Instructional Design Standards
Instructional Effectiveness and Pedagogy
Advanced Organizer
The beginning of all lessons within a course should present an Advanced Organizer. The advance organizer contains information listing the course or unit objectives, goals, student tasks, and resources needed to complete the unit. This provides students with an idea of the length of the unit, how to allocate their time, and expectations for completing the unit-assignments, tests, etc.
Consistency
Courses should have a consistency in structure, functionality, and look and feel. Courses adhering to a consistent structure, functionality and look and feel lower the interface learning curve for both faculty and students. Neither group will need to learn a new interface and its functionality each time they teach or take new courses. This helps to develop a comfort level with users. Consistency is also a concern when the provision of help desk and other support services are provided. Consistency should be maintained as it relates to presentation of content, length of content and activities throughout the courses. For example, course units should be balanced so that one unit does not contain an overabundance of materials and activities and another has very little.
Content
Each course should be based upon a richness of content reflecting multiple perspectives on ideas or concepts. Courses should contain materials existing in a variety of formats, taking advantage of the availability of a large number of materials from many sources-video, audio, primary source documents, external websites, etc. Courses should reflect multiple perspectives and points of view. The technology enables faculty to expose students to resources presenting multiple viewpoints on concepts or issues. Multiple learning styles should be addressed in the consideration of approach to content -- visual, auditory and kinesthetic.
Interaction
Every course must employ a variety of learning strategies and opportunities for interaction. Each course must employ a variety of types of interaction including, but not limited to, interaction between student/instructor, student/content and student/student. These types of interactions foster community building, critical thinking skills, collaboration and opportunities to understand and apply learning materials and concepts.
Student/content interaction can be addressed by having students:
- Read materials, both online and in a textbook or course packet
- View an online video clip or demonstration
- Work with a clickable image map, interactive tool, crossword puzzle, etc.
- Listening to an audio file-student learning a new language, listening to poetry being read
Student/instructor interaction can be addressed by having students:
- Communicate directly to the instructor by email
- Submit work for comment
- Instructor led discussions
- Student led discussions
- Online presentations and critiques
- Chat rooms discussions
- Bulletin Board Discussions
- Meetings utilizing an electronic whiteboard
- Telephone meetings
Student/Student interaction can be addressed by having students:
- Bulletin Board Activities
- Collaborative projects
- Critique of each other's work
- Chat room discussions
- Team activities
- Email communications
- Student led discussions
- Online presentations and critiques
- Chat rooms discussions
- Bulletin Board Discussions
- Meetings utilizing an electronic whiteboard
Assessment Strategies
Each course should provide a range of student assessment strategies. Each course must provide at least one validated in-person experience that is of significance in determining the final grade.
Web based instruction is well suited to the utilization of multiple student assessment strategies including self assessment.
Self-quizzes enable students to assess their level of understanding.
The WebCT toolset enables faculty to assess students in the following ways:
- Online testing with multiple features including timed testing, selective release, creation of test banks, random questions, multiple choice, matching, calculated, and essay questions.
- In addition to WebCT's toolset, students can be assessed via the presentation of portfolios, online presentations, written papers, projects, participation in discussions and debates, role playing, collaborative projects, etc.
Fair Use and Copyright Guidelines
Each copyrighted resource must be evaluated based upon the Fair Use Criteria set forth by the Board of Regents Copyright and Fair Use Policy. Based upon these criteria and the intended use of the final course product, a decision is made and documented regarding the need to obtain permission for use.
Simply placing a password on a course and restricting access does not substitute for a legitimate fair use analysis. Using copyrighted material may be fine for a one-time use, but if it becomes part of a course and used each time the course is taught, permission to use should be obtained. Fair Use criteria may not cover the use of materials in courses that are used for commercial gain (sold or leased to other entities). If permission to use is obtained, the record is kept in a database and is tagged for renewal of contract, owner, terms of agreement, and timeframe for use.
Faculty participating in the development of online courses guarantee that nothing in the course is owned by someone else and, if it is, can identify its use as Fair Use or has permission granted for use.
If a graphic, interactive applet or other material is created for the course by someone such as a friend or relative, a transfer of copyright or a permission to use agreement must provide the faculty with the right to incorporate the material into a course. If permission was granted for use of material in the face-to-face classroom, additional permission may be required to use for a new intended purpose.
Linking to External Sites
Courses linking to external websites are evaluated according to their stability, reliability and expected sustainability.
For example, the Library of Congress website is a reliable site that is not expected to disappear any time in the near future. The content on the site is reliable and one can expect that the link will remain intact.
All external links are monitored and periodically checked for reliability and continued functionality.
Websites come and go every day. Some sites exist only on an individual's server. Access to these sites and their sustainability and functionality cannot be ensured. In most cases permission to link to an external site should be procured.
Other than large government or institutional sites, many websites cannot sustain large numbers of unexpected hits to their servers. Asking to link to an external site enables the site manager to prepare for the extra traffic to his/her site or to let you know that you cannot rely on the site being accessible. Additionally, if someone has worked to create an excellent web resource, they would like to know that others are utilizing it. If access is a problem, an individual may allow you to post specific resources directly to your course.
External sites are not always accessible to students with disabilities. A determination should be made as to whether this material can be presented in another way to address a student's need.
Faculty Guide to Course Materials
A faculty guide will be created for each course.
This guide serves as a companion to each online course detailing the overall concept of the course, describing the various teaching/learning strategies and options built in to the course, and providing instruction on how elements of the course may be used.
Addressing Accessibility Issues and W3C Recommended Guidelines
All courses should meet Priority 1 accessibility guidelines as outlined by W3C World Wide Web Consortium ( http://www.w3c.org /).