Unit 2 Activity 2

 

When narrowing options down, I chose to rely on the ‘SECTIONS’ framework. As a summary, my progress to this point highlights the following associations from the framework:

 

  • Students –
    • The demographic is very narrow. All employees are adults, English speaking, and between the ages of 25 and 60.
    • Access issues are addressed in my brainstorming component, and drive the product toward video (real or 3D animation) over VR because of the burden of educating and outfitting each learner with VR equipment and it’s use.
  • Ease of use –
    • Students need to be able to access the material on a PC or Tablet
  • Cost (time) –
    • This is an interesting issue, the budget requires existing time/resources, and potentially even a reduction in the future. Ideally the digital resource will be more economical and time efficient than the current system
  • Teaching –
    • The 3d animation simplifies the visual aspects of the structure(s) and allows for focus on the important elements more exclusively. Cognitive load is respected more so in this regard than actual video of the facility
  • Interaction –
    • There should be at least some interactive ability. I suspect I’ll use PowerPoint or Keynote with internal hotlink shapes as the ‘engine’ for my project, allowing some customization of the learner experience
  • Organizational issues –
    • Readiness is high, subject matter experts are available and motivated, and general organizational attitude toward progress is good.
  • Networking –
    • Non-existent. This will be a video library, so this is not a desired feature of the design.
  • Security and Privacy –
    • Organizational privacy, mostly in the form of respecting trade secrets, will need to be addressed in further courses. In the initial course, there are no issues. Student data is not collected in the initial course either, but later courses may require data security commensurate with Transport Canada examination results standards.

 

The Sections framework suited this project well. It allowed for a rapid enough set of decisions to be made, while still driving good questions, and even opening the discussion to other technologies. While I confess having a strong inclination toward 3D animation at the very beginning of this assignment, there is definitely benefit in confirming the idea. There have been projects in the past where I have been slowed by second guessing; having a formal decision process minimizes that drag. Where there would be more latitude in the final product, I suspect this framework may be a little simplistic, but in this case, it was quite effective.

 

From other readings, I was directed to UBCwikis, and was introduced to the design principles distilled by Robert Talbert from research conducted by Richard Mayer. Here is the link:

 

https://wiki.ubc.ca/Documentation:Design_Principles_for_Multimedia

 

I’ve decided to use the principles in the table as my ‘sanity checklist’ while progressing through the prototyping and final production phases.  These research informed principles are not new, per-se, but like any good lists, they keep us on track.

 

At this stage, I expect that my options have been narrowed down to 3D animated video, or VR. Since the animation program I use (Blender 3D) can output to VR capable files, both are being done at once, at least until the very last steps in rendering and output format.

 

References:

 

Bates, A. (2015, April 05). Teaching in a Digital Age. Retrieved July 30, 2018, from https://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/part/9-pedagogical-differences-between-media/

 

Mayer, R. E. (2009). Multimedia learning (2nd).