Develop

By now, you have designed a blueprint of your course on paper. It's now time to roll up your sleeves and dig in. Here, you will develop any remaining content and begin to build the Vista course.

Content

Review your blueprint and make sure you have all of the supporting content.

• Develop additional content if necessary.
• Develop assignments, assignment instructions, etc.
• Create assessments, quizzes, etc.
• Other?

Welcome Page

It's a good idea to write up a short "welcome" for the course. In the welcome, you can introduce yourself and set the tone for the course. You might include a picture or a short video. This will give the student a glimpse of you and your personality. From the welcome page, you can instruct them how to get started with the course.

Welcome Page

Start Here (Module)

You might want to incorporate a "Start Here" module. The "start here" information introduces the students to the learning environment. It's a good way to get some of the potential "house keeping" problems out of the way before the actual instruction begins. Items that might be included in the Start Here module are

• Overview of the module
• Syllabus
• Course schedule or course map
• Communication rules
• Course structure and tools
• Technical requirements
  • Browser issues
  • Vista help desk information
  • Vista tutorials
  • Internet connection
  • Types of documents students must submit (Word vs. WordPerfect, RTF, etc.)
• Class Introductions for students
• Discussion area for questions about the "start here" information.
• Student survey to collect information (previous courses, phone, email address, etc.)
• Quiz over material in the "start here" module

Prepare the Vista Environment

• File Manager: Create folders for each unit of instruction to help you organize your documents.
• Home page
  • Welcome Page
  • Learning modules' folder
  • General discussion area for students
  • General chat room for students
• Create and name learning modules for each unit of instruction that you identified for the "Semester's Units (Topics) of Instruction" in the Design section.
  • Create an Overview Pages (HTML) for each module, and make sure it has the following information:
    • Goal
    • Objectives
    • Instructions to student

Remember, the instructions tell the student how to proceed through the learning unit.

Learning Modules

In the Design section, you created overview pages. In the section above, you created these pages (hopefully in HTML) and added them to the learning modules. Use these pages as a guide to build units of instruction.

• Upload content into the appropriate folders in file manager
• Link content to appropriate learning modules
• Add appropriate Vista tools as needed (assignments, discussion, chat, quiz, etc.)
• Use headers to visually organize content and tools; be consistent between all learning modules

Review Your Work for Quality Assurance

After you have developed your instruction in Vista, have someone review it with you. Things you might look for follow. Use the worksheet to help you keep track of things that need to be done or corrected.

• Is the user interface easy to understand and follow?
  • Are the learning modules consistent in form and function?
  • Are the overview pages professional looking?
• Is all the content in place?
• Do all the links work?
• Are the objectives signaling what the students will be able to do?
• Do the assignments support the objectives?
• Do the assessments measure the objectives?
• Are the instructions concise and clear?
• Is there sufficient opportunity for interaction between students and instructor?
• Is there a means for the student to give feedback on how the learning experience is going?

Worksheet for Quality Assurance Check-Off