Elizabeth McAlister

Tag: Instructional Design

  • Elective Course – Group Project elements

    For an elective course taken early 2021, I worked with three other classmates to create a module aimed at Professional Development for School of Education faculty. It could be done using Articulate 360, Rise 360, etc., but had to be housed in and feed analytics into Canvas. We opted to do ours using only tools we knew were available to UAB faculty (Articulate is not). Our goal was to not only provide professional development, but also to show the faculty what Canvas is capable of. 

    Our team did a module covering chapters 10-12 of our text: Clark, R. C., & Mayer, R. E. (2016). E-learning and the science of instruction: proven guidelines for consumers and designers of multimedia learning. Wiley. Part of my contribution to the initial analysis phase was the goal analysis. We worked together to decide on goals and instructional material. I was also responsible for creating the graphic introducing each section, used Canva to create them. and UAB’s branding site guidelines for colors.

    chart outlining process of analysing learning goals
    Goal Analysis

    Applying the Segmenting and Pretraining Principles: Managing Complexity by Breaking a Lesson into Parts:

    Explains Segmenting and Pre-Training Principles, Managing complexity. Segmenting: Essential Overload caused by too much interrelated information coming in at one time. Break a complex lesson into bite-size segments (1-2 major steps). This allows the learner to focus on relevant information, that is, essential processing. Pre-Training: Essential Overload caused by too much unfamiliar information. Identifying key concepts before getting into the lesson allows the learner to focus on the overall concept (essential processing).

    Engagement in eLearning:

    Image showing 5 principles of Engagement in e-Learning. Focus on relevant material. Mentally organize it into a clear concept. Integrate it with relevant prior knowledge. Doing does not necessarily lead to learning (Behavioral Engagement). Promote appropriate cognitive processing (Psychological Engagement).

    Leveraging Examples in eLearning:

    Image showing 6 principles to effectively use examples to promote learning.

  • Elective Course – Individual Projects (Article Review, Informative Comic, Infographic)

    In an elective course taken early 2021, we were assigned to do three individual challenges (the course itself was primarily group work). The three I chose were an article review, creation of a comic strip explaining a concept from our textbook, and creation of an infographic explaining a concept from our textbook.

    Course Text: Clark, R. C., & Mayer, R. E. (2016). E-learning and the science of instruction: proven guidelines for consumers and designers of multimedia learning. Wiley.

    Article Review

    Review an article from a professional, peer-reviewed, research oriented journal. Include a summary of the article, the value I felt it brought to the profession, the contribution I feel this made to my understanding of the subject matter, and ideas for new research generated from the article. I was actually disappointed with this article, but didn’t have time to find a new one. Besides, not everything can get two thumbs up.

    pdf available upon request

    Informative Comic Strip

    Create an informative comic strip expressing application of the content matter we have been covering.

    I decided to do a strip regarding the concept of the Segmenting Principle. available upon request

    Infographic

    Take the information you have learned and create an Infographic. I chose to do mine on a chapter from our text covering how people learn which, as it turns out, is essentially an overview of Mayer’s Principles of Multimedia Learning. available upon request

  • Instructional Design Internship and Project

    I did my internship with CHIME (College of Healthcare Information Management Executives) to design a course for their Digital Faculty, especially those new to online teaching. I had initially wanted to build it in their LMS (D2L) but due to time constraints and the learning curve, we opted to create it using Rise 360, which has been used for some of their courses as well. The initial course objectives “aimed a little too high in Bloom’s taxonomy” so were revised per the client’s instructions and were, essentially, individual module objectives.

    Course Outline:

    • Introduction
    • Training: Online versus In-Person
    • How People Learn
    • Using Media & Technology Effectively
    • Conclusion, Resources, and Further Reading

    Course Objectives:

    • Identify differences and similarities between online learning and in-person learning.
    • Identify adult learning theories and ways to incorporate them into the learning environment.
    • Identify strategies for effective use of media and technology in the learning environment.
    • Identify strategies for effective use of media and technology in the learning environment.
    • Identify types of engagement that build community in the online learning environment.

