Communication

Artifact: EDTEC 572 Instructor Manual for Face-to-Face Workshop

Until my foray into instructional design and writing, most of the writing I’d done consisted of academic papers or short, informative articles for professional newsletters. The idea of writing for a specific learner audience intimidated me, but I discovered that I enjoy doing it even though I sometimes require a heavy-handed editor.

Writing for Instructors

To demonstrate my competence in communication, I’ve selected the instructor manual that I created for EDTEC 572. This was a particularly challenging assignment because although I planned to teach the Finding Health Information on the Web workshop myself (which I did), the materials needed to stand independently so that any Web-savvy instructor could pick up the manual and teach without guidance from the course designer. The manual had to strike a balance between providing enough information to foster this instructor independence, but not so much that the instructor felt constrained by small, unnecessary details. Adding to the complexity of the project was the need to provide participant materials as well.

I was very happy with the manual upon completion. I felt that I successfully navigated the line between too much information and not enough information. I liked the schedule; I thought that the agenda left ample time for learner practice and feedback. And speaking of learners, rather than create a participant manual I opted to create individual worksheets to be handed out by the instructor at the appropriate times. This would keep learners from flipping ahead in the manual rather than paying attention to the task at hand.

But then I taught the workshop.

Reality Hits

I discovered that the schedule was ambitious; that the final learning objective added too much content, and that a learner’s self assessment of his or her computer literacy skills did not always match reality. While the issues of time and content can be easily fixed by a slight change in course design, the issue of computer literacy skills requires attention.

Both the instructor and participant materials were written with the assumption that the learners would have intermediate computer skills (keyboard, mouse), and basic Web search skills (“I can find Google and search for a specific phrase”).  I stated this in the advertisement for the workshop when I taught it. But what I realized was that this was not explicit in the instructor manual, and I did not provide alternative exercises for participants who incorrectly gauged their computer or Internet skills.

The End Result

Overall, I remain happy with the instructor manual for Finding Health Information on the Web. My writing is crisp, coherent, and the exercises are (I think) fun. But I know now that an complete instructional package must make explicit all the important aspects of instruction, including learner prerequisites, and offer some alternatives for an instructor who may be less familiar with the content.