Final Project

Login to Moodle and select the course link entitled NateWildes. Sorry, only Dr. Newberry has access to this course.

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Week 10

My roles within the course are both the developer and instructor. This eliminates the need to invest a lot of time matching instructor needs and preferences with the course design and content. It does, however require more attention to the end user experience because of the fact that all of the resources and materials are being generated from one main source. With little outside perspective to influence the development, it is important as a developer/instructor not to lose sight of the course objectives set for your students.

When developing the course I made a conscious effort to look at it from both a student and instructor’s perspective. I constantly toggled my roles back and forth within Moodle to ensure that the course design would be user friendly. I wanted a consistent logical structure in place that would work well for all involved.

I first posted step-by-step directions explaining what was to be covered in order to prime the students for the lesson.  Next I demonstrated these steps for the students by executing them systematically in a video tutorial in order to reinforce the content. I implemented brief comprehension quizzes from lesson to lesson in order to maintain the students’ engagement and gauge the effectiveness of my delivery. Finally there is an activity in place where the student will have an opportunity to demonstrate what they’ve learned. All resulting files will be uploaded independently by each student and graded based on the criteria I’ve established I the syllabus and lesson introductories. I will then batch process to compress and upload the students’ audio files to the CMS where students can critique one another and submit constructive feedback. I will ask that students use a new distinct title for their work from week to week. This will preserve ambiguity and hopefully allow the students to post unbiased feedback.

Now that the content is in place, my job as the instructor is to facilitate the learning process in the most efficient and effective way possible. I have asked that students contact me via email in event of any confusion or uncertainty pertaining to the course tasks or requirements. I want to make myself accessible to the students because the course is cumulative so if they don’t stay on task they could easily fall behind. I will also need to check the feedback submitted within Moodle for each lesson, even before the lessons are due, to address any issues that may arise. I have provided many additional resources to aid the students and I will fulfill the needs for further information as soon as I become aware of them.

The anticipated workflow will be very intensive initially because I will need to quickly assess the students various experience levels as well as ensure that they all have the necessary hardware and software to complete the assigned tasks. Given that this equipment is not cheap, they may have to explore several means of obtaining it and this could be time consuming. I give the students one week to gather the required hardware/software before it is needed for the course. This is sufficient for the software because instantaneous downloads are available online, but may pose a problem for the hardware. For this reason I will list both the required hardware and software in the course description so that students will know that once enrolled, I will begin instruction under the assumption that these requirements are all met. Nonetheless, I can foresee needing to purchase additional equipment to loan to students or place in a campus lab in event of extraordinary circumstances.

The next challenge I will have is gauging whether the delivery of the content is effective before asking the students to demonstrate what they’ve learned. I don’t want them to become frustrated if they aren’t grasping the concepts so I integrated short comprehension quizzes to see if they are retaining the information. Though these quizzes won’t be included in the final grade, I won’t announce this to the students, as it would skew the results. If I see that students are having difficulty retaining the information I will have to adjust my delivery methods for the following lessons.

The assigned task for each week will be accompanied by a step-by-step video tutorial, a text file within the CMS and as a downloadable PDF as well. My goal is to eliminate the chance that technical difficulties will inhibit students from completing their assignments. I have provided multiple resources in multiple formats to accommodate different learning styles and user preferences. Though much of the information overlaps, no one media replaces the other and I expect students to utilize them all. I presume that a majority of the student-instructor interaction will take place at this section of the lesson where the students are asked to demonstrate what they’ve learned. I know those students who are unfamiliar with the software being used will need addition guidance and many times the answers that they need won’t be readily available to them. Each student will have a different setup (computer, software versions, internet connection, peripherals, recording environment etc.) so I will need to be available to help them troubleshoot any problems on an individual basis. I will use email for the primary student-instructor interaction in these cases, but may need to resolve issues over the phone depending upon the complexity of the situation.

Once the assignments are completed the students can upload them to the CMS where I can review them under each student’s profile. Upon assessing and entering a grade for the task, I will convert all of the music files to mp3 format and post them in a resource section at the end of the lesson so that students may access and critique them. I will be grading their compositions from weekly as they evolve. I will have a separate set of criteria established for each lesson and the grading will be based on the student’s attentiveness to these requirements. I’ll also be looking to see that students have participated in critiquing their peers’ work. Grading this course shouldn’t be too demanding because most of it is done automatically within Moodle and the criteria for each assignment is unmistakable.

I hope that I’ve provided the students with sufficient means to gain a working knowledge of the music industry and translate their creativity into a finished product using the tools that are taught in this course. I know that they will gain motivation as they develop their skill sets and begin to see their ideas transform into a work of art. One last issue that I can foresee is the varying motivational factors amongst the students with different background knowledge coming into the course. More advanced students tend to lose motivation if tasks are simplified for the lesser experienced students, so I’ve provide more information than needed for those who are especially ambitious. At the same time I want the beginners to gain fulfillment from the process as well so I will always instill positive feedback to highlight their progress. I intend on perpetuating this enthusiasm from lesson to lesson by guiding and developing a relationship with each student and sharing my ideas with those that are genuinely passionate about music.