Instructional design is a precarious balance for me between best design guidelines, training/teaching, managing people(!), and a passion for education with a focus on student success (!). I’ve built a handful of courses now and something that’s always said to me as I’m outlining expectations is, “Work your magic!”. My mentor and I had this discussion yesterday at a check-in meeting. She laughed, “Magic!? I’m no magician.” And, it’s true that IDs are not magicians. We are not the subject matter experts (SMEs) and we can’t pull information for the course out of thin air. An ID works hand-in-hand with the SME. And, my focus when building a course is to make the course engaging, interactive, and with a variety of resources and formats. Yes, I’m focused on best design guidelines, but sometimes this isn’t applied 100% of the time. Sometimes I work out of the box. Sometimes I have to give the client or SME what they ask for because I can’t talk them out of a less engaging option. Sometimes the SME can’t work around their organization’s requirements and we all must compromise.
Jess Mitchell’s article (2019) talked about inclusive design and how to step out of our comfortable spaces. Inclusion is often the task of being willing to question, listen, and hear who’s missing from the room. Who is the course aimed at? Who’s not included? How can we make this course more engaging? More accessible? In ID, accessibility is a strong focus on concrete inclusion: closed captioning, font size/style, color contrast, navigation, audio, and so on. However, critical ID is so much more than the design, it’s about how engaging the course is, who can access it, and how students can succeed.
Jonan Phillip Donaldson (2019) outlines the principles of constructionism, which I think aligns with critical ID:
Making
Learner agency
Situating Learners as Designers
Authentic Audience
Focused Tinkering
Okay, so what’s constructionism and the principles that Donaldson outlined? And what does it have to do with critical ID? Donaldson (2019) stated,
“...The focus of constructionism is on the design of learning environments, not of instructional materials - because learning is not the result of acquisition of knowledge, but the construction of meaning. Assessment is not about mastery of learning objectives, but a reflective practice.”
From my experience, the principles of constructionism are pivotal in high-retention learning and more importantly, meaningful learning. Thus, learner agency comes into play. The learner must have the ability to design their own learning (e.g. blogs, videos, visuals, etc.) through some playful and experimental ways. Having the freedom to align a course with their own personal interests, designing their own environment. For an authentic audience, learners can create complex and imaginative design outcomes when their work has a place in the real-world. For example, writing a paper for my 20-classmates to critique or being able to use my writing in the form of a blog for my portfolio. The latter is the clear winner as it has some function and impact outside of the classroom. How engaged am I? Does my work matter?
The format of the course is a primary concern in critical ID. Something that is also at the top of discussions right now in my mind and with other IDs is learning management system (LMS) equity and data privacy. It’s true that a lot of courses in an LMS are built to be reused time and time again. Once the content is there, an instructor may simply use that same course semester after semester, year after year. But, as Sean Michael Morris (2017) stated,
“The real problem here is not that quality suffered, but that people mistook what they were doing within the LMS as pedagogical. It may be teaching - in the same way that reading from a handout is teaching - but simply slotting your pre-written materials into an online framework and calling it a class is not interesting or sound pedagogy.”
In a time of increased remote learning during the pandemic, the LMS and course design is more visible than ever before. How can we avoid the basic LMS course build-it and leave-it method?
I’ve taken a lot of post-secondary courses at this point in my life. Recently, I took a course that had had the same format and content for several years. Students were confused. They were stressed. Heck, I was confused and stressed and understood that I was uncomfortable for a reason. The course wasn’t focused on critical ID or student success. It was tailored to meet the checkboxes of an online course. Modules...check! Quizzes….check! Graded discussions...check! But, the course wasn’t engaging and it was dampening the initial excitement of new students. What was missing? It checked all the best practices checkboxes. But, learners were not allowed to be creative or imaginative. There was no wiggle room to play and design. In fact, it seemed like the instructor was there to quickly finish the course with as little student support as possible.
When thinking of my continued ID career with a focus on the learners, I ruminate on these issues. How can I make a more engaging course? How can the learner walk away feeling...exhilarated and with a toolbelt for the future? Which organizations and LMSs are protecting student data? How is data being used? The questions come like waterfalls. The choice is simple though. Through continued research and learning, discussions and collaborations will continue to build. Through these communities, the collective ability to improve will be a lifelong effort.
References
Donaldson, J.P. (2019). Traveling in Troy with an instructional designer. Pressbooks. https://cdpcollection.pressbooks.com/chapter/travelling-in-troy-with-an-instructional-designer/
Mitchell, J. (2019, April 17). Inclusive: what is it?. Jess Mitchell. https://medium.com/@jesshmitchell/inclusive-what-is-it-55acfd8094dd
Morris, S.M. (2017, May 1). Critical Digital Pedagogy and Design. Sean Michael Morris. https://www.seanmichaelmorris.com/critical-digital-pedagogy-and-design/
Comments