Link 1: What’s in Your Bag

I’ve decided to examine Shaun’s What’s in Your Bag task. This is based on my observations at the time of writing (May 23, 2020).

How has your colleague’s experience differed from yours? And how do you know?

Shaun chose to look at his gym bag and it’s very functional. Everything in his gym bag is purposeful and connected to the necessities of working out. Even though this description suggests that he carries very little in the bag, this isn’t the case. Although I haven’t met Shaun before, his bag tells me that he is very thoughtful, respectful, and adaptable. He carries shower shoes and indoor shoes for his gym experience!

What web authoring tool have they chosen to manifest their work?

Shaun has used Adobe Captivate for his task. It creates a more interactive experience with transitions and animation. To move through his text, I have to click whereas in my work, you have to scroll.

To access the task, you need to access the Moodle LMS.

How does their tool differ from yours in the ways in which it allows content-authouring and end-user interface?

I’m new to WordPress so there might be a lot more that can be done that I am not aware of. However, I specifically chose Shaun’s task because he uses Moodle. Before this course was launched and I wasn’t aware that we were to use WordPress, I was considering using the Canvas LMS for my ETEC540 blog. Specifically, I was thinking of using my Canvas e-portfolio and sharing it as a public link and allowing for comments. My rationale was that I’m more familiar with Canvas and how it behaves. Also, my e-portfolio is already populated with my other ETEC course materials so it would be nice to hold all of my MET learning in one place.

In many ways, Shaun’s use of Moodle is a foil to what I was originally thinking. Using a familiar LMS and its tools affords opportunities for interaction that might not be possible with a WordPress blog. As well, an LMS is more private and you can experiment before officially launching a post. An open WordPress blog can invite conversations with other colleagues and open access for future use.

What literacies does their site privilege or deny in comparison and contrast to yours?

To access Shaun’s task, you have to enter with a username and password. There are also some nuances with everyone in the class sharing the same credentials and us having to reset the task each time. Luckily, Shaun has provided text guidance for this in his LMS.

One challenge I have encountered is where to comment on the tasks since they live in two places. Should I engage in the UBC Blog or within the LMS? Since I’m only using WordPress for my blog, everything is in one place and “less traveling” might make it easier for users to navigate.

What theoretical underpinnings are evident in your/your colleague’s textual architecture and how does this affect one’s experience of the work?

Although we’re all using UBC Blogs for this course, Shaun is housing his actual work in a Moodle LMS. From browsing through his blog and Moodle LMS, it’s clear that Shaun has different long term planning for his course work.

There was a well established architecture both in his UBC Blog site (using the menu) but also in his Moodle LMS. The Moodle LMS has an architecture for this course AND the other courses Shaun is taking this semester. I think if we were not forced into using UBC Blogs, Shaun would have shared his Moodle LMS only and focussed his efforts into Moodle.

In the UBC Blog site, Shaun currently has the following organization to access this task:

• “Blog” in primary menu
  • “Tasks” page that lists his tasks in a bulleted list
    • “Task 1” post that hyperlinks here with the Moodle site
      • Log into Moodle using the provided username and password
        • Start new session for interaction with the task in Moodle

There are a lot of clicks to get to the task, but I can understand this architecture as a repository of links. The use of a username/password to access the tasks suggests privacy and limited access.

I don’t know if Shaun will house his other course material within Moodle as well, and then provide links in his blog to them, but I find that his blog menu is well organized and aware of the course expectations. It does a very good job of identifying all the assignments and organizing them.

How do the constraints of the course design manifest in your architectural choices? How have you responded to the pedagogical underpinnings of this course design in your own web space?

My blog’s main architecture is based on the primary navigation menu.

The landing page is an about this blog type page and then I would expect users to use the menu to get to where they want. I’ve predicted that people looking at this blog are interested in the assignments and want to get there quickly.

The primary menu includes:

• ETEC540 Tasks (category)
  • Clicking will take you to my tasks posts in most recent order
  • individual posts are available in a sub menu
• Linking Assignment (page)
  • At time of writing, I’m not exactly sure what I’m planning on doing here
  • Probably a category and then similarly arranged like tasks for consistency
• Final Project (page)
  • At time of writing, this is a filler page
• Ramblings (category)
  • Clicking will take you to my ramblings posts in most recent order

Like Shaun, my course content will be housed in my blog and the menu reflects this. However, I’m still thinking about how the architecture might shift as I develop more content. One problem I’m already seeing is that my current sub menu for ETEC540 Tasks will become very long. This is something I might need to re-think.

Modelling Linking Assignment after the current ETEC540 Tasks might be okay because there will only be six items at the end. However, this current set up also forces me to update the menu every time I create a new post.

For my own purposes, I’ve set up a secondary widget that includes recent comments and posts because this might be relevant to users. However, as I write this, I am considering removing the recent posts section. It might be useful to have an additional path to travel to my posts, but I wonder if it’s just filler and redundant.