment 5 – Other case studies

We also have the following case studies with problems to solve, but it is hard to combine both higher ed and K-12 into them (Our classmates had indicated it’d be nice to have some choice. That’s why the main case study above provided that opportunity for them). If the course does use any of them, it’d be interesting to see what solutions our MET students come up with!

Student engagement and interaction

Mary teaches a second-year undergraduate Mathematics class, with 600 students. Over the last few years, Mary noticed that the attendance has dropped and students are not understanding the concepts needed to move on in class. It is mathematics; the course is structured so it builds on the concepts taught in each week. If Mary’s students do not understand enough of the previous concepts, subsequent concepts won’t make any sense to them! Mary is finding that the 40% of the class that actually turn up to lectures have very confused looks on their faces. When she asks the students simple questions based on the concepts from the previous class, most of the students don’t get it. As such, she’s finding herself repeating materials from the previous class and is unable to proceed and cover all the course content. All lectures are recorded, so Mary couldn’t help to blame the lecture recording for the lack of attendance, as most would.

Mary decides the class cannot go on like this and that something has to change. But what?

Can you think of some ways to help Mary to 1) improve students’ understanding of the concepts introduced, and 2) improve attendance and engagement?

We actually solved this scenario by using lots of Canvas quizzes, it seems crazy but the instructor created a quiz for every lecture. The students must complete a quiz on the current topic before the next class, which is usually in a day or two.  Yes, the quizzes count towards the final grade, otherwise the students would not bother. Surprisingly or unsurprisingly, students understand the concepts better and as an unintended consequence, students decided it was easier to come to class than forever catching up on lecture recording. It would be interesting to see if there are other ways to deal with this.

Assessment

Bob teaches a large first-year undergraduate Economics class, with 1400 students. The course consists of 3 x 1-hour lectures, plus a one-hour tutorial once a week starting from Week 2. The assessment structure for his course is simple, 2 x semester tests (20% each in Week 4 and Week 8) and a final exam worth 60%.

Bob only has a few TAs to help with marking, and it usually takes them four weeks to turn around each batch of test marking. The problem with this is that they can barely give out the test results of the Week 4 test before students have to take their second-semester test in Week 8.

The institution that Bob works for has pushed out a new set of policies for assessments across all courses. These policies must be implemented by 2019. Those specifically concerning Bob are:

• There should be more formal assessments of learning in the course. (Bob is not even sure what this means);
• There should be an early, appropriately weighted, assessment in the course, where students should receive feedback within the first three weeks of the 12-week semester; and
• The weighting of tests and the final exam should not exceed 70% of the final grades for any given course.

 Discuss how Bob can change the assessments of his course to meet the new requirements? More importantly, how can he change his assessment to provide more learning opportunities and more feedback that will support student learning? Keep in mind that he won’t get any additional resources to support marking.