Creating the introductory module in Moodle was a beneficial learning experience. Although I may not actually use the Moodle course that I am creating, I am glad that I am going through the course creation process using this LMS for a number of reasons. It has allowed me to experience an online course from a different perspective. For the first time, I am seeing an LMS from the teacher side of things. I have not ever designed an online course before and working through this process has given me both insight and a greater appreciation of just what goes into designing an engaging and effective online learning environment.

My Initial Moodle Experiences:
A number of years ago, I attended a Moodle workshop in my local school district. Moodle is a district supported LMS and our district ‘School Without Walls’ program and other distance learning opportunities use this for all of their online course delivery. Despite the fact that I was not in a role that required me to be creating online resources, I had a niece who at that time was using Moodle for her online course work and I was curious as to whether or not there was any way to take advantage of the LMS platform in my own classroom. A Smartboard had recently been installed in my classroom and I was still familiarizing myself with the software. After taking the workshop, I used Moodle for a few months as a means of designing multi-media pages with links to online resources and embedded youtube videos. Once I was comfortable with my SmartNotebook software, which allowed me to create multi-media resources similar to what I had been creating in Moodle, I no longer used the LMS. Although my previous experience with Moodle was very limited, I feel that at least being familiar with the basics of the platform made this assignment less overwhelming than it would have been without that prior exposure.

My Biggest Challenge:
I often use video makers like Powtoon and Moovly to create ‘hooks’ to use with my students. As a part of my introductory module I wanted to use a video to grab my students’ attention while informing them of what they can expect to learn in our human body unit. Once I had created my ‘hook’ video using Moovly, I downloaded a copy of the file and proceeded to attempt to upload the video to Moodle. This is when I hit my first speed bump. I quickly realized that my video exceeded the maximum file size allowance for uploading purposes on Moodle. I began a long and involved trouble shooting event. I attempted to compress the file, but it was still too large even in its compressed state. I eventually ended up having to redo the video on Moovly in a smaller format. I finally had my video reduced to an acceptable size. I uploaded it successfully only to be disappointed again. Although my video was there and was playable, only a small portion of the video (about a quarter of the total picture) was visible. I spent far more time than I should have researching the problem and trying various html fixes behind the scenes to remedy the display issue still to no avail. I realized that I needed to either scrap the video idea or consider other options. Knowing from my past experiences that embedding a youtube video is much less problematic, I decided to make my own youtube channel, publish my video on it and then use the video in its youtube format for my introduction. In a matter of minutes, the problem that I had quite literally spent most of a Saturday trying to fix, was solved. On the bright side, I now have a youtube channel to upload my video creations to in the future.

This was by far my largest stumbling block during this first Moodle task. Thanks to the tutorials posted for us by the course instructor, helpful online forums and advice pages, combined with the information shared in our ‘Collaborate’ session, I was able to accomplish everything that I set out to do for this introductory task. The only other real issue that I experienced during this assignment was in regard to the formatting of the table that I used to organize my course schedule information. Initially, I was having a hard time getting my schedule table to appear as a table, and not just a box. After a few quick Google searches, I easily found the steps to take and achieved my desired look without too much trouble. For organizational purposes, I also used tables to arrange my text and graphics in the ‘Human Body Basics’ section of the introductory module. This allowed me much more flexibility in how my text and images lined up and appeared on the page. Other than the difficulties that I experienced with my initial video upload, the most time consuming task was finding just the right images to use to enhance my information pages being sure to select them from sites in which I could be certain that I was not going to violate any copyright laws.

My Rationale for my Course and Design Decisions:
As the LMS was selected for me on this task, I did not need to work through a framework to help me select which LMS platform to use. I did however, use a portion of Bates and Poole’s SECTIONS framework (2003), to help me shape my design choices.

At the forefront of my decision making was the ‘S’ for students. As my target audience is grade five students, children aged 10 or 11, I wanted to be very mindful of what would appeal to them and what would be within their skill level. Although the bulk of my students are very familiar with online resources, I would be confident stating that none of them have ever completed anything resembling an online course via an LMS such as Moodle. In my design choices, I am counting on my students being familiar with basic web based navigational skills such as clicking on embedded links and videos, as well as creating new discussion threads or responding to threads created by their classmates in the established discussion forums. Because of the young age of my students, I was very conscious of the amount of text that I was placing on any one page of the introductory module as pages that are too text heavy with this age group will simply not be read by the majority of the students. I was also mindful of needing to keep instructions concise and clear, so that the flow of the lesson would be easy for them to see and follow. The actual content that I selected once I was creating the ‘Human Body Basics’ page, also had to be of an appropriate readability level for grade five learners. As I develop future modules, I will need to be aware of how much I am asking of the students in regard to workload. I will also need to include a variety of activity types to keep the students engaged in the learning tasks and moving forward through the prepared material.

