The project involved working with Blackboard to develop courses incorporating elements of e-learning pedagogy delivery best practices. The courses are there to empower faculty in their teaching.

The IDC and OTL team met with Caroline, a Blackboard designer situated in Australia, weekly to review the content being put together for the courses. Caroline took the feedback provided by the team to guide the creation of the courses and an exemplar rubric for evaluating quality course design, which served as the foundation for the courses.

This work led to the creation of four courses:

1. Evaluating Quality Course Design,
2. Universal Design for Learning and Digital Accessibility,
3. Online Design and Facilitation, and
4. HyFlex Design and Facilitation.

The Office of Teaching and Learning brought unique perspectives to the project due to the two representatives being current students themselves. Additionally, OTL has hosted a large grant project, Gateways-ND, focused on best practices in teaching, however, the project was limited in who could participate, and the courses being created through the CARES grant would be open to all campus faculty.

 OTL and IDC’s goals for the project included providing support for instructors on best practices in teaching, especially with the many mediums instructors teach within (i.e., in-person, online, HyFlex). The self-paced nature of the courses give faculty the flexibility to work at their own pace and when works best for them during the course of the year.

It’s recommended that faculty start with Evaluating Quality Course Design. This foundational course is different than the other three, and it walks you through developing a course you will be teaching as you work through the modules.

This course will take several weeks to complete, depending on your pace. The other three courses are designed to take about 6-8 hours to complete. In addition to improving your teaching, these certificate courses are a great contribution to your portfolio.

A walkthrough of how the courses are laid out, as well as look at the exemplar rubric that was developed, starts at 7:43 in the video.

Watch the video on the OTL YouTube page to see the full 30-minute conference session. To learn more about registering for upcoming course offerings of these certification courses, visit the Instructional Design Center’s website.

Mark your calendar for the 2022 Teaching and Learning Mini-Conference to be held May 24, 2022. We will see you there!

About the Author:

Amy Tichy is pursuing her M.Ed. in clinical mental health counseling at NDSU.  She graduated with a Master of Arts in theatre with a concentration in drama therapy from Kansas State University (2014), where she was a graduate teaching assistant, lecturing 6 credits of public speaking per semester, and with a Bachelor of Science in history education and theatre education from Dickinson State University (2010).  Amy is a registered drama therapist.  She works in the Office of Teaching and Learning as a graduate assistant.