Going with the flow(chart)

Source

I attended the midpoint symposium for MSIDT cohort 12 over the weekend. The first topic of the day was a discussion of our masters thesis projects, which seems to be causing plenty of stress and anxiety for everyone. After listening to the presentation and getting some questions answered by the faculty I think everyone was a little bit more at ease. I had the chance to consult one-on-one with faculty members and am relieved that they see potential in my project proposal. I'm still focused on getting through this semester first, but the project is still going to be on my mind since much of this semester is in preparation for the project.

One aspect that I thought about this weekend was the flowchart. It is a bit odd to me that this was what was on my mind since there is plenty more research to be done before getting to the actual product design phase, but someone mentioned flowchart and it got stuck in my head. Perhaps it was because I was in charge of the flowchart for the group project during summer session. For that project I used a site called Gliffy which let me create the following lovely charts for free with no download required (although there are paid options):

There are other options out there similar to Gliffy, but I've been using Gliffy for a few years and am used to it, although I am open to trying new things. The above flowcharts may seem simple, but Gliffy does offer features to make more complicated charts. I actually used Gliffy to created an advanced organizer for my other MSIDT course.

Zero Week

Since this is the first entry in this new blog on instructional design, I figure we should start with what Rena M. Palloff and Keith Pratt call "zero week".

Anyone that has taken any class anywhere has probably had this experience: on the first day of class, the instructor tells everyone to take turns standing up and telling the rest of the class their name, goal for the class, and favorite food. The name part is easy. For the goal, you want the instructor to think you actually care about the subject and aren't in the class just because it is a required course so rather than giving the truthful "I just want to pass" you tell everyone how you wish to learn all about <insert boring subject here>. Finally, for your favorite food, even though you know the instructor just threw this one in there as a fun ice-breaker, you end up over-thinking it. You want to say pizza, because really that is every red-blooded American's favorite food, but you don't want the rest of the class thinking your idea of fine dining is Pizza Hut, so you frantically try to think of something fancier. You can't say lobster or caviar, because you don't want the class thinking you're a rich snob, so you start thinking of some article you may have recently read and remember that quinoa is popular right now. So you say that your favorite food is quinoa, but you end up mispronouncing it and the class is laughing at you anyways. Time to go over the syllabus.

After that embarrassment, you enroll in an online course thinking that you are safe, but you didn't know about zero week. Zero week is a term to describe the first week of class (realistically it is week 1) in an online course. Like the first day of class in a traditional face-to-face class, zero week is all about introductions, getting to know each other, setting goals, and going over expectations for the course. This process is as important in an online course as it is in a face-to-face one.

There are many activities that can be done during zero week. One that I found on this site involves having students use VoiceThread to share their fantasy superhero name and power. It is an activity that is fun, creative, and provides all the psychology majors something to over-analyze. Have an activity you like to do during zero week? Feel free to share.

Reference

Palloff, Rena M., and Keith Pratt. Building online learning communities: effective strategies for the virtual classroom. 2nd ed. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2007. Print.