Category: LRNT 527

As LRNT 527 comes to an end, we have all been tasked with reflecting on our empathetic design challenge. To start my reflection process, I reviewed my own notes and my past blog posts. This course could be best described as a journey, and like many journeys, I found I had forgotten some of the earlier moments. The journey map that I created in the design phase would have been the most surprising for me. At first I was not sold on the idea, but after completing, it gave me the ability to visualize my thoughts and my time spent reviewing my course differently. 

Moving into the prototype phase, my goal was to add a digital learning resource that allowed for more engagement between the instructor and students, and gave the students a better understanding of the course expectations. Overall, I think my prototype is a good step in that direction, but could be expanded to make it even more clear for my students. Feedback received from peers included incorporating the learning goals and intentions of the DLR for the students to see (D. Hatzigeorgiou, & T. McLeod-Treadwell,  personal communication, August 15, 2019). 

If I were to do this project over again, I would scale back my ideas sooner. I originally went into the prototype thinking I was going to make a few smaller activities. However, the amount of time it took to complete the prototypes that were (in my opinion) good enough for my end user took me much longer than anticipated. One of the reasons for this is because the prototypes were developed with an emphatic approach, which gave me a different perspective on why I was creating them. 

To end this post and 527, we were tasked with answer the below questions

What was the most surprising thing that you learned by participating in the design thinking process and designing and developing your digital learning resource?

How much I wanted to work with other people and discuss my prototype and process. I normally think of myself as fairly independent, but through the different stages I found myself wanting to work and collaborate with others. This is most likely due to the design process being very different than other types of improvements or innovations I have added to my courses. 

What suggestions and improvements did you receive? Did you get any feedback that you did not expect? What feedback needs further investigation?

Throughout the entire course, I received feedback on blog post and then finally on my prototype. One revision, which was received through feedback, would be to increase the amount of instructions given to the students once they receive the Excel spreadsheet (J, Christie, personal communication, August 11, 2019). It was something that I did not think about, as in my mind the prototype was over. But adding it makes a lot of sense for accessibility and ease of use for my students. 

What are the next steps you would like to take to build upon your digital learning resource?

By building this prototype, my hope is to integrate it into my new course in the fall. Hopefully this will allow me to start building stronger connections with more students, and give all of them another tools to utilize for their own success. Before doing so, there are a few more revisions I would like to make. I would like to develop the Moodle version of my quiz, and add more instructions into my resource as suggested in my feedback. These instructions would be for the how the student could download and access the excel sheet. 

Also, consider how you might utilize the design thinking process for the design and creation of digital learning resources in the future, or for other tasks that you may encounter within your instructional context.

I often collaborate with another colleague at work regarding similar class features. I would utilize a few of the more collaborate stages of the design challenge. There are also a few that are methods I have never used but would be interested in trying, such as Analogous Empathy and Story Share-and-Capture (Stanford University Institute of Design, 2016, p. 12-13). I enjoyed doing it by myself, but I think having more ideas in some of the earlier phases would have been able to open up the topic and ideas a bit more. 

Thank you for reading my blog. Time for a week off before we jump into LRNT 528!

Reference

Stanford University Institute of Design. (2016). Bootcamp Bootleg.  Retrieved from http://dschool-old.stanford.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/METHODCARDS-v3-slim.pdf

This week in LRNT 527, we were tasked with moving our design further along into the Define stage. For me to complete the define step, I needed to complete the empathy stage- which was my journey map. I ended up hitting a snag, as I originally had planned to use my new Chemistry 12 course that I had not seen yet. This would have allowed me to utilize the “beginner’s mindset” ( Stanford University Institute of Design [SUID], 2016, p. 6 ) as it would have been my first time moving through this new course and I would have less bias. Unfortunately, the courses were not released in time as planned. Therefore, I needed to go back and use one of my current courses that are running, but will soon be discontinued. 

For my journey map, I put a timer on, and went through the first hour of my current Chemistry 12 course. This included logging in and trying to familiarize myself. After completing my hour in the course, I combined my new experience with my previously gathered observations, to create my journey map. 

 A few of my main takeaways from my own experience is how many videos there are for the student to watch. There was also a lack of engagement with the material, at least for the first hour of the course for me. Most interesting was the confirmation I got that the students are not watching and using the videos in the course. I confirmed this when watching the very first content video on the first page, which explained in detail how to complete a certain task ( Writing complete and net ionic equations). Oddly enough, this is one of the most asked questions I get on the first assignment, and one of the largest areas for mistakes. However, the video in the course clearly explains the steps and show multiple examples. If students are watching the videos they are not retaining the information needed. Another main insight I had, was that there did not need to be more videos for content delivery- and the current ones needed to be broken up a bit. 

