Week 3: who are you and how do you work?
A lot of interesting thoughts have emerged over the past two weeks. Paul wrote a bit of a summary on the Week two topic what is the role of the learning designer These threads will of course remain, along with all the posts made to try to test out the system. I think there are still some errors poping up her as they debug: so if you see some PHP code appearing in a pink box, just ignore it, it may or may not be terminal, usually not. And the reply problems seem to be sort of fixed. And so with the notifications.
Week two: December 17th - 24th 2008
We have had a bit of time to warm up. I'd like to encourage you to complete your profile a bit. ie click on your name at the top of the right of the screen.
And here in this forum, this week: to consider the question who are you and how do you work?
There is a lousy post somewhere lying about the system where I asked about people and their views on ADDIE. If you are an LD, where do you fit in the spectrum of practice models? Whare do you get forced to be due t your role? (Are they the same thing?) This is of current relvance to me. I will ask Lyn to post: her work on a taxonomy involving Jan Herrington's work is quite helpful.
How do you like to work? What makes your Instructional Design - Educational Design - Learning Design practice effective? (And on the way: a short intro on who you are and why you are here may be helpful)
-Derek
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Hallelujah!
Yes, i totally agree - this is the most common issue I've had to deal with. It ties in with my comments about teachers wanting a 'just-in-time solution', which was strongly indicated in the MoE project "Approaches and implications of eLearning adoption in relation to academic staff efficacy and working practice." I know it's (partly) because they're busy, but I wish I could find a way to convince them that planning (ie thinking ahead -and behind!), and careful design will make their lives much easier, and their teaching more effective, in the long run. It doesn't stamp out the opportunity for creativity.
I would love t hear how others manage this difficult part of the designer-teacher relationship. I don't think 'competency' (ie LMS and applications) training makes any headway on the issue - it seems to do just the opposite. and prof dev that relates to pedagogy can sometimes be too remote for people who jsut want to get on with 'putting their course online'.
Are we selling it wrong?
k8
Fascinating John . .
Well said. I was accused of this very thing recently. Probably a grain of truth in it at the time. We often can at a superficial level 'pattern match' and use a plan/design from a similar situation and with a little more reflective analysis things could have been much deeper.
Yesterday my boss asked me to present tomorrow on 'What I do' to the department. I have been immersed in images, principles, stories and models for the last several hours, trying to figure out exactly how to make this transparent and concise.
So much of what I do in practice is more divergent than convergent.
I wonder if an image can show here? I will see.
This is a favourite cartoon of mine. Sometimes I cannot explain what actually happens. Activities, needs, drivers, resources, supports all kind of come and go in focus and in prominence.
re: more views on ADDIE
John said: They develop their understanding of the ‘gaps’ then straight away want to develop a ‘solution’.
Yes, and tools such as an LMS make this more possible than when solutions had to be developed from the ground up.
more views on ADDIE
Great to see NKK get an airing Paul :-)
I have found there is a danger of moving from Analysis straight into Development giving only fleeting consideration to ‘Design’. In fact some people seem to confuse Design with Development. They develop their understanding of the ‘gaps’ then straight away want to develop a ‘solution’. The exploration and justification of options against pedagogy and technology tends to disappear in the rush! Or go in the too hard basket!
Design models
Derek asked about 'views on ADDIE'
When I was with Nga Kiwai Kete we put together a page about design models:
http://www.nkk.org.nz/kete3.php?id=95
It includes the NKK model we developed which builds on other models, including the ARIA model that I worked on with Cathy Gunn and others during a project in Hong Kong. Note that there was a decision not to include the ADDIE model in NKK, from memory because it didn't seem very relevant or appropriate for our target group!
Paul
OTARA: comments
This is a copy of the post from Moodle.org on OTARA from Kate:
It's great to see OTARA continues to grow. Now that i'm not working in a single institution, I don't always keep track of how/where it's being used successfully (tho i keep in touch with Joyce and David
).
I'd like to add to the background of OTARA's development -- the following could really be said to be the founding principles:
To add to joyce' examples of ways to use OTARA: I Have also used it very successfully as a
project
planning tool for a website when team members were spread around the country.
As well as providing the 'common vocab' Joyce mentions, OTARA is invaluable for tracking the evolution and current stat of e a course - as long as you are vigilant about version control! (I like to save a new copy every week during development, and keep all of those files in an archive folder in the course or somewhere very safe.)
