In many ways, 5318 was a unique challenge. Having no previous experience in designing an online course, as well as limited experience in participating in a professional learning online course, made this course feel particularly exciting. However, what I discovered throughout this journey was that when you are passionate about the content you are teaching and the skills you want your learners to gain, online learning provides an opportunity for a truly personalized learning experience.

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According to Bates (2015), constructivism is defined by the belief that new knowledge is created by connecting new knowledge to prior knowledge through reflection and other social interaction.  In an online course, I believe that this is important because teachers are scaffolding information for the learners into modules while still helping students to search for, and make sense of, new sources of information. Here is my Instructional Design for my blended professional course.

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Within a learning institution, there are many standards to be addressed and much content to be covered. As educators, it’s our job to ensure that students are meeting the needs of today’s careers and have the skills necessary to be successful in life. According to Harapnuik (2018), in order for students to truly learn, they need to experience choice, take ownership of their learning, express their voice, and learn through authentic experiences. In an era of standardized testing, and in a setting where one instructor is responsible for meeting the diverse needs of many learners, it’s important to have a blended learning environment in place. In my Implementation video I have included the links and resources needed for my blended professional learning course.

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Online learning also allows students to experience different types of specific, immediate feedback including comment posts, question posts, and short video feedback from the teacher. Online learning teaches students important digital citizenship in real-time, which is a major strength of the format.

 

Another key takeaway from this course has been that just because a course is online does not mean that it cannot be interactive or collaborative. Through technology such as Zoom, Google Hangouts, teachers and students can interact and collaborate in real-time. As a final assignment, three stakeholders needed to test and provide feedback to my PL online course. Here is the reflection of their feedback along with the usability assignment considerations.

 

                                                                                        Resources

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 Bates, A.W. (2015) Teaching in a Digital Age: Guidelines for designing teaching

                and learning. Retrieved from https://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/

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Harapnuik, D. (2018) COVA. Retrieved from http://www.harapnuik.org/?page_id=6991