EDTECH 542- Worked Example

Here's my screencast on setting up folders and a sharing process for students and teachers in a school using Google Apps for Ed.

EDTECH 513: My Digital Story (Gene Tognetti - Need for Speed)

My digital story is about my developing - and ultimately, fulfilling - my "need for speed." I've always enjoyed driving fast, but obviously that's difficult and dangerous to do, along with being illegal, on city streets. I've gone to go kart tracks, watched many races over the years, but always felt a desire to actually "race" a car on a race track. This is that story. It's a very personal one, and in this case, I used a mostly casual, friendly, and  engaging style to draw the learner in. That's how I supported the Personalization Principle. 

This project helped me pull together and demonstrate many key elements of the course. In particular, I strongly resisted throwing everything plus the kitchen sink into the video. I was minimalistic in use of graphics, tried not to over-talk the narration (many edits and revisions went into the script), and even deleted several pictures I wanted to include "because I thought they were cool" but that added no value. I believe I supported the Multimedia Principle well (not overloading learning channels), and I feel I did support the Coherence Principle well also, by weeding out extraneous audio and video.

The key first step, was, of course, defining the project: what was the story I wanted to tell? Making sure I had created some boundaries so the end result would not be an endless video was clearly important, and I had to go through several script iterations to accomplish that. Pulling in images was not that hard, except for the weeding out process, which took more than a bit of time. Some fine tuning while matching the script to the particular images also took time. I used the tried and true PhotoStory application from Microsoft. I played a bit with YouTube's editor, as well as UTellStory, but neither seemed to be able to do what I knew I could in Photostory. I had not used PhotoStory in a while, and considering how old it is, I was pleasantly surprised how well it met my digital storytelling production needs. So, key things learned would be to allow enough time for the script creation and editing process to play out, and to not underestimate how long it takes to match (and then cull) the images I wanted to use with the script. 

Overall, I'm pleased with the result. A couple of the images (scanned in or from screen capture) are not quite as crisp as I wanted, but unless people try to watch the video on a big monitor or TV, it's probably not an issue. My handy dandy Samson microphone again impressed me with ease of use and how it 'helped' my voice over.

I would enjoy getting feedback on this result!

EDTECH 513: Coherence Principle

In essence, the Coherence Principle means “less is more.” In other words adding “interesting but unneeded” material can negatively affect the learning process (Clark & Mayer, 2011, p. 152). The three primary concepts that make up the Coherence Principle are:

• Do not include extraneous audio in e-learning.
• Do not include extraneous graphics in e-learning.
• Do not include extraneous words in e-learning.

Each of these concepts are well-supported in learning psychology, as well as evaluation of research evidence. One way of looking at the Coherence Principle is that, if the item being examined cannot be tied directly to the learning needed, weed it out. This does not mean the lesson needs to be boring, but that it does need to be focused on the desired learning outcome.

A well-known local organization  provides edtech integration instruction, and they’ve created a significant number of presentations/learning packages for ed tech trainer use. I’ve recently been searching for information to assist me in structuring learning for an 800+ iPad rollout for teachers and students at my new school, and reviewed some of their materials available online.

I’ve been surprised how often their presentations (viewed online) put me into an “information overload” state. The amount of words, links, concepts and images on each Google Slide (or scrolling Google Sites pages) can be overwhelming. A Google Slides presentation on iPad integration exhibited characteristics of what to avoid based upon the Coherence Principle, particularly for excessive text and graphics. It’s difficult to cull key information from any given page, in particular overloading the learner (in this case, me) with too much text (Principle 3).

Another Google Site learning artifact had too many columns of dense text, links, and images, violating Principle 2 and 3. This is too bad, because the information provided IS good, and could be used and learned much more easily if presented more clearly.  Fortunately, there is new blood in the organization, and they fully understand learner needs, and how important it is to structure information in more bite-sized chunks.  I’m already seeing many signs that new multimedia presentations done by this group much better support learners’ capabilities.

I have attended many training sessions by a very well-respected ed tech speaker/trainer that support the Coherence Principle. I feel he is a master of the minimalist Google Slide page. His well-attended sessions tend to be fast paced, but focused on a specific topic that is well-supported by simple, not overwhelming images (most typically), short videos, and very few words. He routinely includes a “resources” page at the end of his presentation where people can refer later for more detail, if need be. I aspire to create training material along the lines of this gentleman, who produces very focused training materials. Correspondingly, in California (and beyond), he is one of the more sought-after speakers, and often is now asked to keynote large ed tech conferences. All three of the Coherence principles are supported well. In particular, extraneous words on a slide are used VERY sparingly, and even what he verbalizes is typically very to the point.