I also needed to consider ‘E’ for ease of use. After trying out almost all of the available themes in Moodle, I chose a simple theme (Boxxie) as I felt that the layout of the navigational features was straightforward and clean looking. I ordered the individual pages within Topic 1 (Introductory Module) in the order that students would be best to complete them in. I gave explicit instructions in each page and forum so as to help the students complete all of the expected lesson components before moving on to later tasks. I tried to use text features such as the use of headings, changes of font colour, and bolded text to help highlight important information and/or indicate that a particular task was coming up. For example, on the ‘Human Body Basics’ page I used alerts like ‘Explore!’ and ‘Watch this!’ to let the students know that they needed to perform a task. As a means of being proactive, I also included a ‘Course Questions and Technical Support’ forum at the top of the main course page to enable students to be able to share any challenges they are facing. By doing this via a forum activity, either the teacher or the other students can step in to provide support for anyone struggling with the LMS itself or with the unit content and lesson expectations.

The ‘T’ and the ‘I’ from the SECTIONS framework were jointly considered in the way in which I designed the flow and content of the introductory module. As the students are in the process of familiarizing themselves with the learning interface at this point and are just getting a taste of what the course will entail, I wanted them to have the chance to try out a variety of activities both on their own independently and also with their classmates within the discussion forum areas.

Introduction Activity:
This task serves a number of purposes. It provides the students and teacher with the opportunity to get to know each other. It also allows me to do some pre-assessment using the KWL strategy (what do we already KNOW, what do we WANT TO KNOW and then at the end of the unit revisiting this with WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED). A simple task like this can be very informative in regard to the background knowledge of the students. The student that shares that they already know humans have 10 fingers and 10 toes, is very different from the student that shares that they know some muscles are voluntary and others are involuntary. By having them also share through this activity what they are interested in learning more about, if there is some flexibility in the latter parts of the unit, I may be able to incorporate some of the common areas of interest in later module work as a way to increase student engagement and make them feel as if they have more ownership over their own learning. By assigning this activity promptly at the beginning of the course, it begins to establish a sense of a learning community from the onset.

Introduction Materials:
I included three introduction pages (how to be successful in this course, learning outcomes, and course topics, mark breakdown and schedule) in this initial module, as I feel that it is important to inform students of where they are going with their learning and how they can get there successfully. Although we are not going to be building this course in its entirety, I wanted to create the schedule as it would be if I really was creating a 13 week online course. From my personal experiences being a student in an online course, I know the frustration that can be brought on by a lack of clarity in regard to course scope and sequence, as well as important due dates. For this reason, I tried to make the schedule detailed enough, without overwhelming the students with too much information. I also like that the access link to this information is posted right on the main course page and not buried under a few navigational layers, so that students can return to it and review the course timeline whenever they need to.

Introductory Module Questionnaire:
I included this activity after the introductory materials for a number of reasons. I wanted to expose the students to a variety of activities in their first week in the course as a way to help them become more familiar with the various LMS affordances sooner rather than later. I also will use the questionnaire results to gage the students’ level of comfort with site navigation, familiarity with course goals and outcomes, as well as a means to receive some feedback about the design choices that I made in regard to the schedule and introductory activities. As Chickering and Gamson (1987) posit in their Seven Principles of Good Practice (1987), frequent contact between students and their instructors is a key factor in both student motivation and involvement. By giving opportunities for feedback and by participating myself in the discussion forums early on in the course, I hope to establish this close contact and begin building a relationship with my students despite not being in a face-to-face situation with them during their learning endeavours.

Introduction: Human Body Basics
Because this basic human body knowledge does not encompass enough material to be a learning module of its own, I felt that it fit nicely here at the end of the introductory module. It provides the students with some important unit content to help them build a foundational knowledge base for future learning. It also allows them to do some independent lesson work, as they are expected to visit a few websites and work through some online material, view the prepared material on this page in Moodle, as well as watch a related youtube video. The students will use this learning to complete their first post. Since cells are the building blocks of everything in the human body, I shaped a discussion question that ties in some information from the online reading materials and the video, which requires the students to synthesize the information in order to construct their answer. Having a good grasp of the concept and role of cell membranes early on in the unit will aid them in understanding the exchange of materials that takes place at the cellular level in many of the body systems that will be covered in later modules.

References:

Bates A. W. & Poole, G. (2003). A framework for selecting and using technology. In A.W. Bates & G. Poole, Effective teaching with technology in higher education (pp. 75-108). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chickering, A. W., & Gamson, Z. F. (1987). Seven principles for good practice in undergraduate education. American Association for Higher Education Bulletin, 39(7), 3-7. Retrieved from 
http://www.aahea.org/articles/sevenprinciples1987.htm