Course Design

Given the current nature of today’s learning environment, a lot of uncertainty surrounds the future of education around the world. Of course, the sudden and unplanned transition to online learning that occurred during this past Spring 2020 semester meant that teaching and education that would normally occur in the classroom – face-to-face, was forced to make a drastic turn to a new online environment. Educators have surmounted a difficult feat in continuing education for their students in the wake of the global pandemic, likely encountering numerous obstacles along the way.

It is because of this newfound necessity for online learning that it is now, more than ever before, critically important for educators to consider the numerous tools available to them for enhancing the student experience online. 

Northeastern University’s commitment to fostering an environment that is welcoming, effective and accessible for all students is reflected in their development of the Academic Technology Scholar Summer 2020 program. As Academic Technology Scholars, numerous PhD students from many disciplinary backgrounds in Northeastern’s community of graduate students are engaging in training that ultimately aims to serve faculty by providing them with the necessary tools and knowledge to build out engaging and meaningful online curriculum for their students. 

As an Academic Technology Scholar (ATS), I look forward to learning from and engaging with like minded PhD students from our community as well as the numerous staff that have put together this ATS program, and to consulting with faculty on course-design and Canvas technology over the course of the Summer 2020 Semester. 

A large part of moving online requires the understanding that this environment is new, to both the students and the faculty, and that everyone’s experience and level of comfort with the new format will be different.

Theory Behind Online Course Design 

Building a comprehensive understanding of Course Design has been at the forefront of our education thus far in this program, as it underpins the concepts, tools and technologies that we will be consulting Northeastern’s faculty on.

Small Teaching Online – a book by Flower Darby with James M Lang, lays out the groundwork for understanding the necessary concepts for online course design that can ensure faculty are building out their courses in a practical, cohesive and effective manner. There are so many interesting and useful concepts introduced in this reading.

One takeaway that I think will resonate with faculty is that it’s not always necessary to make large overhaul-scale changes to their lecture-style (classroom-based) courses, and that there are many useful ‘small-scale’ tools that can be used to convert their current course material to an effective online-learning environment. As with many experiences in life, this will be an iterative process – where techniques, tools and styles implemented at the beginning of the course design process will be tested, tried and improved upon. As suggested by Flowers, asking yourself (1) “What really worked about this?” and (2) “What could have been made better?”, will foster meaningful changes to the course design overtime that can be supplemented by student feedback as well.

Backward Design

Small Teaching Online begins by outlining the Backward Design theory for course development, where faculty are encouraged to first focus on outlining the overall course objectives and learning goals of a given course before selecting the materials required to achieve said goals and objectives. This method brings intentionality to course design, which is extremely important to help students engage with the material and to keep them motivated throughout the coursework.

One of the first questions that Flower’s brings in their Small Teaching Online is; “what do we want students to walk away with after this course.” A series of questions that are introduced in the book that may help to further develop an online course or to convert an already well-designed lecture-based course to online are provided as follows:

Be Consistent, Transparent and Intentional

An extremely integral part of online-course facilitation are transparency and intentionality. Being open and clear with students about the design of a course by introducing the learning objectives both at the beginning of the semester as well as throughout the duration of a course, I think will instill confidence in the student about a given faculty member’s decision to provide the given coursework and will help to maintain the student’s motivation. A student’s success in their course may be improved upon if the students are made explicitly aware throughout the trajectory of the course, what is expected of them, why it is important they complete a given task/assignment, and how to go about reaching the desired course learning goals. 

Making course learning objectives clear to students – both easily accessible online, and frequently referred to over the duration of the course, will help to facilitate a sense of understanding and motivation in the students as they progress toward said goals. 

There are many useful Canvas-related tips and tricks that I look forward to sharing with Faculty as they begin their journey to “online”.

 For now, some example tips are as follows: 

1. Think of Canvas as a great space for you to learn about alternative methods for delivering course content and reaching out to your students. Because you are now ‘online’, make sure your students have a sense that you are still present and fully engaged in the course and that you will remain so throughout the duration of the coursework. Providing introductory audio/video messages at the beginning of the course and each of the Modules throughout the semester is a great way to do this!
   

2. Focus on Backward Design throughout the duration of your course by asking students to reflect on the learning objectives they are working towards after each given module. This can be an excellent way to keep track of student progress from the faculty’s perspective, and would help students to reflect on the skills that they are acquiring.

Reference Darby, F. & Lang, J.M. (2019). Small Teaching Online: Applying Learning Science in Online Classes. Jossey-Bass: A Wiley Brand.