PROJECT DOCUMENTATION

Course link: http://moodle.met.ubc.ca/course/view.php?id=658

My Course Topic

My course topic is on WCAG2.0 (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0).  The information is a bit dry but this standard is an important topic that more and more governments as well as corporations are growing to realize and implement.  Part of the reason for its rise in importance is that as web development becomes more complex and deep, it proportionately becomes more inaccessible for certain audiences due to their disabilities.  For e-learning this guideline means allowing a greater number of users to access courses and not to be unfairly barred (wittingly or unwittingly) due to any temporary or permanent disabilities.

Learners and the organization

While the WCAG2.0 is created to benefit those with disabilities, the target audience for my course is actually adult learners who are in web development related jobs creating the websites to be accessed by anyone including those with disabilities.  The organization that the learners from this course belong to are most likely work-based including but not limited to government, academia, and corporations.  In the e-learning community, this can include instructional designers, instructors, course administrators, school boards and other decision-makers and any subject matter experts who may be interested in how their topic of expertise may work within the WCAG2.0.

Role of the Instructor

The role of the instructor is deliberately minimal in this course.  Considering that this course is meant as a self-paced course that the learners are most likely taking as part of some mandatory work training, I wanted to design a course that can be available at any time to any employee who hasn’t taken the course yet.  Therefore as you may notice, there is no course schedule.

In a real-life scenario, all modules would be completed in full before presenting to the learners so that they can move through it as quickly or as slowly as they choose rather than waiting on a weekly basis for the modules to be posted.  (I would compare this to watching a show on cable TV, where even with PVR, there is certain time constraints to when you watch the show, versus Netflix where all the episodes are loaded on at once and the viewer watches at his/her own pace.)

Communication

To allow for a course where several learners may be taking it simultaneously, I have included a discussion forum with a relevant discussion topic within each module. As well, there is  a comment area for students to ask questions and they are also offered the option of contacting the instructor by email or to set up a video chat using Google Hangout.  However, keep in mind that this course is created for self-learning with minimal peer interaction due to the fact that there may only be one student taking this course at an organization at that particular time.

There is also a latest news block added to the top right column of the moodle page.  This allows the instructor to communicate any course announcements and updates to the students in a location where it can be easily seen and referred to.

 

LMS: Moodle

I selected Moodle as the LMS for a number of reasons.  Moodle is often used for adult e-learning courses which mine was targeted for.  Secondly, it is one of the oldest LMS around.  I wanted to see why was able to stick around for so long.   Third, with open source it is in a unique position where improvements are made by a global community of its users rather than just the product development team in a company.

 

Andragogical Objectives

As the WCAG2.0 is an extremely detailed and comprehensive document, this course serves an introduction only to familiarize individuals with this topic and give an idea on how to use it.  Learners should refer to the guide itself if they are attempting to be compliant.

These learners are most likely working professionals who are taking this course during or after work hours.  Therefore the distilled information of this course is further divided into 5 short  modules that is based on microlearning.

 

Course Structure

To keep the material engaging, each of the 5 modules contain three components: 1) the content in a SCORM package, 2) a quiz, and 3) a discussion question in the discussion forum (except for module 0 which does not have a quiz).  I choose to create the quizzes and discussion forums using moodle functionality as it allowed me to track them as separate activities from the viewing of the course content by the learner. Not only is it clearer and more intuitive to the learner to set these three up as separate activities, I could also edit the settings in moodle so that a check was given when each of the activities were completed.

Each component is mandatory and has been set up in the LMS so that the system would indicate when the learner has completed the task.  The learner cannot check off completion themselves.  In a workplace, this allows the employer to go into the course and confirm that the employee has completed all the components of the course.

If the employer is not interested in the discussion forum, they can simply ask their employee to disregard it and no check will be given.  The only difference is that it also means the employee would not receive a Moodle badge at the end of the course since not all activities were completed.  However, this is an option for employers should they choose to take it.

SCORM Package

The content is delivered in a SCORM package to add interactions, graphics and general interest to the course content, particularly since WCAG2.0 is a dry topic.  I have deliberate set up the interactions on the pages and the movements between the pages so that it appears to the learners that there is a minimum of pages as not to overwhelm them.

The interactions are also meant to keep the learners engaged, requiring them to navigate and click through the content.  It also helps breaks down the content into smaller more manageable chunks of knowledge for the learner to digest.

The course content were created on Powerpoint and the interactions added on Articulate Storyline where it was then published as a SCORM file.  A SCORM file is required as Powerpoint interactions do not port into moodle.

In order to keep my content presentation consistent, I also decided to manually build my interactions instead of using the pre-created interactions using Articulate Engage on my Powerpoint because I was unable to put the interaction within one of my themed slides.

To stay as true as possible to corporate and government style training, I chose to embed a SCORM package into moodle as well (using moodle as an LMS shell rather than as the content provider itself) as this is the way many e-learning companies operate.  They create a SCORM package of the e-learning that can be delivered and uploaded to their client’s LMS.