    Design Process

    I initially built one Articulate Rise course with four modules. In order to import it into the client’s LMS (D2L), I broke each module into its own Rise course, imbedding them into individual units.

    Each unit began with an ungraded quiz built in their LMS to check the learners’ current knowledge about the topic, then moved to the course built in Articulate Rise, and ended with a reflection prompt. The course itself ended with a graded quiz consisting of a mix pre-test questions and “knowledge check” questions. Some questions were identical to what the learner had done and seen in the individual units and some were similar. This was done in order to better gauge retention of the material.

    Each Rise course was also formatted similarly:

    • An introduction
    • The module objective
    • A quote relevant to the topic
    • Key terms (if needed)
    • The meat of the content
    • An ungraded knowledge check

    I used an informal voice that included a smattering of “breaking the fourth wall”. For example, in the Media & Technology lesson, in explaining alignment, I said, “For this module, I want you to be able to identify effective use of media and technology. That means I am going to teach it, provide materials that support it, and assessments will give you the opportunity to identify effective use of media and technology (i.e. I won’t ask you to define a term because “able to define” is not the objective).” And in the Online vs In-Person, there’s a little Easter Egg reference to Spiderman:

    Myth: Anyone can be successfull in an online course.

    The truth: Online isn’t for everyone. To be successful in an online course requires time management and self-motivation – for students and sometimes even faculty! You might even say that with great flexibility comes great responsibility.

    Some of the Rise courses included “Tricks of the Trade,” offering suggestions on ways to implement the information they were learning and tips on using technology which pulled from personal experience over the last year: things I’ve learned to use within Zoom that have improved my own presentations and that I’ve seen others use in webinars and workshops that I thought were a great use of the technology.

    I found the experience extremely relevant to what I had learned over the previous two years, referring back to almost every textbook I used in the degree program plus a few new ones. I also got to create a couple of graphics which, frankly, is one of my favorite parts of all this.

  • Multimedia Design – Compilation of Course Projects

    Link to course compilation of Multimedia Design assignments

    Course Assignment Recap

    The final project for the Multimedia Design course was to create a “course” detailing each assignment.

    • Articulate Storyline
    • Rise 360
    • Quizmaker and Engage (Articulate 360)
    • Peek and Replay (Articulate 360)
    • Camtasia

    Link to Course

    Disclaimers: 

    The Quizmaker and Engage project is rather random. The purpose of the assignment was to utilize as much of the two programs as possible and then compile it into one Storyline “course.”  As I was posting this, I realized that I did not update the placeholder text to reflect the assignment details. Unfortunately, my trial membership had expired and I’m unable to update it at this time. The assignment details were:

    1. Use Quizmaker 360 to create 10 quiz slides from three built-in question categories. Include 4 Graded Questions, 4 Survey Questions, and 2 Freeform Questions. Save it to my computer.
    2. Use Engage 360 to create 10 interaction slides from 20 built-in interaction templates. Save it to my computer.
    3. Open Storyline, import the quiz and engage slides that you saved to the current story scene, add transitions, then publish the story.

    Second Camtasia assignment: The assignment was to “either use Camtasia to record my computer screen as a screen cast video clip or download a video clip from YouTube.” I ended up putting multiple videos together* and created, essentially, an homage to Eddie Van Halen, who died October 2020 from cancer. As such, there are clips in the video that are copyrighted (and not by me). Links to the source videos and material are in the video description and the video is only accessible through the link in the course.

    *Personal “proud” moment was syncing up the music track of “Eruption” to match the video track of a live performance!

  • Articulate360 – Storyline360 Mini-course on GME Compliance

    Link to course on GME Compliance0

    Course: Multimedia Design
    Assignment: Create a course on any topic to include the use of Storyline templates, a quiz, a video, and a slide created from blank. Because I was unable to find an appropriate video already made, I opted to make an intro video of my own.

    For the topic, I took the opportunity to create a mini-course that could be used with our GME Coordinator Onboarding program which, because of COVID, is being redesigned and moved from in-person presentations to virtual. This portion on annual compliance is part of a larger presentation on the role of the GME Office.

