Facilitating Design Experiences

I held a LEM design meeting in my office with Brandon Burr and Brett King. The meeting went really well. Brandon was familiar with LEM before the meeting so there was no need to explain the process. We jumped right into mapping out the course.

Brandon has been tasked with redesigning a hybrid FMCD 5373 course. The current course that is being taught has a really good structure that is consistent and easy to navigate so we decided to keep that. His main goals are to update the assignments and add more practice and dialogue. Once we started talking about the actual assignments themselves, he saw a need to make them more relevant to the student.

I did not map out the current course beforehand because I do not want my instructors to rely on someone else's design. I want to hear how they want the course to be. However, in this case it would have been good in order to see the differences between his plan and the current course and since we decided to keep the same structure, it may have cut down on the time spent mapping everything out.

Using LEDx as a framework, I would add in placeholders in D2L for those elements that we discussed for Brandon's course.

Planning a Learning Environment Design Experience

Below, I am applying the LEDx framework to the Facilitation workshop.

I would first start out the class by getting to know not only my instructors but discovering what they know about facilitating an online learning environment. Right now, my instructors delve right into the content and I do not have a clear understanding of where they are coming from.

This goes along with the discover phase for me, but I would also like to know what they believe makes a good facilitator in general and how that applies to online learning or if they think there's no connection. I need to know what they believe they will get out of this course and how they plan to achieve those objectives.

UCO has a solid Facilitation workshop as it is now, however, I would definitely add more examples for the instructors such as video tutorials, podcasts, images, etc. My instructors learn a great deal from each other so it would be a great idea to include examples from current online facilitators so they can see what their peers are doing in their courses.

The final project is the hands-on portion of the workshop where the instructors build out items in D2L. I would like to build upon this and have them create a "How to Teach This Course" guide as well that incorporates all of the best practices they've learned in the course.

Designing the Design Space

I chose my design space for its functionality. The space includes several whiteboards and has room for several more if needed. The table in the middle also has a whiteboard top. The space is low-key and located right outside the offices of the instructional design team so there is always the opportunity to find other opinions if need be.

I would use this space for a larger group. I typically work one on one with an instructor. If there are more than three people in my office, the space becomes cramped.

Modeling Agenda Design

This modeling agenda was used for my LEM design meeting with Brandon Burr for his redesign of FMCD 5373. I asked Brett King to join us and offer any suggestions he had with the design. 

Applying the LEDx to BIG Design Challenges

For my design challenge, I chose to apply the LEDx framework to “Your Ideal Introductory Video for a Course.”

Part of my job as an ID is to manage the faculty facilitation course for UCO. In this course we share best practices and one of the content topics is to create the ideal welcome message. I am going to be basing the following framework off of interactions I've had with my faculty.

Discover: Empathy Research

I would like to start off my conversations with finding out what the instructor's purpose is in creating this message. In Facilitation, I get a variety of videos. Some want to instantly build a connection and use the video for this purpose. Others are quick and to the point in conveying pertinent information.

Understand: Diagnostic Model

It's always useful to see the message or video the instructor is now using. It gives me a baseline to start from.

Envision: Design Model

In this particular topic, instructors must share their videos with the class so they have ample opportunity to see what their colleagues are doing. If they are just working one-on-one with me, I will have plenty of examples to show them to find out what kind of format they like.

Build: Develop Environment

Instructors can use any type of video recording they like. Once the instructor creates a video, I will give feedback.

Innovate

Once the instructor has an opportunity to use the video in class, I will recommend that they revamp it every semester. They should always keep in mind what worked and what didn't work.

Different or Similar?

Credit: https://hortmonvera.wordpress.com/2015/03/06/addie-instructional-model/

In the past, my basic method was to use the ADDIE model when designing courses. This worked relatively well, however, I was constantly having to adjust the method to fit my instructor's preferences. This led to my processes being constantly in flux.

LEDx is similar in the fact that it is easy to understand but for me, the difference lies in its fluidity and ease of use. Though my processes are still evolving, they are much more consistent when working with instructors.

Curating BIG Learning Environment Design Challenges

The challenges I face are varied. I am an instructional designer so I come across several challenges when working with professors to design their courses. A few of my biggest challenges are below:

1. Too much information - many times my instructors think more is better in terms of content. However, most of the time this content is not aligned with their objectives. It's a challenge explaining this without stepping on toes.

2. Alignment - This goes along with #1 above but before LEM it was a challenge mapping out the course in a way that made it very clear that the course wasn't aligned. Now, it's incredibly fast and easy to see what's missing from the content and what should be taken out.

3. Instructor frustration - it's difficult at times to convince an instructor that though it makes sense to them, their students may find something confusing. They are the content expert, however, I am here to help them design their course in a way that's fluid and comprehensible for the student.

4. The "I have no clue what I am going to do" phase - Unless the instructor has never taught this subject before, most of the time they do have some sort of idea how they want their course to be set up. The challenge comes with the brainstorming sessions and articulating their wants.

Modeling Learning Environment Layers

For this assignment I chose the model "A Run with Friends"

Outcome Layer
I believe the outcome of this model in particular is the time spent with friends while exercising.

Strategy Layer
The strategy for accomplishing this is by running.

Systems Layer
The system used can be found in the interaction between the participants prior to the actual run and in the feedback gathered afterwards.

Experience

The experience of this can be gathered from the entire process of the actual run itself.

Exploring Design Layers in Learning Environments

This course was designed as an online Dance Appreciation course.

Outcome
The outcome of this course is for the students to meet the objectives set forth by the instructor.

Strategy
The instructor uses a variety of deliverables in her course and really focuses on making the content meaningful to her students.

System
The modules were designed to flow seamlessly together. Also, the design of each module is consistent so the student knows what to expect each week.

Experience
The instructor encourages interaction based on critiques of dance performances. She has a strict netiquette rule she enforces which allows for a safe environment for expression and opinions.