| Hold an introductory meeting to establish expectations. |
- Discuss the instructor's vision for the course - who the audience is and what students can expect to take away.
- Review the University-approved course proposal.
- Discuss responsibilities and roles, as well as higher-level objectives and goals for the course completion.
- Establish a shared to-do list to manage regular meetings and item completion.
- Introduce and explain the "Course Development/Revision Status Reporting" document used to communicate with project stakeholders.
- Discuss technology needs and resources.
- Discuss questions and concerns about developing an online course; the process and time commitment involved, and the resources available to complete the course development.
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| Establish a workflow and timeline. |
- Delineate responsibilities, course development deliverables, and timelines to take into account participants' other responsibilities and to ensure on-time completion of the course in advance of its first offering.
- Discuss participants' work preferences (how will author deliver content to designer?) and the technologies we use for collaborative work, such as SharePoint and Teams.
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| Create and implement a strong course overview plan that includes a map such as a course blueprint, a Visio board, or a spreadsheet to ensure that the course delivers and assesses the learning objectives described in the course proposal. |
- Discuss how to use your chosen plan to organize the course as described in the course proposal.
- Collaborate to develop the first draft of a course map.
- Continue to work together to finalize the map and your comprehensive timeline.
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| Write learning objectives for all lessons to provide students with solid, easy-to-understand learning objectives. |
- Discuss how to write objectives (if necessary).
- Write clear learning objectives for each lesson based on prior course offerings and/or prior course materials and the course proposal.
- Once the objectives are written, review them for clarity and discuss ideas for improvement (if needed).
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| Develop a learning assessment strategy. |
- Discuss methods to assess student progress toward learning outcomes that go beyond traditional m/c tests and papers and that engage students in the learning process.
- Structure assessments to maximize both student experience and grading load.
- Provide feedback on first drafts of assessments.
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| Select readings and plan exercises/labs that support content to (1) ensure students have access to all course reading assignments and (2) ensure required course reading assignments augment course content and are directly relevant to assessments. |
- Discuss options for student access to course materials through eReserves, purchase of paper copy of books, student library access, e-books, OER materials, etc.
- Identify supplementary course materials, such as a textbook, individual readings, or other materials to augment course content as desired/needed.
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| Plan media needs for exercises and labs far enough out to ensure that there is time to develop them in time for the course rollout. |
- Review known options for adding media to a course and brainstorm new ideas based on the course needs.
- Schedule a meeting with the Programming and Media Team, author, and learning designer to discuss media needs to support the course content.
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| Write lesson content, including any exercises, labs, and learning assessments, to ensure that the content and the assessments are appropriate for the course description. |
- Discuss how much content is ‘enough’ and provide feedback to help the course writer prepare content that is clear for students.
- Prepare draft assessments of course content, based on course and lesson objectives and the course map.
- Ensure that content and assessments are commensurate with the course’s credit designation and level of difficulty.
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| Implement copyright, usability, and accessibility best practices to ensure compliance with legal requirements and Penn State policy. |
- Review usability and accessibility requirements before the development of content. Discuss and provide links to Creative Commons and OER materials, as well as to materials on how to make images, media, tables, etc. accessible.
- Review course content for materials that require adaptation to comply with usability and accessibility standards.
- Discuss any new material that may present a copyright, usability, or accessibility challenge and necessitate accommodation.
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| Ensure the course supports Academic Integrity: (1) Develop a course in which robust assessment design minimizes the temptation of cheating while maximizing the tracking of any cheating that does occur. (2) Enforce college policies to maintain academic rigor in Penn State courses. |
- Review academic integrity issues and concerns specific to the online course environment; discuss strategic assessment design and tracking.
- Understand and enforce the Academic Integrity policies of the college.
- Discuss the need to be prepared to implement multiple test versions and revise assessments between offerings.
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| Confirm that all materials in the University's Learning Management System (i.e., Canvas) are functioning properly (including visibility, user tracking, access, and assessment completion parameters). |
- Review advanced features of LMS to enable the instructor to better manage online courses, communications, and grading.
- Discuss organization options and consult on developing LMS materials.
- Prepare the gradebook, assessments, discussion forums, calendar, and any other functionalities intended to be used during the course.
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| Use Drupal and Canvas effectively. |
- Agree upon a process for edits and basic changes to content in Drupal and Canvas and review the functionality of both systems, if necessary.
- Review content pages and discuss ways to enhance user experience and learning.
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| Proofread and properly format materials to present a polished, fully functional course to students. |
- Ensures the content is clear, including spell-checking the pages in the course and formatting content to make it visually engaging.
- Review content to ensure it is current, accurate, and relevant.
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| Adhere to Penn State Policies. |
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| Keep course content current. |
- Discuss the fact that as courses mature, academic departments expect that courses will be updated on-the-go, to maintain the currency of content.
- Be prepared to tweak the content of the course, responding to changes in the field or updating to improve student assignments and interactions.
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