A Focus on Instructional Design & Assessment

As we move through our Covid 19 distance learning experience, my focus of inquiry has turned to what role instructional design and assessment play during distance learning.  When you take away the carrot and the stick of earning a grade for engaging in learning, how do we motivate students to show up and engage in learning?  

• Focus on the critical learning targets - scale way back
• Make the learning intention clear.
• Make the learning relevant.  Students should be able to answer the question "Why do I need to know this?"
• Articulate the success criteria that will be used to determine when students meet a learning goal. 
• Provide examples or good models for students to reference.
• Offer choice in how it can be learned
• Focus on feedback
• Be clear about how you will know if students "get it" and not worry about quantifying their performance on a scale of 0 -100

By making student learning our primary focus and helping students share that same focus, the learning experience moves from knowledge transmission to active learning.  Teachers are the authors of their instructional design and should take into account the different ingredients when designing instructional experiences.  Think about something that you are good at.  More than likely, you were not always good at it. How did you get good at it? Look at the graphic below, were all or most of the elements below a part of your learning pathway to achieve the level of proficiency you now have now?

How can teachers that relied heavily on the common lecture format find success during distance learning?  They must ensure that success criteria is established for earning credit for a skill or learning target. The success criteria must be clear, rigorous, and attainable. When students are working online and submitting evidence of their learning, teachers must make sure that they are assigning things that they can give feedback to the student on.  Feedback should be offered along the way to ALL students so that they know where they are in mastering the criteria.  It will also be critical to have additional resources or paths available to students who don't "get it" when others are ready to move on.  The graphic below designed by Stephen Taylor was adapted from Grant Wiggins work and touches on the different avenues effective feedback can take online.  Feedback needs to be a conversation and not a statement. John Hattie and Helen Timperley found that effective feedback answers three major questions asked by a teacher and/or by a student: Where am I going? (What are the goals?), How am I doing? (What progress is being made toward the goal?), and Where to next? (What activities need to be undertaken to make better progress?) We must remember what the student does with the feedback is what matters.  

Learning should be assessed formatively using digital tools in small checks for understanding along the way. These are low or no stakes experiences or practice assessments that yield feedback to students.  Check-out Retrieval Roulettes developed by Adam Boxer as a tool to use. The brain science behind retrieval practice is solid and this is an excellent tool to empower students. It allows them to spiral back through content knowledge.  

Generating opportunities for students to give you "summative output" can be done by student created products or student performance within an online testing environment. Check out 100 Things Students Can Create to Demonstrate What They Know or the website Exam.net.   Exam.net is free to use right now if your school is outside Sweden.  An additional resource for math teachers to look at is a post by Alice Keeler, From @mathdiana: Have Students Talk About Math.  (I prefer to call it a task not a test” – @mathdiana) 

During these difficult times, we will learn new and better ways to guide students along a learning pathway than placing a number on a paper.  I believe that growing and getting stronger in instructional design and assessment practices will transfer to improved learning experiences for students once we are back in our brick and mortar classrooms.  And this goes without saying, but if you have a solid relationship formed with students this is all going to be a lot easier!

If you have additional resources and ideas on instructional design, assessment and feedback practices, please share them! I know that I have only scratched the surface in my own learning. 
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