Developing Your Online Course

When instructors are in the midst of course development there are several aspects of effective online course design that tend to get lost in all the other activity. This is one of the reasons it's important for online instructors - especially those new to developing an online course - to work with CTL digital learning consultants throughout the development process. Things like alignment, presence, pacing, usability, active learning, visual design, tone, accessibility, and effective media use can make a significant difference in your students' learning and experiences in your course. Here we'll take a closer look at four of these.

If you've taught online or used Canvas extensively in an in-person or blended class you've likely heard of students having difficulty navigating the course or beginning a task or being frustrated because something "just wouldn't work." While there are certainly occasional issues with technology, often much of the student frustration can be alleviated by focusing on the usability of the course site. The most common usability issues in online courses are related to findability, readability, completeness, and clarity.

Findability

If your students can't find what they are looking for, aren't able to download an article or worksheet, or can't tell from the instructions what they should be looking for in the first place, they can't do what you are asking them to do or learn what you are asking them to learn. Lack of findability impacts student self-efficacy, motivation, and learning. You can improve findability by making sure

• everything is as structurally and visually consistent as it can be
• page, assignment, and discussion titles accurately describe their content. For example, naming assignments "assignment 1", "assignment 2", etc. does not effectively differentiate between them and wastes student time checking and rechecking the content of each assignment
• very few clicks are needed to reach important content and activities
• all links in your content and instructions work for students and have some description of what the link is to and what the student is to do once they follow the link. Sometimes links are added that work for you because you are logged in to a particular website or database or you have a higher level of authorization than your students
• instructions correctly reflect the current user interface in Canvas, related tools, and websites you use

The Modules tool in Canvas can make organization and navigation easier for yourself and your students. Modules allow you to aggregate your content, activities, and assignments for the module in one easy-to-find place and put things in the order that you want your students to work through them.

Readability

Writing in an active voice in 2nd person at an approachable reading level will significantly improve readability in your written materials. To check reading level you can paste a sample of your text into a Readability Checker or check readability within MS Word. Additional ways to improve readability are to

• align all text to the left
• keep colored text dark enough to read
• avoid putting any text longer than one sentence in italics (large blocks of italicized text are difficult to read)
• make sure there is good contrast between the text and the highlight color (light  highlight  on  black text /  dark  highlight  on  white  text)
• use bold instead of underlining(underlining indicates the text is a link )
• use bold instead of underlining (underlining indicates the text is a link)
• avoid excessively long bulleted and numbered lists
• using descriptive text in place of URLs in all links ( IU Indianapolis Homepage instead of www.indianapolis.iu.edu)
• ensuring that all written content is grammatically correct, not missing words, and not using incorrect words (their, they're, there, etc)

Writing mechanics not only affect readability, but also perception of the credibility of the content. If you tend to compose directly in Canvas, please check out Grammarly, a free browser add-on that will check spelling and grammar in Canvas text boxes and other web forms.

Completeness and Clarity

While you know how to do something and may not think it needs explaining in detail, students may or may not know how. This is especially true if you have first-generation students or a mix of majors and non-majors or continuing and new students. Providing accurate complete instructions are a great help to online students. Instructions for basic tasks with Canvas or related technology are likely already written and available for you to link to. Check the IU Knowledge Base and the Canvas Student Guide to avoid re-creating materials.

Taking time upfront to make sure your students can actually do what you are asking them to will avoid confusion and delay. For example, asking students to turn in a paper with properly formatted references and then only allowing submissions through a text box when text boxes do not allow for the single line indenting required of most reference styles.

Contradictory instructions, either within an assignment description or between an assignment, the syllabus, an announcement, or a module overview page are a common clarity. For example, the syllabus may say that students will be placed into groups but an announcement may say to form your own groups, while the group assignment may say to form your own groups and then tell the instructor who is in the group so they can make correct groups in the Canvas Groups tool. Providing rubrics, models, or examples are also great ways to help students understand what they are supposed to do.

People make decisions about the credibility of a source based in large part on how the content looks. Whenever you take in information from any source, your brain evaluates that information based on the combination perceived meaning and perceived value. Human beings value things they perceive to be attractive and tend to evaluate them as more trustworthy, professional, and credible. Of all the aspects of visual design, the ones that faculty have control over are layout and graphics. For a good overview visual design basics, see Clean Up Your Mess - A guide to visual design for everyone.

