• Recognize availability of existing resources, its benefits and obstacles in online learning
• Recognize media selection is an important step in creating materials
• Identify the names of commonly-used application tools/software available for instructional methods.
• Recognize different types of application software, advantages and disadvantages
• Recognize media selection factors
• Recognize selection of media may be limited in online learning
• Recognize decision is based on several factors, namely: ease of use, accessibility to software, time, experience and other resources.
• Select one existing course material and identify one course material that you will create using the materials review checklist.
• Select media and application tools/software to use to create content.
• Complete Lesson Planning Template and submit via Assignment tool in Bb.
  
  

Introduction

This module is about selecting course materials for online courses. It begins by helping you to consider using existing materials (the resources and course materials that you already have available). In addition if you are going to produce your own materials, what software is available to help you accomplish your goals? To help you make decisions about materials it’s important to consider the “formats of instruction” that you are going to use in your course, and how they have an effect on learning. Each of these topics needs consideration before you can get started developing course materials.

Sometimes rather than “redesigning the wheel,” it’s better to consider what you already have, to perhaps use those materials instead of developing new ones. Remember the internet is home to thousands of well prepared course material that you can readily use in your courses. However, the legitimacy of these materials, the legal aspects (copyright laws) of using other’s materials and the applicability of materials to your course goals and objectives have to be well thought out and addressed.

Please remember, you are the expert, and only you can pick the most appropriate content for your audience/students. In such cases, you are tasked to create content. What should be some of your considerations to begin the development phase? We will use the Materials Review Checklist
in this process. This checklist will help you work through the process of gathering relevant and existing materials.

If you have determined that existing content materials do not meet your course needs, then it is time to develop your own. You as the subject matter expert will be faced with numerous questions. How do you present your content to your students in order to help them retain and apply the information? What format or media will you use?

Instructional formats are important because they effect how well your students can learn. When teaching in a classroom, you often make media decisions. For instance, you make think “I’ll just tell them that next week,” or “I should give them a handout.” Each of these is a media selection. “Telling” is the use of voice to convey verbal information, while a handout is text to deliver a verbal message. Each of these formats has its advantages and disadvantages. Text is often more useful because it provides permanence, while the human voice is more fleeting, but may convey other additional information (e.g. the emotional aspects conveyed during a conversation).

These ideas give a whole new meaning to the old phrase “A picture is worth a thousand words.” Pictures certainly, convey visual information. But consider video. This is a medium that combines both the visual and verbal channels. So does that mean video is worth a million words? Again both have their advantages and disadvantages.

The following presentation on Media Selection will define multimedia, types of media, media selection factors that you as a subject matter expert should consider while creating your content.

Now that you have identified the content and format (media), how do you accomplish the task of actually developing your lesson for online learning? There are several software applications or tools that can help you produce a course activity or presentation. How do you decide what to use? Fortunately, this is where the expertise of an instructional designer (among other things) is valuable. The use of a particular software application depends on several factors. Cost, familiarity and learning curve, support services, time and experiences are just a few to consider while selecting a tool. This section discusses these applications and the considerations you must make as you choose to develop these learning activities.

For example, let us take the web for instance. The web obviously delivers text and graphics quite easily. To develop web pages or web sites you’ll need a web editor like Microsoft FrontPage or Adobe Dreamweaver. These programs offer a simple interface that allows you to create or edit a web page. Dreamweaver is a program used by professional web developers that allows you to build templates, manage style sheets, and edit. Microsoft FrontPage uses an interface that’s similar to Microsoft Word. No matter which web editor you choose, content can be copied from Microsoft Word and pasted directly into your editor.

However, text-based web pages can be boring. To focus a learner’s attention, or add visual appeal, you can add visuals or graphics to your website. But it’s important your photo or graphics have clear instructional purpose. Photos may be scanned or taken with a digital camera and then incorporated into web pages. Depending on the level of editing you plan on doing you may want to consider the Microsoft Office Picture Manager or Adobe Photoshop. Microsoft’s Picture Manager is built for the novice but still let’s you do some basic photo editing. Adobe Photoshop is a professional tool which provides much more functionality. Microsoft’s Picture Manager is included with every Office installation (look under the Office Tools folder).

Web-based video is often used in online courses. Unfortunately video contains a huge amount of data, and to be sent across the internet, it must be digitized and compressed. However to receive streamed video or audio student should have a broadband connection (DSL or greater). Video is edited with Adobe Premiere, digitized and then may be streamed with Adobe Flash. It should be noted that each of the above production processes has difficulties associated with them. As one might imagine, video takes the most time to develop, followed by graphics and then finally text.

These three examples (webpages, graphics and video) are just some instances where the use of the applicable software should be considered while integrating these elements into your course. For a complete list of commonly used application software, review the Selecting Application Software Handout. This handout will provide you a comprehensive list of application software/tools that are organized by learning component. The list provides the resources necessary both for instructor as well as students if an application software is chosen.

As part of your activity for this unit,

1. Using Materials Review Checklist, select and evaluate an existing piece of chttp://eta.health.usf.edu/PTO/module3/unit5/SelectingApplicationSoftwareHandout.pdfourse material that you intend to use in your lesson.
2. Also identify (if necessary) one piece of course material that you intend to develop for your lesson. For this lesson, using the Selecting Application Software Handout, identify the application and media you intend to use for this lesson. Complete Lesson Planning Template and submit via Assignment tool in Blackboard. Instructional designer will provide individual feedback.

Recapping this unit, it is important to consider reviewing existing materials for your use in courses keeping in mind that they legal to use and are relevant to your course objectives. When it comes to creating your own materials, again, selection of media and instructional format plays a critical role in ensuring that your students have a optimal learning experience.

End of Unit 5.1