Effective Online Instructional Design 

        After this week's readings and research, I found that educators must approach the element of instrucitonal design differently when it comes to conducting an online course. There is much difference between a traditional in-person class to a remote online class. To begin, during an online class,  the teacher is not physically instructing their students in a conventional classroom. This alone completely changes the teacher's approach and format in which they instruct e-learning.  They must switch forms of traditional instructional materials to online curriculum materials and online resources. When creating the instructional design it is vital to consider the use of engaging and interactive e-learning materials and lessons to grasp students attention and successful understanding of concepts. Many factors are a crucial part of the implementation of a pedagogically effective online course because the dynamics of instruction and learning are changed and require a different set of approaches and methods.

           One model to consider when conducting an online course is the Pedagogically Effective Online Instructional Design Model. Within this model are four main steps which are to identify, select, create, and assess. During the first step, the instructor must identify a course format because it is an essential process when designing an online course.  Then, an instructor has to identify instructional objectives, identify learners’ needs and characteristics, and identify appropriate pedagogical approaches. In addition, online instructors also have to identify the learning context in order to maximize students’ learning (Chen, 2015). After selecting the effective elements and format, the second step in this model is to select things such as forms of communication, content, and resources. Is it important to critically think about the way in which instruction will be given and received, student, peer, and teacher interactions and communications.  At this stage, online instructors select web-based content organizations to be linear or nonlinear., select interaction and communication methods, select technologies for communication and content delivery,  and then select resources to help their learners learn (Chen, 2015). In continuation, the third step to this model is to create instructional methods, materials, assignments, assessments, and the flow of your course. The final step is to assess, here is where the instructor will evaluate the effectiveness of the instructional methods. There can be severe forms of assessments such as projects and presentations. There are several advantages to applying the proposed model for online course design. First, the model is built upon considerations from traditional instructional design models as well as currently existing online ID models (Chen, 2015). 

        Furthermore, another online instructional design model is the Community of Inquiry. There are three main parts to this model template, which are Cognitive Presence, Social Presence, and Teaching Presence. An educational community of inquiry is a group of individuals who collaboratively engage in purposeful critical discourse and reflection to construct personal meaning and confirm mutual understanding (The Community of Inquiry, a.n.d.). The basis for this model is cognitive presence, which is the importance of the community participants to construct meaning and maintain effective communication. Cognitive presence is a vital element in critical thinking, a process, and outcome that is frequently presented as the ostensible goal of all higher education (Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, 1999). Another core element of this model is social presence, which is where the participants have the ability to project their personal characteristics into the community. Its main function is to in a way provide a means of support of the cognitive presence in the way of creating a community of learners who think critically. Lastly, the final element of this model is the teaching presence. This consists of two general functions, which may be performed by any one participant in a Community of Inquiry; however, in an educational environment, these functions are likely to be the primary responsibility of the teacher (Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, 1999). The teacher must ultimately function as the designer of the educational experience. This is why it is ever so crucial for teachers to have the ability to create a well-thought-out instructional plan, especially when it comes to online instruction and all of its varying dynamics. In the past decade, online instruction continues to grow rapidly. With the popularity of online instruction in education, there is a strong need for a pedagogically effective instructional design model for online education to facilitate the development and delivery of engaging online learning environments (Chen, 2016).

Food for thought... 

Instructional Design for eLearning

References 

Chen, L. (2015). Pedagogically Effective Online Instructional Design Model. In S. Carliner, C. Fulford & N. Ostashewski (Eds.), Proceedings of EdMedia 2015--World Conference on Educational Media and Technology (pp. 1551-1554). Montreal, Quebec, Canada: Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE). 

Chen, L. (2016). A Model for Effective Online Instructional Design. Literacy Information and Computer Education Journal, 7(2). https://doi.org/10.20533/licej.2040.2589.2016.0304

Garrison, D. Randy., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (1999). Critical Inquiry in a Text-Based Environment: Computer Conferencing in Higher Education. The Internet and Higher Education, 2(2-3), 87–105. https://auspace.athabascau.ca/bitstream/handle/2149/739/?sequence=1 

The Community of Inquiry: About The Framework. (a.n.d.). The Community of Inquiry. https://www.thecommunityofinquiry.org/coi