Learning Gap and Instructional Needs

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With the rapid transition to virtual learning, instructors and learners need to adapt more efficient and effective ways of saving and organizing their notes and links when doing research online. Public school teachers currently use Google Drive and Chrome Bookmarks for most things. When I began taking these EdX course online, I quickly realized that I needed to adopt a digital note taking app like Evernote to save PDF readings, links to articles, screenshots of diagrams from videos or slides, etc. This made writing essays, studying for quizzes, and creating projects much easier than trying to have a combination of handwritten, printed, and digitally archived materials. As an instructor, this is equally useful for researching and updating content, managing professional development materials, and organizing assets to use in slide decks, websites, or Learning Management Systems.

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The stated Learning Goal is, "By the end of this module, trainees will be able to outline a plan for how to choose, develop, and implement a digital notebook for meet instructional and learning goals." The worksheet also provides three specific objectives with learning tasks provided to attain the goal.

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The audience would include adult instructors and older learners, so it is important to use the principles of andragogy here. I included choice, allowing trainees to do as much as they needed to for their own purposes outside of the training session. The worksheet walks them through the steps if they need scaffolding, but there is no emphasis on completing every part and turning it all in to get credit for the training. I also don't require the trainees to use Evernote, but offer resources and suggestions for how to research and choose for themselves based on their personal and professional needs.

 

Instructional Strategy 

 

The goal is inclusive of instructors and learners, since instructors need to understand the objectives from both perspectives. It would also give them something they could use with their students if they wanted to use these strategies in their course.

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I incorporated techniques recommended for interactive learner-centered videos like Pauses and Annotations. A Table of Contents and Links to the worksheet and resources chart are provided in the video description box. I used titles screens throughout and added Chapters in YouTube so learners could skip or return to sections later based on their needs. I also learned how to include Cards and an End Screen to offer those who would like more information suggested supplemental videos.

 

Considering the issue of cognitive overload, I kept it short by showing only the most relevant features in action rather than going through a step-by-step tutorial since that was not the learning goal. I used one visual channel and one audio channel to simplify the video to just two modalities. I had recorded with my camera on, but decided during editing that it was unnecessary and only cluttered up the visual space. I realized after filming that I had elaborated too much, so I used editing to cut it down quite a bit.