Session 8

Session 8 Development - Testing

 1. List the two levels of testing as outlined in the presentation and discuss each one in turn. Then describe the types of testing activities for each level of testing.

Level One:

The first level is testing the reliability of the media as the media is being created. This is usually completed by the media developer or development group. The testing is done in a lab or controlled environment where problems are corrected as various steps of the project development.

Level Two:

The second level of testing the reliability of the media is more intense. This is done just prior to the release of the media, not in a lab environment but in an environment that is close to what the consumer will be using.  The reason that this testing needs to more extreme is that once the media is released it may reside in an environment or server that is not easily accessed by the developer to make corrections. It is also important that the media presented to the consumer be as perfect as it can be to not erode the consumer confidence in the use of the media due to multiple problems or glitches.    

 

2. What is ADA and how does it apply to the design and development of eLearning materials?

Signed into law signed into law on July 26, 1990, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) protects the civil rights of persons with disability. For education this means that: “Under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act, schools must, without charge, ensure that communication with students with disabilities is as effective as communication with students without disabilities, giving primary consideration to students and parents in determining which auxiliary aids and services are necessary to provide such effective communication” http://www.ada.gov/doe_doj_eff_comm/doe_doj_eff_comm_fact_sht.htm.

Apply this criteria to the design and development of eLearning materials requires that these materials must alternative made available in forms that can be used seamlessly by persons with disabilities. For example for persons who are visually impaired material in the form of text must be made available in recorded voice.   According to Dr. Newberry’s Session 8 presentation typical disabilities and their accommodations include:

Typical disabilities	Accommodations
Color Blindness	·        High Contrast ·        Avoid Red-Green-Blue Combinations ·        Don't Use Color to Convey Meaning ·        Make Use of a User Changeable Font ·        Text Version
Low Vision – No Vision	·        High Contrast ·        Make Use of a User Changeable Font ·        Navigation Requirements ·        Configurability – Screen Reader Compatibility ·        Text Version
Seizure	·        Avoid Strobes ·        Flickering Images ·        Fast Animations ·        High Contrast Close Lines (optical illusions)
Auditory	·        Alternatives to Audio ·        Text Version ·        Captioning Videos and Slide Shows with Audio (Multimedia)
Motor	·        Navigability Issues ·        Keyboard Control Instead of Mouse ·        Internal Navigation to Skip Through Long Sections ·        User Configurability

 

3. What is your institutions (You may use CSUSB's) policy towards ADA and eLearning? Explain what this means in practical terms and what you think the strengths and weaknesses of the policy.

California State University San Bernardino’s (CSUSB) ADA Procedures and Guideline can be found on the Policies and Procedures website at:  http://policies.csusb.edu/ada_procedures_and_guidelines.htm.

These policies and procedures are reviewed by the Campus Accessibility Advisory Board to the Office of Services to Students with Disabilities. This committee meets to insure the interest and concerns of the student population and to insure the campus’ compliance for federal, state, and local laws.

The review process consists of the following approach:

1.       Identification of the interest, problem or concern.

2.       An analysis of the factors involved, including cost and funding sources.

3.       A review of the alternatives possible, including cost.

4.       A response to the originator of the item.

5.       Implementation of the solution.

6.       Closure of the process.

One strength is that the management group meets quarterly basis to review the campus’ ADA program.  

 

4. Revisit the 11 instructional design steps presented in chapter 1 of the text (Design Quickly and Reliably).* Revise this 11 step system using what you now know about development and testing. Try to create your own instructional design process/template that you might actually use. Briefly explain your modifications.

