Thursday, October 10, 2013

LMS & CMS Discussion - #TECSIG Fall 2013 Breakout Session

Some CMS/LMS systems districts are using:

  • Moodle
  • Schoology
  • Edmodo
  • Project Share Epsilen
  • iTunes U
  • Blackboard Collaborate
  • Blackboard - U of H Clear Lake
  • Desire2Learn
Administratively difficult to use multiple systems at university level. In K-12 also difficult.

If you work for a university or school district, who owns a course you create? If you put it together on your own time and are not compensated extra for the development, is it yours or your employer's?

If teachers put together a course with no editor, there is no quality control. Teachers may not have all of the skills they need to do online instructional design. Also, once the course is built, links go dead or change or become outdated. Continued design is a huge time investment.

Is there a need for dedicated online course instructional designers in K-12 education?
  • Consistent look and feel? (Unified design)
  • Deep understanding of the LMS/CMS and how it works.
  • Keep course content updated
Do K-12 schools need courses completely delivered online? Is the cost to develop worth the need? (homebound, credit recovery, acceleration)

In K-12, CMSs fill a blended learning niche more than than a fully online learning niche.
  • Lewisville ISD is doing a two day in person/three day online model with a group of students and students are seeing benefits.
Teaching online courses is a lot of work. It is a bigger time investment to design and implement online courses than in person courses. This is woefully misunderstood by administrators and teachers.









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