    Articulate Storyline Course

    Intro Video for course was created using Doodly.

  • Designed to SCALE: A Model for Small-Group, Complex Learning

    Course: Alternate Instructional Design and Development Models

    Often in our field we are called to be innovative and utilize the tools we have to solve a problem in a way that may be outside of the box.  Things don’t always line up or fit in the squares we want them to. We need to be able to innovate and develop an IDD model that works for our client, our team, and ourselves as a designer.  For this report, I was tasked with identifying a gap in the current models used in our field and then find a way to close the gap, supporting my design and decisions with research.

    pdf available upon request

  • Designing Instruction for Small-Group Learning (Book Chapter)

    Course: Learning, Cognition, and Instructional Design and Development

    For this assignment, we were tasked with designing a learner-centered instructional intervention and then writing it up using our class text as a formatting guideline. Mine was created with my experiences and interests in Medical Education in mind.

    Text for this class: C. M. Reigeluth, B. J. Beatty, & R. D. Myers (Eds). (2017). Instructional-design theories and models: A new paradigm of instructional theory (Volume IV). New York, NY: Routledge.

    [pdf-embedder url=”https://www.elizabethmcalister.net/wp-content/uploads/securepdfs/2020/06/Instruction-Intervention-McAlister.pdf” title=”Instruction Intervention-McAlister”]

  • Program Coordinator Onboarding Curriculum

    2018-2020: With the Program Administrators and Coordinators Leadership Team, developed a 6-month rolling curriculum for onboarding new Program Coordinators in Graduate Medical Education (GME). Sessions cover six topic areas: Getting Started, Accreditation, GME Requirements and Processes, Onboarding/Offboarding, Recruitment, and Professional Development. Each team member is able to co-present on any given session but have specific assignments based on area of expertise.

    2020-present: Because of COVID, the in-person sessions were stopped. Additionally, because we all had to learn how to do our jobs remotely and via Zoom, the onboarding curriculum was essentially put on hold. In March 2021, the GME Education Coordinator and I became Power-Users in UAB’s Campus Learning LMS (Docebo) and are working with two other members who are passionate about education to move the curriculum into a self-paced format. 

    The initial project was written up, submitted, and accepted as a poster presentation for the 2019 Association of Hospital Medical Education conference.

    Craft J, Fleming R, Pickens T, Freiger B, Butler K, Chandler R, Chambless S, McAlister E, Millette N, Veazey M, Whitehead J. (2019). Program Coordinators Onboarding—It Takes a Village to Be Successful. Association for Hospital Medical Education 2019 AHME Institute; Savannah, GA.

    Abstract. In AY 2013, a Program Administrator and Coordinator Leadership Team (PACLT) was established to provide mentoring to Program Coordinators (PC). PACLT members are experienced in GME and represent residency and fellowship programs. Members routinely present best practices at the monthly institution-wide PC meetings and meet regularly with the GME Director (GMED) to identify quality improvement activities. Through collaboration, a GME PC Manual (PCM) was developed. Recognizing that the ACGME Next Accreditation System is continuously evolving, there is need to frequently create new institution-level processes. With an average of one new PC per month, the group determined that a standardized and comprehensive program was needed to effectively prepare PC for internal and external requests.

    The objective of this activity was to develop a comprehensive PC Onboarding Program (PCOP) to prepare new PC for their important role.  Key components were to include: 1) monthly learning sessions (LS); 2) individualized training meetings with the GME Education Coordinator (GMEEC); 3) a listing of institutional resources; 4) a calendar of GME deadlines; and 5) opportunities for professional development.

  • Intervention Evaluation

    Course: Performance System Technology. Spring 2020

    Assignment: Create an infographic to teach the most important information about intervention evaluation—overview, planning, and implementing—and provide my rationale.

    Response: Evaluation is the foundation of a successful Performance Improvement Intervention. The three main types (formative, summative, and confirmative) form one  part of the support. Underneath that is Meta Evaluation 

    which supports the overall evaluation process by confirming the validity of the other evaluations, and thus, the value of the intervention itself.