Instructional Design Process
* As presented in the text	My instructional design process
Identify your underlying goal	1.       Review the learning institution and your goals for learning outcomes.
Analyze learners' needs and abilities (Add an analysis of content and instructor needs/abilities/preferences.)	2.       Determine  what technological skills students and the instructor need to be successful in this class
Identify what to teach	3.       Identify scope of content subject matter. Make sure it not too great a burden for instructor and student to accomplish online.
Set learning objectives	4.       Based on the content scope of content determine what objective need to be accomplished.
Identify prerequisites	5.       Review skill and knowledge needed to determine course prerequisites or preliminary testing.
Pick the approach to meet each objective	6.       Pick the approach to meet each objective
Decide the teaching sequence of your objectives	7.       Decide the teaching sequence of your objectives
Create objects to accomplish objectives	8.       Create objects to accomplish objectives
Create tests (Add other methods to determine whether or not objectives are met as appropriate.)	9.       Create tests (Add other methods to determine whether or not objectives are met as appropriate.)
Select learning activities	10.   Select learning activities
Choose Media (Add a discussion of activity structures and interactions.)	11.   Create objects and/or materials to comply with institution’s ADA policies and procedures and federal, state and local laws.
	12.   Choose Media (Add a discussion of activity structures and interactions.)
	13.   Create objects, materials, and applications insuring that they run within in a media lab environment.
	14.   Test to insure that objects, materials, and applications in an environment close to as possible as the consumer will be using.

 

 

Session 7

Session 7: Development, Media Choices and Considerations

1. Why is media selection important in eLearning?

It is important to select the right media:

• To match the instructor’s ability to access and teach the course.
• To match the student’s ability to access and complete the objectives.
• To insure there is no infringement of copyrights
• To insure the cost meets any budgetary restraints
• To allow flexibility to make adjustments when problems occur.

2. Define "new media"?

According to New Media Institute “new media” is a general term that defines all that is linked to the internet and the interaction between technology, sound, and images. Because new media is constantly evolving and new technologies created, this definition can change daily and exponentially as new uses are discovered (Socha & Eber-Schmid, 2014).

3. Choose a "new media" and explain it's strengths and weaknesses for supporting eLearning.

In today’s job market perspective accounting career seekers need to be experienced in the use of electronic spreadsheet software. One of the most popular is Microsoft Excel. It is a part of the Microsoft Office suite of desktop applications. New media training in Excel can be accomplish using previously prepared online tutorials or by self-created online tutorials.

Previously prepared online tutorials

The strength of previous prepared tutorials such as the ones made available from Microsoft Support are convenient by the fact that the course developers or instructors need only to investigate the content of the tutorial to find relevance to the subject being taught and give the student the internet link to the tutorial site. Another strength is that many of these tutorials are free. The weakness of these tutorial is that the procedure being illustrated is generalized and may not connect implicitly with course objectives.

Self-created online tutorials

New media software such as CamStudio allows the developer or instructor to record a screencast with a voice narrative on how to perform a particular task within an application such as Excel while illustrating that procedure on a computer screen. Along with also being free, the strength of self-created tutorials in that lessons can be created that are intimately connected to a lesson, objective, or an assignment. The weakness to this software is that the preparing a self-created online lesson is time consuming and needs to be uploaded to a site where students have access to view the recording and screencast.

4. Explain the term "Mobile Learning" and discuss the importance of "Mobile Learning in the current eLearning environment and in future eLearning environments.

According to our text mobile learning has two main meaning:

• Mobile learning uses new media technologies to allow student to participate in conventional form of learning including classroom learning.
• Real mobile learning utilizes objects, environment, experts and other students as student engage the real world.

(Horton, 2012, p. 501)

 

5. Explain the term "Virtual Classroom". Describe how a "Virtual Classroom" can be used in eLearning.

An online class that are organized like a standard classroom course is a virtual classroom. The curriculum contains elements such as class schedules, weekly or daily assignments, tests and quizzes. It is in the standard educational format but utilizes “new media” where the student participates in synchronous instruction. In this environment instructors can connect to and monitor the student’s progress in the class (Horton, 2012, p. 540).

A popular virtual classroom environment is the webinar. Like combining the words “smoke” and “fog” to get “smog”, “webinar” is derived by merging "web" and "seminar."  Webinars are instructional presentations of video and/or audio with slides and often used in a student to content interaction.  If a webinar is synchronous, meaning that student and instructor are online at the same time, the webinar can be employed to produce student to instructor interactions in real time (Horton, 2012, p. 540).

