Technology

Learning Journey of my Multimedia Project

To make things simple, let’s do it through a flipsnack, a magazine capable of showing you so much more!

It started off on a day where I was late for class on my first lesson, travelling from work to school. The first lesson felt very tense, the session felt daunting and expectations were high. Questions were being thrown to give us an understanding of the module and the journey ahead of us.

So what did I do for my project? It was a topic of hypertension care for adults, it’s a really a topic that is close to me, that I felt could be shared with the world to understand that you can make changes to make your life a lot better than it is. I segmented into 3 components:

• Right Food Choices – Selecting the right choices when eating in a hawker centre.
• Get Active – Allowing learners to get physical and start exercising through small steps
• A mystery component – Allowing learners to take ownership of their own lives and account for the areas of improving their lifestyle through the 1st two topics.
  One of my first multimedia projects using Adobe Captivate and Powtoon. It was relatively customisable and I would rate it a 7/10 in using the software. Notably, the mark deductions came from the bugs I had to fix and realised that recreating or copying a project actually solves them.

It was a challenging process of picking up the software in an instant, and to become an overnight wonder in it. There were hours spent on designing the characters expressions, taking reference from some places such as freepik.com and Google search. These were inspirations that I took to design a more immersive experience for my learners.

The other element was spending time on storyboarding the entire process and trying to be both a content expert and also a novice in learning the materials. There were areas I couldn’t assume that learners will have, such as understanding what are the food types that were really high in salt/sodium. They were critical towards informing my learners that the food out there that you are eating is not as healthy as you think it is.

Thinking Gamification and Game-Based Learning

If I could make a choice today again on what I did, I would have chosen gamification elements into my project still. I find it relatively effective on learners as it engages them better. The things that I was short of were areas such as point systems, leaderboards, etc. It even went on to areas and inspirations from Khan Academy, where I saw the potential of evolving avatars. These factors will make the game more immersive and learners coming back for more even when they are already done. I was thinking of areas for improvement and drew inspiration from Kayla Itsines, maybe posting how your lifestyle improved will also motivate the learner and the community in general.

"The prize was more exciting than the game to get it" - Natalie Portman Harvard Commencement Speech The difficulties in measuring in e-learning

Measuring 2000mg is REALLY difficult to measure. I was given feedback on how I could improve by giving better indicators on measuring sodium and not using 2000mg as a source. One of the things that were pretty weak, was failing to show learners that one bowl of noodle soup might have about 2500mg of sodium while replacing it with rice noodles may bring it down to 1000mg of sodium in total. There are metaphors that I felt I should have used and these are important learning points in my project as a reflection.

Text and voice appearing at the same time

I’m giving my alternative perspective to the use of voice and narration appearing at the same time. No doubt that I respect Mayer’s design principles and have aggressively defied it in an E-Learning project I did last semester. I defied areas like extraneous loads and redundancy principles during the conversations. I understand it is really difficult to read and hear at the same times, our sense just doesn’t work that way. but most importantly. These are elements that are shown in non-critical elements to create a scenario and using a light hearted approach towards E-Learning contents. The light-hearted scenario(yet considered a bit weak in context) was aiming to place learners in a more immersed environment. I was thinking perhaps considering the use of ideas such as:

• Selecting a gender – Male or female character and role reversing.
• Creating and choosing a name. That will give greater depth in personalisation.
• Get fit in 5 steps must have the text and voice appearing together

This was one of the segments that had 5 green buttons, to encourage learners to get active and help themselves to become fitter during the course of hypertension. I was pondering for a long time, must I allow learners to listen to the narration in this segment.

The ability to replay is an important component that I valued through the gameplay of the E-Learning content. I felt that the conversations between the two parties (Sam and Jane) could be improved further. Possibly allowing learners to either replay the whole conversation, or to repeat certain segment. This is to cater to all ages of learners (young or old). I am pretty sure people will get bored of listening to the same scenario over and over again.

Other Design Elements for Improvement

The consistency of the Colours in the lady could have been improved, especially in the area of the park where both had contrasting Colours appearing. The colours were similar and might be a little too close for comfort. Suggestions for contrasting colours would definitely be plus points for my project.

Dwelling back to Mayer’s design principles, I thought about the use background music and voice together. I once asked a researcher who was doing music cognition, on whether the use of background music is going to immerse the learners better in the learning experience or is it just going to be another distraction for them. She gave me valuable insights on how it could hinder or make the experience even better. I believe that staying true to my principles was really important, at the same time taking new perspectives into consideration too.

Final Words?