    I believe it would be valuable to someone on-the-job primarily because it gives a basic and concise explanation of each evaluation type, its purpose, when it’s typically done in the life cycle of an intervention, and what is involved in the implementation of each evaluation type. For a practitioner, this could provide enough information for them to decide the type of evaluation needed and provides sufficient information for them to dig deeper should they need or want to do so.

  • Successful Intervention Implementation and Maintenance

    Course: Performance System Technology. Spring 2020

    Assignment: The text for this course (Van Tiem, Moseley, & Dessinger, 2012) presented 8 techniques as it applies to successful intervention implementation and maintenance:

    1. Partnering, networking, and alliance building,
    2. Process consulting,
    3. Employee development,
    4. Communication to develop support,
    5. Change management,
    6. Project management,
    7. Feasibility, and
    8. Sustainability.

    We were asked to compare and contrast them and then determine which we felt is the most valuable tool to have in our tool-belt as an instructional designer and explain why.  

    After reading over the 8 techniques for successful intervention implementation and management, what struck me is that they are all interconnected. An organization identifies a problem and partners with a performance practitioner who begins with process consulting, then is part of the Project Management team. The project management team looks at the feasibility of a project, communicates with employees and other stakeholders in order to develop support (which will aid sustainability), and encourages employee development to ensure a smooth transition (change management). 

    The primary difference among these eight concepts is how individuals within an organization are involved. Feasibility studies, sustainability, project management, change management, and process consulting primarily involve the performance practitioner and management or a small group of individuals who would represent the organization as a whole. The remainder (partnering, networking, and alliance building; employee development; and communication) can be the actions of an organization or an individual (large-scale to small scale).

    Examples of partnering, networking, and alliance building from large-scale to smaller-scale include the Alliance for Academic Internal Medicine which represents U.S. Internal Medicine physicians and works to improve medical education and health care in general; slightly smaller, but still large would include subspecialties within internal and family medicine. Going smaller, within Birmingham there are partnerships with COA, UAB, and the VA which ensure a broader experience for medical students and residents. On an even smaller scale, within UAB, I’m part of a group of program coordinators in Graduate Medical Education. Widen that scale back out just a touch and, through a private facebook group, I network with other coordinators across the country and from different specialties.

    Employee development can be an endeavor that the individual employee takes on or something required by the organization due to a change. UAB encourages employee development, but not everyone takes advantage of it and, sadly, I suspect many don’t realize just how much is out there! Likewise, when the Department of Medicine switched to a new Resident Management System, we all had to take part in training (development) in order to learn the new system.

    Last but not least, communication happens everyday between individuals, between the C-suite and employees, Deans and students, between departments, and across campus.

    Of course, the common thread is people. Considering the name of this class, this isn’t a surprise. But as a performance practitioner, I feel that project management would be the most important one to have in my tool belt. 

    Alvarenga et al (2019) completed a literature review and identified 28 traditional competencies. They then asked project managers to rate these competencies “on a 5-point Likert scale from scarcely important to extremely important to project success” (281). Two hundred fifty-seven project managers responded and identified communication, commitment and leadership as being the most important to project success (283). The authors also examined these “traditional . . . competencies according to project managers and the underlying groups of competencies” (281) and “identified seven groups of competencies: self-management, interpersonal, communication, technical, productivity, managerial and leadership” (287).

    My takeaway from this article and chapter is that a successful Project Manager has a network of other performance practitioners and partners with organizations to identify problems, plan solutions (process consulting, feasibility), and plan implementation (communication, employee development, change management, sustainability).

     Resources: 

    Alvarenga, J., Branco, R., Guedes, A., Soares, C. and Silva, W. (2019), “The project manager core competencies to project success”, International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, Vol. 13 No. 2, pp. 277-292. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJMPB-12-2018-0274

    Van Tiem, D.M., Moseley, J.L., & Dessinger, J.C. (2012). Fundamentals of performance improvement: Optimizing results through people, process, and organizations (3rd ed.). San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons.