Week 3 Course design

Course design is always the most important task for instructors, no matter if they teach traditional face-to-face class, hybrid class or online class. As for online course design, I do agree with Ko and Rossen that“putting your class online doesn’t mean copying your lectures and syllabus word to word". “Converting your course to an online environment means adapting it to use some of the tools available in the new environment”. Instructors should reshape their course according to different teaching environments. There are many online course design and delivery methods instructors can utilize. However, I don't think these methods are all fixed or cannot be changed. Flexibility and creativity are two necessary characteristics for a good online instructor as well. 

Storyboard is a useful tool for e-learning course design. I did write some storyboards for my class projects before. I like it. Storyboard visualizes the whole teaching process. It helps instructors to think ahead about what their instruction looks like, what students need to learn and what instructors will do to achieve teaching goals. By creating storyboard, instructors create“the direction (flow), the structure and sequence for the instruction". I think the pedagogical design sheets Lisa presented in the tutorial Where the Hell Do I Start are great examples of storyboard. The design strategies she demonstrated are also very helpful.

As for the pedagogical goals and objectives, I would like to show a very simple e-learning course I designed for a class project. Click here to access the homepage of my project. You will find the goals and objectives on the “About” page. The learning objectives are also available on the homepage.