Reflection on the digital story has been added to both the e-portfolio site and to the Week 11 thread of discussion forum. More reflections will be added (shortly) with regards to the content module. And look at that, here they are:
Assignment #3: LMS Content Module
In the course outline it reads that this assignment will be assessed on the following items:
- Your content module should cover approximately a week or two of your course.
Content added since the “intro” version makes it a three week coverage. If you add the “intro” piece it becomes four weeks. With the pattern I had set of introduction, practice, reflection, repeat it could not have been accomplished in less time unless it became traumatizing for the student(s).
- A splash page with a customized GUI with at least four (4) navigational components – for Moodle;
Initially I had no idea what this sentence meant, what a goo-ey was, or how I was going to have at least (4) of them. However, the more I looked at example pages, or how-to videos, the more I had a sense of what I liked the look of and what I didn’t. The first presentation (what the viewer sees when they open my Moodle site) fits within the viewer pane, and starts with colour-coded navigational components that reflect the pattern of activity for the module and the course. The eye/brain see in one view, the extent of what they need to see at that time. This is what Mayer’s calls spatial contiguity (Bates, 2014). I liked/used the idea of having a reinforcing message/additional information come up when the cursor hovered over the “button.”
- One complete learning module with subject-specific content largely based on HTML pages;
Subject:
I know in my flight path, I had thought this Moodle course assignment would be directed toward elementary aged-students. The more the content and medium shaped itself in my mind, it made more sense to create a course that would help students, by training teachers to be more effective. The course focus is for teachers to learn to model comprehension strategies for their students.
Internal structure:
The structure of the course follows a pattern of instruction, practice, reflection, and try again with a different strategy. I have purposely colour-coded the steps in the pattern to be consistent throughout the course, likening it to the routines set up at the beginning of the year in a typical classroom. Making some things predictable, enables students to focus on learning and not having to re-figure out where things are or where they should go. Gibbs and Simpson (2005) write that student tasks, should focus their time and effort on the most important aspects of the course.
With that in mind I also hyperlinked the assignments to the place where they would be handed in, hyperlinked required reading to be within the page where it gets assigned, and tried to make everything one would need on a specific page available from that page. The less one has to travel the less likely they are to become lost.
Each colour coded block starts with a “roadmap.” This roadmap is framed the same way each occurrence having an overview, content, resources, and assignments/due dates.
I did not opt for badges within the LMS as the focus was on practicing a skill rather than progression through the material. However, students can see if they have completed a particular piece with the presence of a checked box.
With consistent colour coding and patterning, I limited the viewing pane to just the navigational components for each module. I liked how it limited the visual field to just the essentials and reinforced the cyclical nature of the course. With the mind of tidying up and seamlessly incorporating our earlier work from the introductory module into the content module I created a page titled pre-flight checklist. As well, I embedded the digital story into the end of what would be the introductory module.
- Embed your digital story. Specifically, while addressing the work you have done on your digital story, reflect on:
*Why was this the right tool for you to use to tell your story, from a pedagogical perspective?
*How did you purposefully select this for your storytelling tool, in pedagogical terms?
I found this “digital story” requirement for the course to be very vague. I looked through the variety of interpretations of this assignment in the example Moodle pages and felt even more uncertain of its purpose/direction. Had I watched the March 12 video-conference recording earlier, this element would not have looked different than it does. I decided to make the digital story to support the theme of the LMS which I was creating for this term project. There are many ways to tell a story. As a librarian, I can show you a few. There are many reasons why stories are used. I chose to interpret this story as a journey that engages for the purpose of conveying some form of message. It made the most sense to use this digital story opportunity to focus on:
- the audience – who were they? what would their main concerns be?
- state a problem they may be experiencing – ‘doesn’t it make you crazy when . . . ‘
- inform of some kind of solution or expertise,
- clearly show the benefits of that solution,
- invoke some kind of action from them – sign up now or act now
Having the list from Mayer’s (2009) that was in the Bates (2014) article was very helpful to refer to.
I wanted to keep it short. Most people don’t have time for epics, no matter how creative they are.
I wanted to keep it on topic. Keeping the content focused will help the viewer be convinced that the content is useful (or not) for them.
I also wanted it to be succinct. Conveying the essentials is both bait and net. It communicates the message that, “You could have more of these helpful tidbits if you signed up for this course.”
To create this digital story I used the tool PowToon. I have never used anything like PowToon. Creating a “storyline” with animations, music, pictures, and text is very complicated. The more streamlined it looks, the more effort went into the product. To me it was important to choose people characters as opposed to icons. It also made sense to limit the message to a specific need a teacher would have. Unless it is directly helpful to them, or related to the age level they teach most teachers do not have time for “extra,” and are pretty surgical about limiting their intake. Knowing this, it made sense to focus the message.