Clearly, the Coherence Principle should work in tandem with the Redundancy Principle, which states that visuals should be explained with either audio (spoken word) or text, but not both. To me, as one develops a high-quality multimedia training artifact, time must be taken to craft something that has the learner foremost in mind. This will mean finding the balance between providing enough information in a slide, page or video scene and not overloading the learner. Keeping in mind how easy it is to overload the learner’s “learning channels” - audio and visual - is paramount (Cognitive Theory of Multimedia).  The end result should craft the appropriate amount of visuals, enough spoken word to convey the meaning/learning desired, and nothing more. Adding additional “fun” things or arm’s length facts of interest to the presenter must be looked at with GREAT care. It is far too easy to overload the learner, and again, he/she must be top of mind in our thinking as we design effective multimedia.

Similarly, I believe the the Modality Principle works with both the Coherency and Redundancy Principles. That is, the multimedia/e-learning designer should normally consider audio (spoken word) instruction to go along with well-chosen images to provide the learner with an environment conducive to learning the material presented, and maximize the likelihood of learning that material.

There are some competing thoughts about the Coherence Principle, and one is in the area of “extraneous audio” - music, sound effects, and so on. One idea is that, in today’s YouTube focused world of high-energy, fast paced video, the learner needs more stimulation to keep interested in the material, and, hopefully, learning it. The idea, termed Arousal Theory, is that emotion (lots of elements to get the learner’s attention, e.g., music) affects cognition (more flashiness equals higher cognitive engagement) (Clark and Mayer, 2011, p. 156).

The other view, as noted above, is that the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia learning is much more relevant when studying whether additional audio (or other stimuli) is included in multimedia. The Cognitive Theory is the concept of the extreme limitations of the learner’s channels (audio and visual) for learning. Overload these channels, and learning does not occur. To me, from a psychological and learning standpoint, the Cognitive Theory is much more relevant and should be strongly considered when developing multimedia/e-learning. I felt, in particular, the summarization of extra pictures can distract (by guiding limited learner attention away from core learning) and “seduce” (by suggesting to the user that more information is coming for that ‘topic’ and thereby using limited memory to start to organize it) was well-stated.

As I have developed my own training items (presentations for face to face learning or as reference material, videos, other e-learning tools), I have consistently struggled with the balance of information I provide. While I have improved over the years, I still tend to provide too much written information, making it difficult for the learner (particularly the NEW subject matter learner) to read and interpret my materials. This principle (actually, ALL the principles so far in the text) has resonated with me and I am fully supportive of Coherence Theory approach. As noted above in the “bad” e-learning examples I described, when I am the recipient - particularly with material new to me - the overload of information makes it difficult to learn much, and is an almost instant turnoff.

“Gamification” and simulations in learning are hot topics, and not much is yet known about how  “extra” music and sound effects (or graphics, for that matter) affects learning; it is as yet unclear how the Coherence Principle supports or impacts game-based learning.  It will be interesting to see the results of games created using more learning and psychological best-practices, once more research and testing is done.

In summary, the Coherence Principle, in concert with the principles of Modality, Redundancy and the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia, will greatly help multimedia designers “weed the garden” and produce more effective materials to maximize student learning.

EDTECH 513 - "Easy Peasy iPads in the Classroom" Podcast

This week, we were to develop a plan for a podcast series, then produce an initial podcast for that series. I am moving to a new position at a school that is rolling out iPads 1:1 for students. It seemed like a natural for me to create a podcast series that would focus on simple, effective ways for the teachers using iPads to learn tips to better integrate them into classroom process, student workflow and into the academic curriculum overall. So, I envision a weekly podcast series entitled "Easy Peasy iPads in the Classroom." The first week's podcast focuses on a basic component of classroom workflow, which is getting students work conveniently, and simply, from their iPad to the teacher so the work can be assessed. This episode uses Google Docs and Gmail as the focus for that student to teacher workflow.

Click on Easy Peasy iPads in the Classroom to download and listen to my podcast.

One big take away for me from this assignment is that, in hindsight, it would have been a much more effective result if this podcast was, instead, a multimedia presentation of some type. Verbalizing instructions about setting up labels and folders in Gmail, without any sort of visual cues, is a tough way to learn something. It would have been much more effective with a couple of simple screen shots to assist the learner in understanding where to click, what pop up or other information on the screen to expect. A few key screenshots would also make it easier for the learner to understand the overall order of tasks to accomplishing setting up the process correctly. Simply giving them visual reference points ("pages" in a presentation, for instance), that they could flip back and forth within would have made the learning process much easier. So, I believe the Message Design could have been further worked to truly see what I should have included (the visual components) before I created the audio-only version.