I’m writing this despite not having a good grade in the institute’s standpoint, but there are worthy lessons that I have embraced from this entire module alone. To me, I felt like I reached the point where I felt grades were secondary, learning was primary. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank my wife and friends who have helped in me this project. They have also provided help in voice narrations and feedback.

I am almost a year into my Masters programme, this was definitely one of the highlights. So if you really want to take a look at how my project goes, just drop me a message and I’ll be most happy to share with you!

A blend of Thinglink and comics

As educators, we always ponder how to make classroom learning more engaging and fun for our students. As for me, it’s all about working offline to engage them in their own time, harnessing technology to propel self-directed learning. I want to make learners more curious about the contents that surround them, and give educators perspective and tools they can consider for their learners during class using Blended Learning approaches or take it offline by placing contents on Learning Management Systems or simplier tools such as Blogs(WordPress, blogspot, etc.)
It’s all about working with a few web tools so we could get things working.

Thinglink

Thinglink is an interactive image tool that provides users with the ability to turn any image into a multimedia launcher. Users can create multiple “hot spots” on specific parts of an image and turn the image into a multimedia launcher. Embed video, record audio with the click of a button and a free SoundCloud account, or link to any website. Compatible with any blog or website that has a widget to support javascript, this is a great tool for those of us who use Blogger, Wikispaces or WordPress. The basic account allows you to put coloured circles and when you hover over it, it will start blinking and alerting learners to mouse over it. You can mouseover an example as such above!

Pixton (Comic Creation)

Pixton introduces the world to Click-n-Drag Comics™, a revolutionary new patented technology that gives anyone the power to create amazing comics on the web. From fully posable characters to dynamic panels, props, and speech bubbles, every aspect of a comic can be controlled in an intuitive click-n-drag motion (Source: Pixton). It’s really a comic-creating tool to provide some humor relief to your learners in case your subjects maybe too dry. Pixton has many existing templates and comics to ride on. Do consider one of the existing templates to begin your comic creation.

The Final Product

It will somewhat appear like what you see below, where a mix of pixton comics and thinglink icons will appear to attract the learners to engage in them. In this example, I am portraying on how to inspire people with e-learning technology. Considering that learners must also be placed in a context, you could consider the following storyline when you design and develop an engagement tool as such:

1. The context you wish to set, this gives learners an understanding of the scenario that is taking place and what it encapsulates.
2. The learning objective, this gives learners an understanding of what your interactive content offers.
3. Create a series – If you would like to expand knowledge and skills, how would you sequence the series to attract learners to come back again and again.
4. The key takeaway message – What is the one thing you can think of that you wish to deliver to the learners.

Once you are done with these key areas. Consider creating the comic in this manner.

1. Create the initial comic on Pixton, the original text and all the images you wish to place inside.
   
2. Secondly, Copy the comic and make one that has no dialogue or conversation.
   
3. Lastly, gathering all your resources and placing it into thinglink. Start creating the links with the respective conversation dialogue you created initially.
   
   

Last message to tell all of you, do give me some comments on what you think about this particular method. Does it sound too crazy to be true ot just not worth the effort. Have fun trying!

What you need to take note when designing your next Learning App

Apps are prominent in today’s context as mobile devices becoming more prominent and great advances in technology. Almost everyone owns a smart device these days.

Teachers and educators are also jumping on the bandwagon to see how it can benefit learners in classrooms and lectures. Let’s explore some design considerations during the development of an App

The simplicity of instructions in the app

The icons that create meaning and provide heuristic support for learners when they view the App. Certain Icons already have meaning in our daily lives so we can harness the heuristics that each person possess through common icons and pictures.

Your icons are able to immediately provide learners with the pathway and direction in learning. I have actually placed a few keywords associated with certain design.

If you refer to the picture above, you can see ‘Create’ and ‘Design’ is closely associated with ‘painting and the palette’.

A calculator is also closely associated with the word ‘solve’. These clean and simple words actually help learners to understand more effectively. It is also supposed that using plain English is also one of the ways to help learners understand and learn more effectively, especially when concepts are pretty steep and difficult to understand.

You may refer to the following link to download and use one of the references I have found recently online.

Created with Padlet

What applications will u place into the app to create more dialogue between learner and instructor? Interactions in the App ensures that your learners don’t only read, but also interact with the contents and your thought process.

it is crucial to lay out the design of the App carefully, as well as creating small components of interactions for learners to engage in during the course of learning. There are 3 categories of interaction in that I will be discussing:

1. No interaction – it is mainly for a user to read or watch a video using the App. there is very minimal interaction involved. It only serves for learners to read and try to interpret or use the information that they have learnt in future. This of course, has no guarantee that the learners will remember what they have just read.
2. Minor interaction – it refers to clickable links that you place for learners to reference materials. There are clickable links for learners to click and refer, when designing instructions or information for learning. There will be clickable links for learners to access as part of additional materials for them to read and understand the topic fully.
3. Moderate interaction – this is the toughest segment to achieve. Thete are animated videos and quizzes using online quiz tools such as qzzr.com. and Padlet discussions that you set as a social interaction platform. they provide learners a platform to give feedback on what they think or feel about a concept they have just learnt about.

