DELTA staff and Dr. Susan Osborne worked together to create a fully online course as part of a future certificate that prepares teachers for the unique challenges in Special Education, utilizing new research in the area, peer-evaluations, and self-evaluations of teaching methods. Some videos are sensitive in nature; the goal is to implement a system to capture and distribute these videos securely. One of the main goals of this project was to update and improve the look and feel of the Moodle structure. Visual organization was modified to improve online class experience as well as consistency and maintenance between semesters.
Instructional Challenges
- Determine a legally approved policy to upload and store content-sensitive videos.
- Create an online learning community
- Design assessments that work for student planning to complete edTPA and who are only MAT students (not in edTPA)
Highlights and Solutions
- Moodle Structure: Blackboard Collaborate: Blackboard Collaborate was used for online Q & A sessions and office hours. The instructor wanted to discuss upcoming projects and assignments. Blackboard collaborate was selected due to instructor comfort level, security and DELTA support.
- Visuals: Apart from reorganization, visuals (Banners, graphics, chart) were developed to to grab attention and make the subject matter more engaging. A CBM diagram was created to make connections and present the overall course flow. The entire course is designed in a way that helps student to deliver their major capstone project (CBM Project) that is almost fifty percent of their course grade.
- Google Drive: One of the major instructional challenges was to determine a legally approved policy to upload and store content-sensitive videos. The students have to develop video lessons and share these in small group discussions for peer review. The students can upload this in a secure Google Drive folder and participate in the discussion forum.
- YouTube: An alternate to Google Drive was to use a secure YouTube channel, where students can upload their video, make it unlisted and share it with their group for peer review.
- Google Apps: Google Docs and Slides were used for student collaboration and project sharing.
- Watch together: A video sharing tool, where students can watch a video and share their comments.
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