Based
on the research one of the key trends I see is that with the growth of online
or distance learning has come the use of instructional design models such as
ADDIE and Universal design for Learning. Several of the articles seem to
point to the need for the teacher to be comfortable with technology. They
also seem to focus mostly on college classes even though we have seen a growth
in blended courses or even fully online courses for high school and even lower
grade levels. I would recommend that we encourage all of our teachers to
realize that technology is part of our lives now and give them steps to help
them adapt. I would also recommend that researchers look into how high
school courses or even K-12 online programs do, could, and should implement
some of these techniques. I would also suggest to every new teacher that
you start off trying to do more than just use technology as a replacement
mechanism. I found it interesting that creativity was not focused on. We have so many employers now who are looking for people who can bring new ideas to the table and yet we don't seem to take that into account when we design our instruction. That was one of the most frustrating components in my student teaching for me. My students were so used to being told exactly what to do that they had a really hard time being creative. We have got to bring some creativity and self-control back into our instructional design if we want to create productive citizens. I also find it interesting that only a few of the articles took into account any type of disability. This could represent two different possibilities: one we have become so conscious of individualizing that it's not an issue or we have ignored all those who didn't get it right off the bat. The first one is a good step forward because with online education some things are more individualized than we think at first. I do find the one article that focuses on the application of Universal Design very interesting and accurate. Having taken many online classes I have always preferred short assignments and I have found that assignments that include audio is very helpful. Audio not only takes into account disabilities but also learning styles. If you have working students they may not be able to read major articles and stay awake so the audio may be helpful for them. All of these points means there is more that we have to take into consideration when we're designing our instruction. We are now serving a wide range of students so we need to think about every possible issues our students could be dealing with or face in the future.
No comments:
Post a Comment