Workshop Title: E-Learning by Design:22 & 23 September, 2010
Presented by: Richard Pinet, Director of the Centre for e-Learning, University of Ottawa
22 September 2010
Session 1 - Digital Natives? - Youth and Technology
Length 2.5 hours: 10:00 am -12:30 pm
The first generation of Digital Natives - children who were born into and raised in the digital world – are coming of age, and soon our world will be reshaped in their image. Our economy, our politics, our culture and even the structure of our family life will be forever transformed. From: Born Digital: Understanding the first generation of Digital Natives, John Palfrey and Urs Gasser, Basic Books, 2008.
Despite the debates taking place around the extent to which the term digital native aptly describes a particular demographics’ facility with the tools of our contemporary digital landscape, today’s students nonetheless, are deeply immersed in a highly mediated digital culture. Much of their social time is spend in this elaborate environment – be it in gaming, social networking, chatting, emailing, downloading, or sharing music & videos, to name only a few. Given this, what do educators wishing to venture in this digital terrain need to know about such students and the environment they inhabit, that will help them in effectively utilizing this environment and the various tools found there - for the purposes of teaching and learning? This workshop will look at some of the current literature dealing with understanding today’s youth in this ever-changing landscape, and explore ways in which we can design and develop engaging and pedagogically-sound learning spaces for our 21st Century students.
Session 2 - Design and Development of Online Courses: Three Stages ofDevelopment
Length 3 hours: 13:30 pm -16:30 pm
This workshop will explore the three phases of online course/project development and the various elements that go into the creation of more complex courses, academic programs, or large-scale projects that have access to help from a qualified team of developers. At the same time - many of the elements of consideration listed below will also help inform those professors who do not have access to additional human resources, but who will develop complex courses and /or other learning environments on their own. What follows is a list of considerations and tasks that need to be addressed at each stage of online course development:
a)Pre- Production: Some of the following topics to be explored include: conducting a proper needs assessment; project scope; staffing plan (EG. identifying team members and expertise required); creation of a proper project description and identification of goals & objectives; understanding target audience; reflection on assumptions going into the project - both those of the client and those of the production team; project constraints & project risks; time and costs; technical requirements – to name the most significant issues to be considered here.
b)Production: Creating a project plan / schedule; setting a tone and staying on track; project design and specifications; network and systems architecture and design; software systems architecture and design, database design and specification; project tracking; effective communication methods; identification of appropriate learning activities & media that properly address course/project objectives; creation of project schedules; identifying project milestones; creation of work breakdown schedule for various members of those involved in development.
c)Post-Production: Exploration of various testing strategies such as beta and usability testing; making appropriate modifications based on testing outcomes; considerations for ongoing project maintenance and upgrading; project closure; evaluation (formative and summative) and lessons learned.
23 September 2010
Session 3 – Web 2.0 Tools and Higher Education
Length 3.5 hours: 10:00 am -13:30 pm
The term Web 2.0 is a term used to describe a number of web applications that facilitate information sharing and collaboration. Such Web applications would include – but are by no means limited to: social networking sites; wikis; blogs, mash-ups and folksonomies, to name only a few. One of the key characteristics of this term (which is also an issue of debate) is that such tools foster a web environment this is participatory as it allows students and professors to interact with each other and change website content in ways not possible with the more traditional read-only websites – websites which – as characterized in Web 1.0 - simply allow for the passive viewing of information.
This workshop will explore the benefits that such participatory learning environments can have on enhancing learning by engaging students through the utilization of many of the tools they are already familiar with. We will look at a number of these tools - such as News Readers, RSS, Wikispaces, podcasting, Googledocs, Second Life and social book-marking, for instance - and explore how they might best be used in the creation of engaging and sound pedagogical learning environments.
Session 4 - Strategies for Managing Courses, Facilitating Online Discussions and sharing of responsibilities for Learning Outcomes
Length 3 hours: 14:30 pm -17:30 pm
One of the most crucial elements in ensuring a successful and fruitful online learning experience is rooted in your ability to provide consistently engaging learning spaces. Utilising your time properly and providing strategies to foster learner-centred activities can make or break an online course. One of the major criticisms levelled against online learning comes from those who say they feel isolated in such a learning environment. This workshop will explore strategies to how best utilize your knowledge and expertise, when and how to intervene and situate yourself in online discussions, and utilizing students’ prior knowledge and expertise for the benefit of the entire class. Topics such as: managing your time, managing assignments and performance assessments; peer assessments; collaborative & group-based assignments and consideration of inviting guest speakers and guest moderators, are some of the issue we will explore in this workshop.