OPTION 2: Designing for Diverse Students ~3-5 hrs.

Designing and facilitating an equitable online course includes five primary areas of consideration, all of which are integral parts in the five different modules of this course (Kelly, 2019):

We hope that the Fit for Online Learning Course models quality inclusive online design and facilitation with regards to all of the following elements:

1. The online learning environment,
2. the accessibility of the course resources,
3. the diversity in and different formats for the resources we curated, adapted, and/or created,
4. the choices we allow you to make relating to content, learning and assessment so you can stay invested and engaged,
5. the various levels of challenge in tasks and content,
6. our availability and willingness to respond to question and ideas,
7. the tips we deliver how to stay motivated,
8. the connections we draw between the information and real world applications,
9. the feedback we provide on progress and completed projects.

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2.1. Online Learning Environments

Let’s take a look the virtual environment first. The important elements here include the user interface, the navigation strategies, the layout, functionality, accessibility and user experience (TELAS + ASCILITE, 2019, Standards 1-3).

While not all aspects are within your control, you can certainly communicate to your students how you will use the existing interface and layout to organize and structure your course. You can, for example, share strategies and basic tutorials that explain how students can navigate between the content you post and and the online activities you create for them to engage in.

Not every barrier in an online environment is necessarily due to software design. If you, for instance, post important information in places not directly visible to your students, you will need to clearly let your students know what it is you want them to access and where they can find it.

Testing through quizzes and exams within online environments often poses challenges to students that you will need to address proactively to avoid anxiety and frustration (Tobin and Behling, 2018, p. 226-228). Working closely with technical and pedagogical support staff will help you plan effective online testing.

To manage and improve the online learning experience of your students, it is important to build in feedback instances allowing students to share the nature and date of problems they are facing when using your course technology. Sharing that feedback with the people who are responsible for hosting and designing the tools and environments is critical to ensuring their continuous improvements.

Note that if you decide to use the university supported LMS Moodle, you can rely on a dedicated team of technically and/ or pedagogically trained specialists to advise and support you in teaching with Moodle online. You can request one-on-one help or access a set of digitally available tutorials by clicking on the following link: https://moodleanswers.com/.

The graph above is used to show that there are multiple levels on which access to learning can be impeded, not only pertaining to the resources you create yourself. The online learning environments and content created by others come with their own in-built design features, which cannot easily be altered. However, there are a number of things that you can do ensure that the course resources you use are accessible. The Accessibility activity in the following section will guide your focus towards ways to overcome (often undocumented) learning challenges in students.

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2.2 Course Resources – Activity 1: How to Meet Accessibility Standards

Accessibility of Education

When you choose or create teaching materials for your courses, you might want to ensure that all your students can easily access and use those resources.  Accessible content meets the requirements of the Alberta Human Rights Act, which “has as its objective the amelioration of the conditions of disadvantaged persons or classes of disadvantaged persons, including those who are disadvantaged because of their race, religious beliefs, colour, gender, gender identity, gender expression, physical disability, mental disability, age, ancestry, place of origin, marital status, source of income, family status or sexual orientation.”

Content authors must ensure that their e-learning content is presented in multiple formats and, therefore, accessible through multiple senses. For people who are blind, visual materials require an alternative, typically in the form of text. While an audio version of visual content (such as an MP3 audio file that describes a complex image) could be used as an alternative, chances are the audio will interfere with the screen reader output. Text alternatives, on the other hand, are easily adapted or even simplified, read aloud by a screen reader, turned into Braille to be output through a Braille display, or translated into other languages.

3. Equity and Inclusion: Content Choices and Pedagogical Practices

Teaching is a radical act, in which your choices reflect your own identity, your view of learning and the opinions you have about your students. It is important to focus some of your time on the reflection of who you are as a researcher and educator. However, as Kevin Gannon (2016)  puts it: “Our students are not us. If we merely teach to how we prefer to learn, we exclude a majority of our students.” If you are to create an inclusive and safe learning environment for your learners, you might find the following subsections and activity useful for the design of an inclusive learning environment.

3.1 Diversity in Content Choices

The following excerpt from the ASCILITE technology-enhanced learning accreditation scheme (standard 7.3) provides quality markers for online courses at universities in higher ed courses in Australasian countries and may be a useful instrument guiding your content choices to reflect diversity:

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