Another eLearning environment is the virtual-classroom course. This normally includes course content materials, homework, tests, assessments, and other tools that are outside of the standard classroom familiarity. These courses do not need synchronous events and may also include social media tools that let instructors and learners to interact through emails, chat rooms, or online discussion boards (Horton, 2012, p. 541).

6. Thinking about the class you have been designing, what are some ways you could potentially use some new media?

• Previously prepared online tutorials – used to provide student with general content information. 
• Self-created online tutorials – used to provide students with specific content and examples of solutions to computer based assignments.

• Webinars – used to provide students with general or specify content information and provide student to instructor interactions.
• Email – used as communication tool between instructor, students, a class as a whole. Uses to share files and transmit assignments and assessments.
• Discussion boards – used for class participation and group project collaboration. Can be used for discussion assignments and feedback by instructor.
• File sharing websites - used for class participation and group project collaboration.
• Online testing sites – used for student assessment of objective met by online quizzes and overall course assessment by online final exams.  

References

Horton, W. (2012). E-leaning by design, 2nd ed. San Francisco: Pfeiffer.

Socha, B., & Eber-Schmid, B. (2014). What is new media? Retrieved from New Media Institute: http://www.newmedia.org/what-is-new-media.html

Session 6

Session 6: Development Process Overview

 According to our text student learn by completing learning activities. The usual types of activities are:

1.      The student absorbs the knowledge by reading, listening, or seeing information on the subject.

2.      The student does hand on or practice activities.

3.      The student connects with the subject with real personal or work environment.

(Horton, 2012, p. 9)

In this session our assignment was to select a learning objective from our course plan and describe an activity for each learning activity type: “Absorb”, “Do”, and “Connect”.

I chose to describe what I would do given the same objective for each activity type.

Objective: Upon completion of this course student will be able to define the three types of business ownership structures.

 

1. Describe an "Absorb" type activity for one of the objectives in your course plan.

I intend to use a slide presentation allowing the student to “absorb” the information on the three types of business ownership structures. The presentation would include a voice over narrative corresponding to each slide.
 

2. Describe a "Do" type activity for one of the objectives in your course plan.

In intend to use a game in the “Jeopardy” style that allows the student to “Do” a review the content presented in the previous PowerPoint presentation. The game will engaging and cover all the material presented.
 

3. Describe a "Connect" type activity for one of the objectives in your course plan.

I intend to use a writing assignment asking students to respond in their own words to questions such as:  

·       What are the advantages to each business ownership structures?

·       How a sole proprietorship does differs from a partnership?

·       What are limited partners?

Their answers will be shared with the rest of the class on a discussion board where comments from fellow classmates will be solicited.

 

4. Choose one of the above activities and discuss the process you would use to create this presentation. For this task assume that you have no additional assistance other than the instructor who would be able to write content as you describe it and perform for a recording as needed.

For the activity I described in item one, the goal is to create a slide presentation from the content provided from a designated instructor.

a.       Confer with instructor to write the content narrative needed to communicate the elements of the presentation.

b.      Create a storyboard of each slide describing text, animation, and images to support the narrative.

c.       Write an audio script to match each slide in the presentation. To comply with ADA requirements, this audio script will be available with a text description of any slides that need further explanation.

d.      Select a slide presentation software. Although there are a number of free presentation software I would probably use Office Mix, an add-on to PowerPoint, which allows the user to create, record and publish engaging slide presentations.   An introduction to this add-on is available at: https://mix.office.com/watch/7o6kt118pguk .

e.      I would prepare the PowerPoint slide presentation using the storyboard and record the presentation and voiceover using the narrative script with Office Mix. For the voice recording I would use a BlueParrott® B250-XT headset.

f.        I usually save files with as complete as file name as I can. An example for the file name presentation would be Intro_to_accntng_ownrtype.pptx. I would store this in a special folder on my personal computer and on a special external hard drive.

5. Discuss how your approach, for the above task, would be different if you were directing the development efforts of a team that included a graphic designer, a video editor and a web programmer along with all of the tools that such a team would typically use.