A variety of interaction and activity.

[qdeck style=”width: 100%; min-height: 0px; ] [q] In the diagram, guess a common phrase with reference to the diagram below

[a] It’s “HEAD OVER HEELS”
[/qdeck]

Unfortunately, learners get bored easily in this digital age. There are lots of distractions that bring them away from the intentions that you set upon.

Providing learners with activity time engages learners and give them the golden opportunity to voice opinions that have been internalised.

At the opposite end of 2 spaces, there are 2 perspectives to consider during activity design. Taking note of the correct level of activity to engage the correct instructional procedure and serve the correct learning needs:

• Open spaces for learners to input their personal thoughts provides freedom to express their thoughts. Using open-ended questions can give a variety of answers from learners yet it requires more validation to ensure the learners are on the right track.
• On the opposite end of the spectrum, quizzes provide a quick validation on learners’ understanding of a topic. it is ultimately dependent on the knowledge that those educator wish to impart to the student.

The Gamification element

The gamified element, what scores, leaderboards, badges can motivate an individual to work harder by looking ahead at what’s available for them. Gamified elements in its simplest form provide the platform for challenge and healthy competition.

When it is set at a correct level and pace, learners can compete to stay on top of the chart, providing rewards if they stay on top or successfully completing a task. For example, a badge can be given to learners who are in the leaderboard  for 2 consecutive weeks or have posted multiple times in a week.

Reward system can differ time to time, it is up to the designer to decide the magnitude or complexity of the reward system. looking at badges as rewards, some can include:

1. First post in the discussion forum
2. Top poster in discussion forum
3. Most credible contributor in the discussion forum
4. Most social learner in the discussion forum

• What rewards systems are in place to engage learners?
• How simple is the reward system for learners to easily understand how to get there?
• What do they get in return for attending the course?

As learning designers, we need to think about the return of investment when each learner invests time and resources into learning. these can include certificates of completion to recognise their contribution. are there badges that learners can place onto their portfolio website to signify their credibility.

If no certificates or badges are issued, is there a skill or knowledge that the learner can use once they been through your learning app. Could learners use this skill in their workplace instead of attending a 3-day course on it.

If no certificates or badges are issued, is there a skill or knowledge that the learner can use once they been through your learning app. Could learners use this skill in their workplace instead of attending a 3-day course on it. these are important things for consideration during the design phase as you set out the objectives for learning.

It also encompasses the learning journey that each learner will go through when using the App for learning.

1. An amount of time and resources required to invest in the video production – Think of the countless video editing that you may go through as you edit the video for the first time. There might be times that after the first time you used the video, you might have to go back to the drawing board and start reworking the entire video for better understanding. However, once this is done properly, it will be a great and valuable resource that will reside around for a long time.
2. Proper Planning – Videos requires storyboarding so learning becomes more effective. Without a storyboard, the flow of the story will be blurred and unclear. The video might end up looking scattered and impromptu. The sequence and structure of the video play the most important element in video creations.
3. Video Length – Video length must never be too long, or else you might risk boring the audiences in general. It must never be over 20 minutes, as learners might skip through important element during the videos. It is ideal for the video to be hovering on a maximum of 5 minutes, to a minimum of 2 minutes. If there are lots of areas to cover, consider splitting the video into a smaller element. This is also to enforce the need for proper storyboarding and planning process in order to make this happen.

Rediscover the basics of learning through video creation

Learning resources and platforms are readily available for everyone to use and teach others. Technology has also enabled the progression of knowledge to be dispersed to everyone to understand each other’s culture,beliefs and differences. The future is about access, anywhere learning and collaboration. Learning is going to become a more social process where people get to interact with one another using different technological platforms such as Skype, WhatsApp, wechat, etc. Idea generation can be across many regions and everyone will be globally connected to create and spur ideas together, it has evolved into areas such as Kickstarter and IndieGoGo. This occurred due to major crowdsourcing and support from the community, where a large majority of them support the creation process.

Today, I’ll explore opportunities where you will create videos so learning can take place for the individual. Creating snippets of learning through video has never been easier through a smart device. Imagine the possibilities of creating videos that enhance and retain knowledge better, it gives you meaning to your experiences and how it can formulate and reasonate with you better. You will take ownership of learning and find and use video resources, possibility to create your own avenue of thoughts. It is the right time to embrace the cloud with its wealth of resources and platforms available.

