So You Want to Be an Instructional Designer? Good listener. People person. Lifelong learner. Sound like you? No, we’re not trying to arrange a first date. Colleges, K-12 schools and companies increasingly turn to instructional designers to help them improve the quality of teaching in in-person, online or blended-learning environments. Once-lonely techies who helped faculty figure out Blackboard and dwelled in university IT departments, IDs now are growing in number and gaining celebrity status at their institutions. Jobs in the industry take many shapes, but instructional designers act broadly as shamans who guide educators and institutions through the world of digital learning. You’re a good listener IDs often start the design process by talking to faculty and subject matter experts about the courses they teach. You enjoy working with diverse teams Instructional design work is unique to any given organization, but odds are it involves collaborating with people who have vastly different roles and personalities.
CreativityRulz ‘Our Technology Is Our Ideology’: George Siemens on the Future of Digital Learning What does it mean to be human in a digital age? Some people researching education technology might not spend their days wondering how their work fits into this existential question—but George Siemens isn’t "some people." “Maybe my mama hugged me extra when I was a baby.” That’s his explanation for how he thinks about the role of education in the 21st century. A researcher, theorist, educator, Siemens is the digital learning guy. Siemens’ work is on the cutting edge of what’s possible in digital learning, but he doesn’t want to discuss the latest fads in education technology. “Our technology is our ideology,” Siemens says. Rise of the robots Siemens has both an academic and an industry perspective on digital learning. Siemens also serves on the advisory board of learning analytics company Civitas Learning and is a mentor to startups in Intel’s Education Accelerator. The kind of knowledge that humans need to function in society looks different than it did during the Industrial Revolution.
SURVIVAL C.C.T STARWARMER Online Classes Get a Missing Piece: Teamwork Most online courses are a solitary experience for learners. Students lack the ability to strike up an impromptu conversation about last week’s homework or compare notes with whoever’s sitting next to them in class. The absence of social interaction could be one reason behind high dropout rates in online classes. Instead their interactions are relegated to stale chat forums, where questions go unanswered or where few students regularly visit. Students enrolled in online classes at community colleges drop out of class at a higher rate than peers in face-to-face environments, according to the Community College Research Center. Several California community colleges are hopeful that adding a way for learners to interact with each other in online classes will help them complete their coursework. MOOCs get social Carolyn Rosé, an associate professor in the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, has been exploring ways to add social engagement to MOOCs since 2013.
Live From the Apple Education Announcement It's no secret that students around the world are carrying too-heavy backpacks full of large, thick textbooks and handouts for school. What if, though, they could carry just one, thin slab, chock full of interactive text books and worksheets? That could be the story Apple weaves today in its Education Announcement event in New York City. Apple's not saying a word about what's to come, but the Cupertino, CA-based tech company may have sprung a few leaks, anyway. SEE ALSO: Textbook Makers: We’re Not Afraid of Apple’s Education Announcement Jobs and his Apple counterparts have built a pretty good track record for solving various tech and market conundrums.
NWeLearn: Creativity in Instructional Design | Brainstorm in Progress These are only my notes and impressions. Non-tangential ramblings are my own. Contents may settle in shipping: Creativity in Instructional Design Shannon Riggs, Director of Ecampus Course Development and Training at Oregon State University Instructional designers wear many hats in online education. She was reticent to get involved in online education but found that ALL of the online students had to be engaged because the courses were designed that way. The eCampus as 50 online programs, 3k students have earned a degree since 2002, 19k students from 50 states and 19 countries. 1k+ online courses. They are growing at 15% a year and they are proud that they have not let the quality slip – it has improved. “ECampus Essentials”: This requires the collaboration of an instructional designer. The question for the tables was “what role do instructional designers play on campus?” Instructional designers are artists.
The Faculty Project NWeLearn: Limitless Education: Is Open Source an Option? | Brainstorm in Progress Bell tower at Oregon State University. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) Limitless Education: Is Open Source an Option? Tamara Mitchell, Assistant Director Career Success Center at Oregon State University / Arkansas State University Mountain Home / Western Oregon UniversityBrian Daigle, Center for Academic Innovation at Western Oregon UniversityAlexis Terell, Undergraduate Pathway Associate Program Manager at Oregon State UniversityCraig Geffre, Division of International Programs at Oregon State UniversityJennifer Kepka, Linn-Benton Community College Open Source tools are reducing barriers and encouraging innovation among higher education faculty, staff, and administrators. Some of the tools looked at: I think we should have started with a definition of Open Source.
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