Layout

Whether you are working on a Canvas page, an assignment description, or a discussion prompt, there are easy ways to visually orient students and draw attention to different parts of a graphic or page. Using white space, headings, and indents to visually organize text helps students find the sections they need. Consistency in layout is important to improve findability so students aren't spending time hunting for things they should be able to easily find. Module overview pages are an example of consistency in layout. Using consistent sections with descriptive headings and organizing everything in those sections trains students to look for certain pieces of information in certain places. Using headings and indenting to help readers follow your organizational structure of your pages, syllabus, assignments, etc.

If you are comfortable working in HTML, there are several things you can do to tweak the layout of your pages. In the HTML view in any Canvas text editor box you can exercise finer control over indenting, lists, padding and margins around images and sections of text - including images or text boxes floated to the left or right of your text. If you would like to learn more about HTML formatting for Canvas, come in and talk with a consultant.

Graphics

There are two types of graphics instructors tend to use in Canvas pages, informational and decorative. Informational images need to be clear and large enough for students to see all the necessary details. If you have images that are skewed, sized up from smaller images, or otherwise fuzzy, please feel free to come in and talk with a consultant and we'll be happy to help you make your images as clear as possible. Having descriptive text before the image will also help to clarify the image's meaning.

When you consider the visual design of a course it helps to choose an overall graphic style and stick with it. Mixing photographs with clip art with line drawings, for example, can confuse your students and detract from the credibility of the content. Decorative images are just that - decorative. If you've looked for them, you've likely noticed that it is quite difficult to find good images that can be used without considering copyright. The good news is, you don't need a lot of them. While they can improve the aesthetics of the course, using multiple decorative images in a page can draw attention away from the content. A single larger illustrative image is more likely to grab the viewer's attention and be memorable that a collection of smaller, mismatched images. As a member of Indiana University, you have access to thousands of images through Adobe Stock that you can use in your courses. If you're not finding enough diversity in those images, you may want to try the Jopwell Collection or the Gender Spectrum Collection.

It is important to keep the images you use clear and proportionate (not skewed) and make sure instructional images are big enough for students to understand what they are trying to convey.

There are several things you can do up front to make your course more accessible to students with and without documented disabilities. Things like using default heading styles and bulleted and numbered lists in both Word and Canvas, using built-in layouts in PowerPoint, and providing alternative test for informational images is a great place to start. If you are recording video, Kaltura will automatically provide mechanical captioning. This captioning will not be completely correct so please check the automatic captioning in Kaltura and edit as needed.

Although many accessibility practices are fairly easy to do, some practices that improve accessibility are more challenging and you may want to come in and talk with a consultant or someone from the Assistive Technology and Accessibility Center (ATAC). You will likely want assistance if you are

• using assignments that require students to create or work with graphics (such as graphic organizers or graphic models) or manipulate things with a mouse
• using third-party tools to create click interactions (e.g., Adobe Captivate, Articulate Storyline, etc.)
• using third-party tools offered by your textbook publisher (e.g., Pearson Mathlab or ALEKS from McGraw Hill)
• linking to many different websites where you want students to read/watch/listen to material
• presenting a large amount of material that is highly dependent on a single sense (e.g., multiple images; a lot of music; data visualizations that are highly dependent on color).
• requiring students to use a specific software tool or package (e.g., SPSS, Variations, ArcGIS).

ATAC also offers free to-your-door workshops for departments to support the development of online courses and online instructional materials ranging from PDFs and PowerPoints to musical scores and mathematical diagrams. This support up front can ensure the accessibility of your course content without the need for later fixes.

When students passively read or consume video or audio lectures they're not actively engaging with the content. If you think about the difference between your engagement with the topic at hand when you are simply listening to someone report out at a committee meeting versus when you are actively debating the topic with colleagues, you can see the difference. If students are actively involved in working with the content, they will learn more, be more satisfied, and be more successful.

Active learning focuses on engaging learners in the learning process by having them complete meaningful learning activities and reflect on what and how they are learning. Active learning activities require interaction with the content, each other, and you while asking students to collaborate, solve problems, and apply what they are learning. Examples of activities that work well online include

• providing guiding questions for readings and/or videos followed by a brief written reflection
• reflective activities such as identifying the most confusing part or situations where they feel like they don't know what questions to ask
• auto-graded understanding checks with actionable feedback built in
• synchronous review sessions or small group meetings using Zoom
• group case studies using the Groups tool in Canvas
• role-playing in discussions (with or without student created video)
• peer review using the Canvas Peer Review tool
• collaborative writing using Google Docs

For additional ideas for online activities, see a Toolkit of Active Learning Options. for online teaching and learning from Gardner-Webb University's professional development resources.

For additional tips, see our Getting Started with Your Online Course. For more depth, see the Online Course Development Basics ebook or fill out our consultation request form.

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