1. Start with a mobile phone to record the experiences ( I’ve recorded some places where I visited and what I have seen over there.)
2. Have a theme and flow in mind and start recording. (I’ve placed focus on creating experiences for people who visit the Taiwan for the first time to experience it virtually) The flow is very important in a video, it demonstrates how it should start and end. What are the important messages to bring across to the audience?
3. Record by segments, it can be a snippet of 10 second video. It is recommended that you record more segments.
4. Piece them together using a video editing software. (WeVideo, MovAVI, iMovie,etc.) Review and upload it to your nearest social video platform (Youtube, Dailymotion,etc)
   

Innovating through teaching and learning

I was recently testing out something on canva.com, where I was using a restaurant menu to show different sorts of learning activities with your learners.

On one end, it kept my ponder about what I learnt yesterday from Adam Torrens where we were told to go back to the basics of education. He argued how learners are now sitting down in smaller  groups to share their learning experience with each other. It demonstrated how learning can take place with the basic tools such as keynote, where he presented several activities in a short period of time.

• Interactive worksheets – going pass thr conventional worksheets. you can now place pictures where learners can decide where the answers belong to.
• Posters – sharing posters with peers.
• Quizzes – creating quizzes and marking them
• Mockup Apps – demonstrations of an App without using an app builder

Here I am wondering about the most innovative tools, but there he is, making me reflect on the things that I was doing. Am I being overly ambitious in innovating?Should I then look at the basics of what I have, and the powerful tools that is lying around me.

On the other end of he spectrum, I see fabulous innovation through HP demonstrating their learning capabilities. harnessing technology to its fullest for students to create even more.

it is important to recognise the avenues that are given to learners to create new things and innovate continually. these may include opportunities for self creation.

Creation  can take place through different avenues such as powtoons or adobe spark that allows learners to create new animations for presentations. it is also critical for learners to break down learning experiences that they go through each time.

Displacing ADDIE in a modern world

ADDIE model was developed during the 1970s as an instructional design framework for the US army for its military training. While it fundamentally guides the design of learning, its drawback constantly involves the time taken to develop. When we look into a fast paced the world that is changing so rapidly, with technology displacing each other in a blink of an eye. Are new approaches such as SAM and rapid application development applicable to new business practice.

We would be considering new approaches to designing how our curriculum will look like. At times, there are implications of a cost incurred for training. We speak to many stakeholders and most of the concern is about getting the process across and to minimize the error caused by lack of knowledge to handle certain areas.

Sequencing of content

sequencing content and how do we do it? picture courtesy of 1001freedownloads

The sequencing of contents is usually guided by the learner’s needs and requirements. A great designer will take into considerations the mix and match of instructional approaches during the analysis and design phase. That takes into consideration that certain approaches can help to scaffold knowledge when a learner is new to a subject, or it may help learners critically think of a problem that they been facing for a period of time and use approaches such as problem-based learning to address and solve a related problem in hand. It also takes into consideration aspects such as simple to complex contents and relevance. There are also considerations such as learners who have a short attention span that may require learning designers to sequence the important contents in front and the optional ones behind.

Relevance of content

what is the relevance of the content to the learner (Picture courtesy of 1001freedownloads )

There is a load of contents and resources available online. They are so reachable within efficient search engines such as Google. Relevance of content reminds us that whatever placed on the learning resource must relate to the learner. Carefully designed content allows learners to not only understand the content but relate it to the real world, where skills and knowledge become applicable to them. Topics in a textbook are now more subjective and are used as a foundation for a new generation to understand its strengths and limitations.

Implementation of content

Bringing your own device, courtesy of 1001freedownloads.com

In the recent years, the keyword ‘BYOD’ has been dominant and we have colleges who are heavily embracing the use of BYOD. A survey by Educause suggests that over 85% of students purchase and use a laptop for academic purposes. According to a CTools survey conducted by Information Technology Services & USE Lab University of Michigan, the computer expertise of both faculty members and students are over 80%. It shows not only the need for Information and communication technology to be embedded into a curriculum and its content, it also means that colleges must be prepared to embrace more BYOD into a curriculum. There is also a need for content to fit into a variety of devices in the market.Network and security companies such as CISCO are working towards providing and hardening security for colleges and other relevant sectors.

References

CTools – https://ctools.umich.edu/portal/site/!gateway/page/d73c5aac-2fc3-48a0-802b-bff1e3cd031f
Use of Laptops in the Classroom: Research and Best Practices -http://www.eos.ncsu.edu/soc/laptops/why_laptops
http://1001freedownloads.com