When doing a project where you perform all the tasks, you have all the control along with all the responsibility.  When heading a project team you can delegate tasks but you cannot delegate responsibilities. It is necessary that you insure tasks are completed and are on time.  In addition, when working alone you have to rely on your own knowledge and resource. However, working in a team greatly expands the resources that can be utilized. 

a.       Meet with development team to discuss presentation elements of concept, content, software and media. Items to accomplish in this meeting may be:

1)      Create a timeline and assign area of responsibility to each team member for the following.

·  Creation of storyboard and audio script.

·  Selection of slide presentation software

·  Preparation slide presentation

·  Create or Select online environment

2)      Develop file naming and back-up procedures

3)      Discuss requirement needed to comply with ADA.

b.      Meet periodically development team to status of each task

c.       Review presentation and make adjustments

d.      Submit final presentation for publication.

 6. The text presents test types and presents a list of common types of test questions. In light of these, describe a test that would be appropriate for the class your team planned in the previous session

Test questions can either be objective or subjective. Subjective questions require human judgment to evaluate the answer while objective questions have a clear standard for correctness and can offer a choice for the learner (Horton, 2012). Since I wanted a computer, not a human, to evaluate the correctness of the responses and receive immediate feedback, I choose objective test questions such as the following:

Example 1) True of False

Stockholders of a corporation share unlimited liability for debts of the corporation.  True or False

Example 2) Multiple Choice

A corporation is owned by: a) two or more partners, b) stockholders, c) a single individual, d) one or more government agencies, e) auditors

 

References:

Horton, W. (2012). E-leaning by design, 2nd ed. San Francisco: Pfeiffer.

Newberry, D. B. (n.d.). Producing eLearning Resources [Recorded by D. B. Newberry].

 

Session 5

Session 5 - Instructional Design For Online Learning - Part 2

I am working independently and based on Dr. Newberry's suggestion that I reduce the scope of my project, I decided to revisit my course content. Fortunately, I had already been invited to attend a Program Advisory Committee (PAC) meeting at a local college for the school’s vocational accounting program. It was held on Wednesday, May 5, 2015.

Program Analysis

The purpose of the PAC, made up of local professionals and instructors in the accounting field, is to communicate to the school the vocation training and skills needed for students to find employment and be successful at a career in accounting.  The PAC reviews curriculum and equipment used in the classroom and offers suggestions for improvements.

Determining Need

The (PAC) also reviews the program's completion/employment performance and offers suggestions for improvements. The accounting program completion rate was less than 25% well below forecast standards. Student exit interviews indicated that student were not aware prior to starting the program of the work involved with the accounting.

Results of Analysis

One suggestion of the PAC was that the program needed an introductory course that provided information to about a career in accounting prior to student committing to a two to four year program. The course would introduce students to accounting with exposure to accounting basics, and careers available in this field.

Determining Objectives:

I decided to develop an online course that might meet this criteria. The following is an outline of the contents for such an online course. In consists of five sessions, with the objectives and a list of interactions types for each.

 

Course Title: Introduction to Accounting
Session	Session Objectives	Interaction
One	Describe the purpose of accounting	Student - Content: Online Presentation, Online Text, Podcast Student - Instructor: Email, Skype, Webinar Student - Student: Email, Discussion
Two	Describe the accounting process	Student - Content: Online Presentation, Online Text, Podcast Student - Instructor: Email, Skype, Webinar Student - Student: Email, Discussion
Three	Define the three types of business ownership structures	Student - Content: Online Presentation, Online Text, Podcast Student - Instructor: Email, Skype, Webinar Student - Student: Email, Discussion
Four	Classify different types of business transactions	Student - Content: Online Presentation, Online Text, Podcast Student - Instructor: Email, Skype, Webinar Student - Student: Email, Discussion
Five	Identify career opportunities in accounting	Student - Content: Online Presentation, Online Text, Podcast Student - Instructor: Email, Skype, Webinar Student - Student: Email, Discussion