Comments on: Why Course Navigation is Less Important Than You Might Think

By: Crear cursos que enganchen y no aburran « Educación Digital

Crear cursos que enganchen y no aburran « Educación Digital — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 18:44:42 +0000

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By: tom

tom — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 11:59:28 +0000

Ger: good points. Personally I like to make the navigation as a free as possible for the learner. I think it’s important for the learner to have as much control as possible in constructing their knowledge. Unfortunately, a lot of corporate training requires that the courses are locked down, which means the learner has limited navigational control.

By: ger tielemans

ger tielemans — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 08:40:28 +0000

A good blog about “new technique is not the solution for bad educational design.”

(I know from the past a very good linear movie about safety rules, shipped as a demo with a graphics card, showing you how interactiv a good linear design can be, yes only a movie…)

My five cents:

One of the educational reasons to choose for branching is the wish to give the user more control over his own learning.

When you explain branching in your blog, you use pictures, but when designers normally create branching, that picture is only in their head or even in their design notes, but not visible for the user in the interface of the product: user construct their own mental map..

To show them that difference in perspectiv, I show them a copy of their own branching scheme COVERED WITH A WHITE SHEET WITH A SMALL PEEPHOLE IN THE MIDDLE. Then I ask them to (visual) browse their own scheme..

I think that one can create “branching with real user control” by using tools which support that visual aspect AND offer integrated progress feedback to the user:

1. a free browsable table of content (the user keeps progress track in his own head: this was the original idea behind IMS/CP)

2. a free browsable flowchart (like your drawing, offered by some VLE’s liek Dokeos called “the learning line modul”)

3. a free browsable outline of a course (where importance is indicated by the (depth)level of the item in the outline-tree)

4. a free browsable TOC with progress indication like you CAN design in SCORM, when you are not infected by the teacher in control virus.

5. a combination of all of the previos ones as is offered in the visual canvas of a VLE like Moodle (”THE SECTION OVERVIEW OF A COURSE”)
I our local Moodle I added checkmarks to the resources and activity items on the canvas as feedback for the user.

By: tom

tom — Sat, 20 Oct 2007 02:56:19 +0000

George: good contribution and great resources. Story centered curriculum is good. The challenge I find with it (and my guess is that many others do as well) is working with the client or SME to build the right type of story, especially when you come into a project with little expertise in that subject. Cliff is a great resource. I recommend his book all the time.

By: George

George — Sat, 20 Oct 2007 00:56:56 +0000

Tom, good exploration on “is branching the magic solution to engaging learners.” Branching enables certain things as Sam suggests in his post, but it does not create engagement. Here are some further thoughts based on two experiences and two resources. Teaching in the classroom gave me experience in knowing when engagement happens and what causes it. Engagement is more likely when the learning experience requires reflection, is experiential and includes both social and private activities. The second experience was watching students go through my elearning course and think outloud as I watched from behind the usability lab glass window. It opened my perspective to how people really use elearning. Regarding the resources, I have become convinced that a story enhances engagement more than techniques such as branching. I have found the idea of story-centered curriculum to be helpful. (See http://www.socraticarts.com) To help me write stories using PowerPoint, I have found articles by Cliff Atkinson (See http://www.sociablemedia.com/resources_articles.php4) to provide the framework and examples. Keep up the good work with these tips…still practicing.

By: tom

tom — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 16:39:47 +0000

Hello Carolina and Sophia: You both make good points. It really is about understanding how the learner learns and then building the course around that…now it’s just a matter of having the customer give you the freedom to build that type of course:) I always that to be one of the biggest challenges.

By: Sophia

Sophia — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 15:49:13 +0000

Tom, I recently ran into your blog site and have found it to embody and share much of what other e-learning practitioners encounter. This particular heading caught my attention, and brought me back to a time when CBT was the prevailing term and technology-enhanced modality. Goes to show that despite using the emerging technologies, really understanding how learners learn and the instructional theories behind successful learning is pertinent.

By: Carolina Suarez

Carolina Suarez — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 02:15:56 +0000

Tom,
Thanks for sharing this information. I just came back from an international congress about technology and education and one of the most meaningful topics I learned from was the idea of not only creating pedagogical activities for students, but make them genuine.

By: tom

tom — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 14:24:56 +0000

B: your approach is a very good one as well. In fact, many don’t fully utilize PPT’s hyperlinking capabilities.

By: B Diwakar

B Diwakar — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 03:51:37 +0000

Karen and Tom:

I also very much liked the FAQ module on Copyright information. I am not aware of “Engage” which Tom has used to develop this module. But, I have developed a FAQ module on Fertilizers, similar to the one on Copyright, using PowerPoint. Each dropdown information on the Question will be a slide which is hyperlinked to the First slide with 5 or 6 Questions and so on. No doubt it requires effort but can be developed with PowerPoint. May be it will be less effort with “Engage”.