(Same message posted to BBLearn discussion & course twitter)
Below are the common feedbacks for Assignment 2 to help us to learn more about LMS, wiki, and/or Google Classroom. I hope you find them useful. Feel free to contact me if you need any support for your assignment.
· Google Docs Sharing: Many of your share your Google Docs with "Anyone at NAU with the link," "Anyone with the link," or "Public on the web." For the assignment purpose, the best is to share with the specific person, the instructor since your Google Docs assignments contain private information. If you want to share with other, you can copy/paste and share with others. For more information see: https://sites.google.com/site/etcnle/google-docs-sharing
· Most of you found this assignment is extremely challenging. It is. Here are the notes that I shared with one of our classmates. I hope you find them useful to your learning.
o Most of us are not used to analyze learning system; therefore, we are not confident to approach some criteria. The criteria engage us in fact finding, professional opinion, creative design ideas etc. This is not an assignment that we can fully complete it with one attempt. The best way to approach this assignment is to plan ahead to analyze it. Some students, in fact, contact system vendors for the further information on their systems and contact their institutions' IT staff to obtain relevant information. Most importantly, we learn how to analyze learning systems. In the future, you would have better idea how to evaluate systems with your professional knowledge and skills. In a real work case, as instructional designers, you may coordinate and collaborate with your professional team members to accomplish such tasks Your team may have instructional designer, IT technician, graphic designers, teachers, students, administrators etc.
There is no way we can complete this assignment in considering all aspects. Remember, because we don't know so we need to learn. Assignment is another way to learn. More than just an assignment.
· The knowledge and skills gained can be applied to your group's final PD. So your group can use this assignment to select a right online delivery system for your group's final PD.
· "Open/Proprietary System" is referred to open source system or proprietary system. Or Open access system vs. close system for certain users only.
· Accessibility is referred to the system complies with Section 508. It is referred to website usable to all people of all abilities and disabilities, such as Universal Design (UD), assistive technology etc. It is not the issues of how easy and how convenient to access the online learning.
· 11. Technology Infrastructure (Including industry standards, data analysis/warehousing, & safety & security of data. Every single area should be covered.)
o It would be easier to identify an institution's technology computing/digital policy. We can use the computing policy to analyses the system's data analyses, safety, and security etc. It is not uncommon that the systems may not align with the institution's computing policy fully and/or partially. For example, many web 2.0 tools are not allowed in schools' computing systems, such as Google Apps etc.
o You may notice that you may or may locate institutions' or systems' policy or industry standards etc. Many don't disclose the information online. We will need to contact them obtain. Due to 7-week instructions, we may or may not have chance to do so. It is a good opportunity to learn what and how to approach these criteria.
· 12. Implementation Requirements (Training, Installation, Maintenance, Compatibility. Every single area should be covered.)
o It takes a lot of planning and considerations to implement a system for teaching, learning, and administrations.
o How about the organization's preparation to migrate from current system to a new system?
o What planning may involve in the new system training for all stakeholders?
o Is self-training enough?
o Q: What supports does NAU provide for the students and the faculties on LMS?
o A:
§ For faculty: NAU E-Learning Center: http://nau.edu/ELearning/Workshops/
§ For students: NAU ITS: https://nau.edu/its/services/bblearn/
· When reviewing systems, many of us think in a small scale for a class or a few users. Don't forget there is a time we need to evaluate systems in a larger scale for hundreds or thousands of users. I encourage you to challenge yourself.
· Many of you evaluate "Google Classroom." Your analyses were relevant and logical. I hope it was a great learning experience for you. At this point, NAU does not support Google Classroom due to some "accessibility" concerns. It is critical that we want to make sure a system is able to meet and to comply with the institution's computing policy/standards.
· Some of you evaluated iTunes U and provide a great insights and analysis in your assessment. iTunes U is a very different system. It is not a fully function LMS. Can it be an alternative "interface" for online learning system? Particularly, it can be accessed easily on iOS devices.
· We need to remember there is no "perfect" online learning system to deliver online instructions. It is matter of "how we put them (tools) together." This leads to the importance of "online instructional strategies." Be sure to obtain good knowledge and skills for our Assignment 3: Online Learning Instructional Strategies.
· We should have a good understanding in evaluating and selecting online learning systems. Each system has its own strengths and weaknesses. We should base on our online instructional goals and needs to evaluate and to select systems. Sometime you may need a more comprehensive system to support your needs while sometime a simple system may work just fine with your simple needs and tasks. Sometimes you may need a closed system to deliver content and instructions while sometime open system works better for your needs. Remember! If we don't select a certain system, it doesn't the system is not a good one. It could be just that system is not a better fit for your current project. So keep your mind open. You don't like a certain system. It doesn't mean it is not a good system. As a professional in online learning, we should know all systems' strengths and weaknesses. It is not enough that we just say "I like it because it is simple" or "I choose it because I like it" etc. We need to be able to tell non-professionals, certain online learning systems are effective because it has potentials to support certain effective online instructional strategies, like …
· Rations for selecting certain LMS tools: Many of us justified the selected LMS tools for your final PD was based on "I know the tool," "It is easy for me to use," "It's free," or "I like it" etc. These rationales were ok but not professional enough. As graduate students and experts in educational technology, we should be able to provide more professional analyses rather than just "personal" preferences because we may select the tools for others to use not just for ourselves.
· Q: May I have your permission to adopt the template to evaluate other online learning tools/systems?
o A: Yes. Please feel free to do so. As an educational technology leader/specialist, you may need to evaluate different learning tools/systems in the future. In fact, many ETC graduates are using this template to evaluate tools. Just be sure to provide the source/credit when you use it. For example: Source: ETC655, NAU: Online Delivery Technology Evaluation, Rational, & Report, 2017. When using it, you may not need all categories/criteria. You can pick and choose the ones relevant to your evaluations.
· iTunes U: Some of you evaluated iTunes U system. iTunes U is very different from CMS or wiki etc. It focuses on content delivery. Perhaps we can call it Content Management System (CMS) since it doesn't offer much online learner-learner interaction or online collaboration. Its strength lies in more personalized and mobilized learning content. iTunes U is in its infancy stage. We hope it will improve further in the near future. Here are a few iTunes U's important features to be noticed.
§ Focuses on learner-content interaction
§ Mobilizing learning content
§ Access from anywhere and anytime on mobile devices without computers
§ Delivery online multimedia learning content
§ eBooks content can be annotated on the mobile devices
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