Once my journey map was completed, I started in the define stage. For this stage, I used a combination of a Point of view (POV) madlib and the Critical Reading Checklist (CRC) (SUID, 2016). I chose these two methods because I am completing this design challenge alone. Many of the other methods utilize teams and multiple perspectives, but I needed methods that I felt I could be successful at doing individually within our short time frame. 

The POV Mad Lib allowed me to reconsider the needs in more detail of my user. The insight gained from my journey along with past observations highlighted many of my previous suspicions. 

After completing my POV Madlib of I looked at the CRC and answered the questions “What is the point?” “Who says” “what’s new?” and Who cares?”

Of these 4 questions, the most intriguing one to me was what’s new? Having had made improvements to courses before, trying to look at approaching this in a new view is intriguing. Along with the results of the madlib, and the CRC, I adapted my POV to be 

“DL students at WCLT have specific motivations and reasons for taking Chemistry 12; therefore, they need to engage more with the course content and the instructor at the start of the course to better understand the expectations of the course and be able to move through with more success.”

Overall, completing the empathy and design phase as confirmed my initial thoughts. It has shown me how slow and heavy the course starts out, which most likely is contributing to the confusion and slow start many students are having. 

From here, we are off to Unit 2, where we start to design and create. Does anyone have any ideas for me to consider when it comes to my design of my digital learning resource? 

Amanda

Reference

Stanford University Institute of Design. (2016). Bootcamp Bootleg.  Retrieved from http://dschool-old.stanford.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/METHODCARDS-v3-slim.pd

As LRNT 527 continues to move forward, we are now finishing up Activities 2 and 3, which focus on Empathy and methods on which we can gain it for our end users. This empathy will ultimately be used in creating my digital resource. 

While reading Matthews, Williams, Yanchar and McDonald’s (2017) article on empathy in Distance Learning, I found myself agreeing to many of the statements they were making specifically the key tensions. One of the biggest challenges when considering gaining empathy for my end uses, is the variety seen within the end users themselves as well as different stakeholders. Matthews et al. (2017) discuss how “learners as well as other stakeholders can lead designers to contradictory or conflicting design requirements” (p. 490). Due to the variety of my learners age (16 – 45+), life experiences, educational experiences, and home lives, their needs and wants of vary so significantly, that attempting to empathize with them all would be conflicting.

For my design challenge, I am wanting to create a resource that will allow my learners to become more engaged with the content. I am also interested in giving them more choice, and giving the learner more power in how their learning will take place. 

As well as the variety of end user, I am also facing the challenge of 

• Time- this course is only 9 weeks and activities need to be completed quickly
• Date- we are at the end of the traditional school year, there are less staff around and less students work
•  Workload balance- any additional work added needs to be able to be managed with my current workload. 
• As well as other external pressures and practical barriers expected in public school. 

To further gain empathy for my user, I am choosing to participate in Stanford University Institute of Design’s Bootcamp Bootleg’s Journey Map (2016). One of the reasons I choose to use the Journey map to gain Empathy, was the research ethics guidelines that stated I could not contact someone was under 18, part of a vulnerable population, or I had a position of power over. I could have contact past students who are older than 18, but due to the limit of 3 participants, and time, the experiences shared would not represent my whole student population. 

By using the Journey Map, I plan on going through the start my course as if I was a student, and making notes on areas where I feel disengaged, bored, confused, or where there are options to add other material. I plan on only completing the first 2 – 3 lessons, which would only be about 2-3 days of class for the students. It has been a few years where I have intentionally gone through the course now with the eyes of a student and hopefully I will be able to learn more about the challenges they are facing within it. 

I would love to hear if you have any ideas for me while I am creating my Journey Map. I will update my blog when it is done. 

Amanda

References

Image “Empathy” (CC BY 2.0) by sinclair.sharon28

Matthews, M., Williams, G., Yanchar, S., & McDonald, J. (2017). Empathy in distance learning design practice. Tech Trends, 61(5), 486-493.

Stanford University Institute of Design. (2016). Bootcamp Bootleg.  Retrieved from http://dschool-old.stanford.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/METHODCARDS-v3-slim.pdf