Production elements such as timing the text and movements of the characters is a trial and error process. Choosing music that doesn’t detract from the overall theme is time consuming. Selecting size of image or word that won’t over-power or weaken the message is daunting. Using these forms of media to convey what scores of pages of text could not has, as Siemens (2003) writes, “it’s own strengths and weaknesses. The plethora of options available presents a challenge and an opportunity.”
- One additional general discussion forum topic;
This element is satisfied in a couple of different ways within this course. First, I have included a chat forum after the first assignment for students to debrief or talk about how the implementation went. Secondly, is through the feedback that each student will give each other from assessing their strategy implementations. As part of the “cycle,” students are required to reflect on whether they achieved the objectives they have set out by viewing their own (and on another student’s) video upload. The focus is not on their “performance,” but on how their goals matched their ends.
- One group discussion forum for (at least) 2 groups;
This element was satisfied through forming two groups: the fiction-text and non-fiction-text groups, to discuss the features/drawbacks of each. We all have types of text of which we are more fond. The purpose of this was to have a discussion forum, with content that was directly related to the overall purposes of the LMS.
- A reflection upon your experience completing this assignment. Be sure to cite relevant literature.
Good course design requires a need for that course, solid content, and the skillful adjudication of various learning elements and mediums to the objectives for the course. Merely piling on more, shiny, new, and amazing technology litters the journey with minefields jeopardizing what could potentially be accomplished. By applying the SECTIONS framework to guide media and technology selection at the beginning of a project, instructional development teams can approach decision-making in an organized manner while placing a high priority on learning outcomes Boyes, Dowie, & Rumzan (2005). Reflecting on this schema, gave me a sort of threshing floor. Whatever elements were being considered could be evaluated and either left behind as “chaff” or used as a kernel of design/content.
Good course design needs to include making a course appealing and applicable to many different students. There are different ways of creating adaptive content. It can be accomplished by tagging learning components and making them smart, by offering personalized learning paths based on the outcome of previous activities (Spiro 2014). I tried to incorporate this with the cyclical nature of the course structure. Students would be practicing a skill which they had defined the objectives to, and would be adjusting with each new module. Appeal isn’t just reflected by the number of students, but to the diversity of them as well.
Good course design needs to provide forums for feedback. In the “Good Readers” course, the feedback elements focus on students’ performance, on their learning and on actions under the students’ control, rather than on the students themselves and on their characteristics. This echoes condition five from Gibbs and Simpson (2005).
Anderson (2008) also reflects this sentiment in a slightly different way by noting, students also need opportunities to reflect upon their own thinking in order to develop automacy, which is a useful and necessary skill for expert thinking. At the risk of repetition, this again is why students of Good Readers are groomed to try the task, evaluate and try again.
Porto (2015) notes that social media can enhance sharing and collaboration, and in many situations enhances the ease of managing the learning experience. I thought about inserting one into the course (I have three Twitter accounts), but it seemed to be more me just wanting to add it because it would “look” good rather than “be” a good choice. For a different situation it may be just the thing.
As was noted, some of these requirements were straightforward, while others were more challenging. The challenge was to keep the vision one had for their course in clear focus while navigating pedagogical elements, design requirements, and the balance between being educational and technological. The ability to practice these challenges throughout the process in making the LMS, first in small steps, later in larger ones, calls to mind Anderson’s (2008) admonition that the opportunity for reflection offers a student’s the capacity to transfer their knowledge to unfamiliar contexts and to develop new knowledge structures. The content module was indeed a transfer of knowledge to an unfamiliar context. Challenging but rewarding.
References
Anderson, T. (2008). Teaching in an online learning context. In Anderson, T. & Elloumi, F. Theory and practice of online learning. Athabasca University. Retrieved from http://www.aupress.ca/books/120146/ebook/14_Anderson_2008-Theory_and_Practice_of_Online_Learning.pdf
Bates, T. (2014). Teaching in digital age http://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/ (Chapter 8 on SECTIONS framework)
Boyes, J., Dowie, S., & Rumzan, I. (2005). Using the SECTIONS framework to evaluate flash media. Using the SECTIONS framework to evaluate flash media, 2(1). Retrieved from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.186.6505&rep=rep1&type=pdf
Gibbs, G., & Simpson, C. (2005). Conditions under which assessment supports students’ learning. Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, 1(1), 3-31. Retrieved from http://www.open.ac.uk/fast/pdfs/Gibbs%20and%20Simpson%202004-05.pdf
Mayer, R. E. (2009). Multimedia learning (2nd ed). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Porto, S. (2015). The uncertain future of Learning Management Systems. The Evolllution: Illuminating the Lifelong Learning Movement. Retrieved from http://www.evolllution.com/opinions/uncertain-future-learning-management-systems/
Siemens, G. (2003). Evaluating media characteristics: Using multimedia to achieve learning outcomes. Elearnspace. Retrieved from http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/mediacharacteristics.htm
Spiro, K. (2014). 5 elearning trends leading to the end of the Learning Management Systems. Retrieved from http://elearningindustry.com/5-elearning-trends-leading-to-the-end-of-the-learning-management-system