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Home / Blogs / Instructional Design

Instructional Design

Course Momentum

By Kristin Kowal
March 29, 2016

Posted in: Best Practices / Teaching Online

March 29, 2016

In this post, read about an online course that has great pacing and momentum to keep students engaged until the end. What follows is a description of five momentum-building activities from the course, as well as an interview with the instructor. Erin Ratelis developed and currently teaches HWM 335: The Worksite Health Environment.

Five Activities That Build Momentum in HWM 335

1. Photographs on the Discussion Board

Momentum buliders: Photographs of a road and a description of the photographs written by the instructor
Discussion Board Photo Activity (Author: Erin Ratelis)

What it is: Students take photographs of their health environment and post them to the discussion board in the first activity of the course. Erin shares what her environment looks like as well.

What I love about it: This activity does double-duty: an intro to the health environment and a social connector. By sharing their living environments in the context of the course, students are bridging the social gap that often comes with asynchronous online learning. This builds momentum by starting the course off with an activity that is exciting to students and inspires them to learn more in the weeks to come.

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Conference Connections

By Eileen Horn
February 29, 2016

Posted in: News

February 29, 2016

I once heard that fall is “conference season.” At the time it didn’t mean anything to me, but for some reason it

Making professional connections - Eileen at OLC 2015
I found this picture in the OLC Conference gallery. I remember this breakfast conversation! We were talking about differing support models for faculty who are developing or teaching online courses.

stuck in my head. This past year I got a taste of what this means. By happenstance I had the opportunity to attend two conferences back to back in October: the OLC International Conference and UPCEA Central Region Conference.

OLC is huge. There’s no doubt about it. This is both good and bad. It’s good that there are a lot of high-quality sessions to choose from, and it’s good that there are a lot of people to connect with. On the other hand, it’s so large that one’s ability to absorb knowledge is compromised by the din of all the activity, especially when poster sessions are held in the exhibit hall, as they were at OLC. The focus of the conference is online learning. The UPCEA regional conference was small and intimate with a broader focus of strategies for continuing and higher education institutions. It was special because it was local and celebrated the 100th anniversary of the first UPCEA conference, which was also held in Madison, WI.

So, why am I writing about these conferences today?  From these two very different events, I was reminded of a couple important things.

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2 Reasons to Create New Media For Your Online Course

By Kristin Kowal
January 29, 2016

Posted in: Best Practices / Teaching Online

January 29, 2016

screenshot of a video created for HWM 350
The instructor of HWM 350 explaining why research is important in a unit introduction video.

So, you’re putting your online course together and you realize that there are already videos on YouTube for all the topics you’re covering. You say to yourself, “Why even take the time to create my own videos and reinvent the wheel? I could save so much time and effort! I’d just be a talking head, anyway.” Before you make your decision, consider the following two reasons why it may be a good idea to create at least some of your own media.

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ID Team Earns Award

By Eileen Horn
January 2, 2016

Posted in: Competency-based Education (CBE) / News

January 2, 2016

2015 Brightspace Excellence Award
2015 Brightspace Excellence Award

In July of 2015, D2L honored six Excellence Award winners from around the world, including our instructional design team. The award honors the delivery of innovative, collaborative, or impactful learning experiences via the Brightspace platform. D2L recognized the UW–Extension team’s support for UW Flexible Option. View the article for more details.

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