I have a large admission to make, which is probably not news to many people that know me well. I generally do not work well in groups. I get over committed or feel like someone is not pulling their weight or something else inevitably comes up.
Working with my team on this New Faculty Orientation Moodle Course project has been great. It has been a lesson in keeping to my role of project manager and not un-delegating tasks. I've tried to keep my input to feedback without it being prescriptive. I'm not quite sure how well I've accomplished this in anyone else's eyes, but I know comparitive to my previous patterns, it's gone pretty well.
Each of my team members have taken their piece and blown my expectations out of the water. The course module (thanks Deb) is spectular. It includes not only the necessary content but online "quizzes" and checklists/treasure hunts to engage the faculty in active learning. The original hope was that our final product would give a faculty memeber an opportunity to experience an online course as a STUDENT. This layout certainly fits the bill.
The Moodle Orientation guide and the Course Guide have allowed our "documentation specialist", Kirsten, to really shine. Even in the midst of health issues, she has pulled through and created some guides that will make the life of a new faculty member easier that first week here.
Our team of video producers, Danny and William, have pulled together a polished welcome video from the dean of the new college. I saw the YouTube version this weekend and was excited that it could soon replace an old video that was a little embarassing to have on the web. They have also been responsible for pulling together our links repository and our new organizational chart.
I still have the final report to submit once we've had some evaluation and user testing this and next week. We're almost done and it's been the best team experience I've ever participated in. Thanks team!!
Showing posts with label instructional design. Show all posts
Showing posts with label instructional design. Show all posts
November 25, 2008
October 15, 2008
CECS 5210 - Project A Complete!
I met with my prof/client today to review the edits and adjustments as a result of my implementation. Despite the fact that I was trying to accomplish something specific with the different presentation and the learning aid, it all turned out well. I redesigned the presentation, updated the learning aid, and submitted it all.
We're ready to move on to Project B. This design is going to be further developed by a team of my classmates and I. We will be taking the current static materials and breathing interactive life into them through the use of Moodle. We will be creating an online course for New Faculty. I get to meet my team next week. In the meantime, I have to pull together a project scope document. Now this is what I signed up for!!
We're ready to move on to Project B. This design is going to be further developed by a team of my classmates and I. We will be taking the current static materials and breathing interactive life into them through the use of Moodle. We will be creating an online course for New Faculty. I get to meet my team next week. In the meantime, I have to pull together a project scope document. Now this is what I signed up for!!
October 08, 2008
CECS 5210 - Pilot Implementation (Feedback)
Week 7 -- Live Evaluation
On Tuesday, I met with part of my client team and presented my materials thus far.
The presentation went so-so. I realized that I had not adequately prepared my participants. They were my secondary clients and I had made too many assumptions about their knowledge of and investment in the project. We spent a large portion of the meeting getting everyone on the same page - what is the project and why are we here.
As we started into the presentation, my major concern with my design was confirmed. By using two different paradigms for the presentation versus the job aid, I had confused my audience. What I had been attempting to do was create a stand-alone job aid as the takeaway and a typical F2F training session. My previous concept of an exceptional training session (especially one that uses PowerPoint) only uses the slide show as a prompting device, not the content delivery mechanism. Having taught PowerPoint ad nauseum, this is a design tip that I strongly stress. This might have worked however the presentation was category/task oriented and the job aid was linear. This disconnect presented difficulty to my audience following the presentation.
Additionally, I was surprised at a cultural sensitivity that I completely missed. By using the Children's programming titles, I alienated my audience with my first slide. "Who is Mr. Rogers?" It never occurred to me that my metaphor was culturally bound. Once I explained the metaphor being used throughout the presentation, my clients were able to follow more easily. But this certainly is an area ripe for revision.
So this week, I'm revising what I've created and hope to meet with my primary client next week. It'll be nice to put this phase of the project to rest.
On Tuesday, I met with part of my client team and presented my materials thus far.
The presentation went so-so. I realized that I had not adequately prepared my participants. They were my secondary clients and I had made too many assumptions about their knowledge of and investment in the project. We spent a large portion of the meeting getting everyone on the same page - what is the project and why are we here.
As we started into the presentation, my major concern with my design was confirmed. By using two different paradigms for the presentation versus the job aid, I had confused my audience. What I had been attempting to do was create a stand-alone job aid as the takeaway and a typical F2F training session. My previous concept of an exceptional training session (especially one that uses PowerPoint) only uses the slide show as a prompting device, not the content delivery mechanism. Having taught PowerPoint ad nauseum, this is a design tip that I strongly stress. This might have worked however the presentation was category/task oriented and the job aid was linear. This disconnect presented difficulty to my audience following the presentation.
Additionally, I was surprised at a cultural sensitivity that I completely missed. By using the Children's programming titles, I alienated my audience with my first slide. "Who is Mr. Rogers?" It never occurred to me that my metaphor was culturally bound. Once I explained the metaphor being used throughout the presentation, my clients were able to follow more easily. But this certainly is an area ripe for revision.
So this week, I'm revising what I've created and hope to meet with my primary client next week. It'll be nice to put this phase of the project to rest.
September 30, 2008
CECS 5210 - Project Analysis and Planning
Weeks 5 & 6 of Project -- Analysis, Design, and Development...
-Collected Requirements from Primary Client and Secondary Client.
-Met with SMEs regarding administrative procedures.
-Met with Student Services to gain Campus Tour script.
