13.9: Summary

“Step back … Before you get started putting your course online, you will want to take a step back to examine the big picture of what it is you want to do”. (Elbaum et al., 2002)

Planning an online course involves identifying and communicating the preliminary considerations that will guide course design and implementation. At the core, planning requires an examination of individual circumstances, philosophies, and skills. There is no single course planning worksheet that will suit all design projects.

This chapter began with an overview of how the planning process is influenced by context and trends. There is a continuum of design approaches ranging from flexible to linear, and emerging opinions about how our learning spaces should be shaped. Although learning-centred design is commonly acknowledged as central to the success of online courses, and a team of individuals with specific areas of expertise is ideal for effective design, in reality there are often gaps in the necessary resources, skills and knowledge to accomplish everything we need or want to do.

Certain learner characteristics can often be identified early on in the design process, but this is not always the case. Age, socio-cultural backgrounds, and lifestyles of the audience are all important considerations for course design. E-learning offers more opportunities to cater to individual learning styles by combining text and multimedia, planning for exploration, and designing activities to engage learners in a variety of ways.

Likewise, e-teaching style influences design, yet this is another element that can be unknown during the planning stage. An awareness of the general teaching style characteristics and how they influence practice will help to guide the design process.

Communicating our course design plans using mapping tools can serve to identify the important components and relationships among them. Visually organizing design ideas in this manner is particularly suitable for online courses because it can translate well into a website design. Different types of mapping tools can support the various design approaches, some being more linear than others.

The final step of the planning process, the packaging, is a culmination of all steps. Presentation, pacing, flow, and general look and feel of the course is informed by educational philosophies and beliefs of the design team, the audience, teaching and learning styles, and a preliminary sketch or map of course components and the relationships among those components in terms of time and space. There are also some important web design principles to follow.

Practice tells us that there are many different ways to approach online course design. It is easy to be swept away by the plethora of technologies available to designers but an important reminder to conclude this chapter is to keep the focus on learning. Take the time to understand the why of your course plan, and how much of the design should precede implementation.