But the most unexpected use was as a quaility assurance tool for a course programme that was not yet accredited. the accrediting body wanted to see 3 developed courses before they would tick the box. That was unrealistic - but instead we submitted 6 OTARAs that gave details of the first 6 weeks of the course - including the kind of support students would receive.
It can also be used to track the 'wishlist' - things you'd like to do on your course, but are unable to do in this iteration.
The biggest hurdle is persuading staff that this kind of planning is to their advantage. Workloads and just-in-time training (often this is learning how to operate the LMS) frequently take priority. I'm very interested in following up on David's suggestion for a more visual and interactive tool, or a standard framework for a
workshop
, that will do the same job.
Cheers, k8
Otara
of course!
Joyce and David and I would appreciate any discussion about OTARA - on more than one occasion it has been suggested that it would be worthwhile doing some follow-up reserch on how people are using and adapting it. I know David has extended its use if different ways to me.
k8
K8 on Moodle.org.
Hi k8, I'd forgotten about your post on Moodle.org with the overview of OTARA. (http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=96012&parent=478126)
Can I lift part of it and post here?
My work too
Hi all,
I've just been catching up on last week's discussion - I'm sorry to have missed adding my 2c worth from an independent contractor's point of view. But I'm sure there will be other opportunities...
Like Paul, I am self-employed, and so my range of work is somewhat unpredictable.
Since becoming my own boss, I have contracted back to some ITPs on particular projects. I really like that sort of work because it focuses on a particular course, with a particular group of people. My aim is not only to help them create something that is better than they could have created on their own, but to leave them with more ideas, more skills and more confidence. Sometimes this involves mentoring individuals (Oriel's 'why not try it this way?') ; sometimes it's more advantageous to run some specific workshops with small groups. Rather than teaching (I'm not, and never have been a classroom teacher), my background is clearly in the realm of ID - creating intelligible, logical, and usable educational material. My expertise is based in writing and editing - and has extended into the online arena from there.
There are frequently advantages for an organisation to bring someone in from outside - I find that the saying about 'prophets in their own land' not being heard is sadly true - I make it my first priority to check in with the experts in the organisation so we are seen as a team - and i can often help them to promote their own message.
For me, the advantage of this type of work (apart from being projects, which I prefer to providing ongoing professional development, which I know is the core activity for many of you) is that I get to see a wide variety of systems, practices and processes - which I can then refer to on other jobs.
The disadvantage is that I run the risk of having a wide but shallow skill base.
Derek says: If you are an LD, where do you fit in the spectrum of practice models? and refers to Herrington...
While ADDIE may be seen as restrictive (and I've never found many teachers who are willing to consider it very realistically - it seems to take a long-term view and they prefer 'just-in-time'), I do model my course designs on OTARA - which focuses on the DD part of ADDIE. It is also very closely aligned with Oliver and Herrington's work because it puts 'activities' at the center of the model. David Sturrock and Joyce Seitzinger have also had some success with this - and I firmly believe it has a multitude of uses - from providing valuable documentation for audit (as we showed at EIT) to recording plans, dreams and intentions for individual activities.
But I am involved in other work as well - currently with an ITO, assessing the quality of their resources (this has now spun off into another unrelated project); working with university library staff to create consistent and usable guides and handouts; and - as part of a consortium, completing a project for MoE (well, finger crossed - it will be completed ONE day).
How do i like to work? I guess I like the small picture -as in projects, rather than trying to promote institutional change (been there tried that got out). But it's very gratifying to have clients come back to you - either for ongoing work- or fro other projects.
What makes my practice effective? Sound relationships, trust, getting on well with people, listening to them (still working on that one), figuring out what the real questions are, because they are seldom the ones they ask you...
k8
My work
Derek asked: If you are an LD, where do you fit in the spectrum of practice models?
Only some of my work is LD - not very much at the moment but it comes and goes. And since I am self-employed, how I work all depends on the project and the context. But it's true that the platform (eg an LMS or CMS) is often a given so the initial design phase is constrained. The way I prefer to work could best be described as an iterative prototyping approach, but often there is not time for the iterative aspect so perhaps it's rapid prototyping :-)
Paul