INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN AND
PSYCHOLOGY COURSES:
USING THE BEST TOOLS TO FACILITATE
STUDENT INTERACTION IN A LEARNING
MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
Dr. Sheryl Hartman, Miami Dade College
Dr. Risa Blair, Miami Dade College
Dr. Sheryl M. Hartman - Bio
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Dr. Sheryl M. Hartman
– Ph.D. University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida
– M.A. State University of New York at Plattsburgh, New York
– B.A., Stony Brook University, Long Island, New York
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Dr. Hartman is known for total commitment to her
students. This recognition has earned her the College's
highest distinction: the bestowal of an Endowed Teaching
Chair, three times. She is currently recognized with the Dr.
Eduardo J. Padrón Teaching Chair. She has been a
recipient of the Dr. Peter J Masiko Teaching Chair and the
Ruth B. and Jack Kassewitz Teaching Chair. Dr. Hartman
has twice received the National Institute for Staff and
Organizational Development Teaching and Leadership
Excellence Award presented by the University of Texas at
Austin.
Dr. Hartman combines state of the art technology and timetested teaching traditions to insure student success. She
brings creativity and a love of teaching to both her virtual
and face-to-face students. Dr. Hartman teaches Student
Success courses for the First Time in College Student. She
also teaches Psychology and facilitates an online faculty
development and training program, Successful Teaching
and Learning Online. She is co-author of four chapters in
the text, Keys to Excellence.
Dr. Risa Blair - Bio
•
Dr. Risa Blair
– Ed.D., Nova Southeastern University, Fort Lauderdale,
Florida
– B.A. and M.S., University of Hartford, West Hartford,
Connecticut
– Dr. Blair has over 15 years of teaching and experience in
higher education, preparatory education, and online
education. Working full time for the Virtual College at Miami
Dade College where she coordinates and trains faculty in
the course development process, she additionally teaches
for Kaplan University’s School of Information Systems and
Technology. She has a strong background in technology
and communications, business and management,
instructional design, and online and traditional teaching.
– Dr. Blair is also past president of Florida Distance Learning
Association, the Florida affiliate of the United States
Distance Learning Association, where she lead the
organization in conducting technology training, state-of-theart workshops, seminars, and webinars. She brings a
wealth of knowledge in quality distance learning resources,
as well as in Web Development, Presentation Graphics,
Web Storyboarding, and Dreamweaver.
– Dr. Blair even spent a semester in Israel as an assistant
professor using state-of-the art telecommunication
resources for her students to interact around the globe and
learn in engaging online environments.
Presentation Outline
• What do Discussion Forums look like in our LMS
(ANGEL)?
• LMS support for encouraging critical thinking,
collaboration, and variety
• Special Discussion Formats
– Required Post Discussion
– Fishbowl Discussion
– Hot Seat Discussion
• Blogs
• Wikis
• Gradebooks
• Reports
Discussion Forum Screenshot
• Sdf
LMS Support
• Using our LMS (ANGEL), it’s easy to
work through a wizard to create
specialized discussions built in ANGEL
• ANGEL controls access levels for
users, and depending on the type of
discussion, may move users from one
group to the next once they post
• The LMS supports these options
behind the scenes and there is no
special programming required
Required Posts Discussions
• When discussions are set up as
“Required Posts,” this encourages
original thought and feedback, as
students have to post first and then
can read others’ postings
• In Psychology, students can be
directed to read current events articles
from the New York Times and other
sources, provide thoughtful feedback
(without being influenced by others),
and then respond to their classmates
Fishbowl Discussions
• Students may selectively be assigned “in
the fishbowl,” while others may be
required to write synopses or summaries
of the discussions for the week
• Students outside the fishbowl may only
view the discussion, and not comment
• Fishbowl Discussions would be
especially interesting to use to discuss
different psychological disorders
• This helps to vary the participation and
add interest to the class
Hot Seat Discussions
• With Hot Seat Discussions, some
students are placed in the “hot seat,”
and are required to answer questions
• Those students outside of the hot seat
are the ones asking the questions
• In psychology, this would work very
well for a case study and having
student focus on a particular disorder
Blogs
• In lieu of participating in a Discussion
for the week, students could
participate in a blog
• Students especially enjoy the theory of
dreams, this would be content for a
very interesting blog
• Again, this would add interest to the
class and connect with the digital
natives
Wikis
• Wikis are an excellent tool for promoting
group activity in online courses
• Students may use a wiki to brainstorm,
create an outline, or even develop a
group project
• Wikis in ANGEL may be carefully
tracked; instructors are able to see who it
doing what, and when
• Students may be assigned to do an
interesting final group project on a
chosen, approved topic
Gradebooks
• Gradebooks provide tremendous
flexibility in terms of design preferences
Reports – editor view
• Our professors generally use class
login reports and grades reports
Reports – editor/faculty view
• Here you can see the variety of report
types available for faculty
Reports – student view
• Students generally use Grades reports
and Milestones reports
Questions?