-Spent hours on Campus Website collecting URLs.
-Reviewed Staff Employee and Faculty Handbooks.
-Designed "Surviving your First Two Weeks" presentation
-Used Metaphor of Children's Programming to address categories of needs
* Mr Rogers Neighborhood -- people you need to know
* The Electric Company -- essential tasks
* School House Rock -- Academic specific info (grades, courses, textbooks)
* Sesame Street -- Important places on campus
* Where in the World is Carmen SanDiego? -- Putting the department in context
within UNT and the City of Denton
-Designed "Surviving your First Two Weeks" checklist
-Used Timeline structure -- Day one, day two, day three...
-Scheduled meeting with client
-Collected Requirements from Primary Client and Secondary Client.
-Met with SMEs regarding administrative procedures.
-Met with Student Services to gain Campus Tour script.
-Spent hours on Campus Website collecting URLs.
-Reviewed Staff Employee and Faculty Handbooks.
-Designed "Surviving your First Two Weeks" presentation
-Used Metaphor of Children's Programming to address categories of needs
* Mr Rogers Neighborhood -- people you need to know
* The Electric Company -- essential tasks
* School House Rock -- Academic specific info (grades, courses, textbooks)
* Sesame Street -- Important places on campus
* Where in the World is Carmen SanDiego? -- Putting the department in context
within UNT and the City of Denton
-Designed "Surviving your First Two Weeks" checklist
-Used Timeline structure -- Day one, day two, day three...
-Scheduled meeting with client
New Client - Learning Technologies Department
Originally, for my CECS5210 class, I was going to work with a professor to redesign and enhance her Blackboard course shell. Unfortunately, after the analysis phase, this project did not materialize. So, 3 weeks into the project timeline, I found myself starting from scratch, looking for a client. I made my way to the professor's office to explain my situation and hoped that it wasn't too late to still pull out a decent grade in the class.
What transpired next was a boon of fortune. My professor became my client. Before I had time to really think about the implications of having the person grading me also being my client, we were off and running. It appears that much like other places on campus, their department has little in the way of formal instruction for new faculty members. Most of what is learned by a faculty member in their first two weeks has come through finding the right person to talk to, asking questions of several people, wandering around aimlessly on campus being redirected to various locations, and shear luck. (Ok, there is also the official Faculty Handbook of the University but that doesn't address those "where is the library, how do I get email, what classes am I teaching, who's in those classes, and do I have wireless access" questions.)
My new project is "to create a learning tools to help new faculty members survive their first two weeks on campus".
What transpired next was a boon of fortune. My professor became my client. Before I had time to really think about the implications of having the person grading me also being my client, we were off and running. It appears that much like other places on campus, their department has little in the way of formal instruction for new faculty members. Most of what is learned by a faculty member in their first two weeks has come through finding the right person to talk to, asking questions of several people, wandering around aimlessly on campus being redirected to various locations, and shear luck. (Ok, there is also the official Faculty Handbook of the University but that doesn't address those "where is the library, how do I get email, what classes am I teaching, who's in those classes, and do I have wireless access" questions.)
My new project is "to create a learning tools to help new faculty members survive their first two weeks on campus".
September 04, 2008
CECS 5210 Week 1 Question...
Given what you have read about instructional design, how important is it to what your future work goals are?
My career thus far has always contained a course design and delivery function. My true love is delivering technology education to librarians. No matter how I intend to accomplish this in the future, instructional design is one of the foundations of success to a good course. Making sure to analyze no only the material to be presented but also the audience which will be attending has often been the key factor to the quality of the knowledge transfered. Additionally, I have found that evaluation and closing the feedback loop to be instrumental to improving the effectiveness of not only my teaching style but the reference materials the students retain. I'm looking forward to learning about instructional design in a formal manner, as most of mine has been JIT or on-the-job training.
My career thus far has always contained a course design and delivery function. My true love is delivering technology education to librarians. No matter how I intend to accomplish this in the future, instructional design is one of the foundations of success to a good course. Making sure to analyze no only the material to be presented but also the audience which will be attending has often been the key factor to the quality of the knowledge transfered. Additionally, I have found that evaluation and closing the feedback loop to be instrumental to improving the effectiveness of not only my teaching style but the reference materials the students retain. I'm looking forward to learning about instructional design in a formal manner, as most of mine has been JIT or on-the-job training.
Starting my PhD -- Instructional Design Class
I am pursuing my PhD in the Information Science department at UNT. I live in Austin and will be in Denton two to three days a week. This year I've left the "real world" and dedicated myself to being a full-time student and Graduate Library Assistant over at the Willis Library. I've been in the "training" and "library" worlds since 1994 and am looking forward to formal instruction in Instructional Design. All of my knowledge has been through trial by fire or those professional development course I've been able to take along the way. I've done everything from Corporate Training, help desk support, IT management, to course development, professional development delivery, conference presentations, and website maintenance.
For those of you who have been following this blog a while, you'll start to see weekly updates from me on Instructional Design topics from my course work. For those of you classmates, you'll see occasional non-class posts from me and posts regularly from my very insightful co-author. I encourage you to enjoy them all.
Happy Reading!
For those of you who have been following this blog a while, you'll start to see weekly updates from me on Instructional Design topics from my course work. For those of you classmates, you'll see occasional non-class posts from me and posts regularly from my very insightful co-author. I encourage you to enjoy them all.
Happy Reading!
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