I designed the tool, Arts Learning Circle, which provides a space for artists to connect from all backgrounds with the goal of empowering them to learn new skills and develop collaborative relationships with each other through professional development.  The artists ACUA serves will utilize this space to learn from each other and participate in professional development activities.

I designed the tool on my own, and evaluated it from an instructional design and learner perspective.  The design of artslearningcircle.ca was completed in WordPress and utilized WordPress plugins WP Membership and WP Forms.  I used WordPress simply because both expert and novice web designers can use WordPress and there are many resources available to novice web designers to learn how to use WordPress.  Personally, I fall into the Novice web designer category.  In addition to WordPress, communication will be pushed out to artists through MailChimp and social media platforms, Instagram and Facebook.  I also sourced stock photos from Canva, as well as, used Canva to design graphics for the overall design.  In terms of the overall design of the tool, I used Tony Bates SECTIONS Model from 2019 throughout the design process to ensure I was making informed decisions about the choice and use of media for this tool.

The key framework that supported the design of my tool is related to social-constructivism.  Constructivism is based on the idea that learners actively build new understanding and knowledge, and integrate it into what they already know rather than passively take on information.  Vygotsky argued that learners are able to understand so much more with the support of someone with more expertise though social interactions and sense-making.  The tool I’ve created provides a space for learners to further develop their craft through formal workshops and other professional development activities.  The professional development activities will be facilitated by artists, for artists.

In terms of learning, I feel the learning curve for me personally was steep in terms of the technical design skills required for developing this tool.  I had previously used WordPress to create Posts for my work with ACUA and as a student of the MET program, as well as, I have edited Pages in WordPress.  I have never undertaken the full the development of a website.  I spent hours learning how to develop basic functionality in WordPress, as well as, learning how to host my website and deciding on who to host it with.  In retrospective, I would have benefited from developing this tool with at least one other person.  My Aha moment came, when I was trying to figure out coding for a function I wanted to include in the site (hiding a Post from the Blog page), and realized that there was a WordPress plugin that could do exactly what I was trying to do by simply downloading and activating a plugin, reading the installation guide to figure out functionality, and clicking a button.  From that point on, if I was stuck, I went searching for a plugin.  Although, I later learned that using too many plugins may prevent other new plugins from downloading.

Going forward, I believe the tool I created will be used.  I have started to talk to ACUA artists about the tool, and they are excited that they will have a space to participate in professional development activities and learn from each other.  This excites me and I can’t wait to see how it will evolve and be used by them.