Now that students are registering for your Winter courses, you may be thinking about any course redesigns or remodels you want to implement. (Or, you may be thinking about building anew or even starting from scratch if you\u2019ve just been assigned a course you\u2019ve never taught.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One of the best ways to think about course development, according to many educational researchers, is called \u201cBackward Design.\u201d Just as the name implies, Backward Design begins with the end of the course. Or, more accurately, with the long-term effects your course might have. (So, it might be even more precise to call it \u201cFuture Design,\u201d but we can save that debate for a later post.) Backward Design is a technique for building a course so it facilitates the changes you want to see in students\u2014far beyond focusing on content acquisition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Below is an excellent video introduction to Backward Design, a 2011 workshop entitled \u201cHow to Design and Teach a Course Using a Backwards Design Approach\u201d facilitated by Donna Ziegenfuss of the University of Utah\u2019s Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence. [You can scroll down to the video or read the summary below on the way.]\n\n\n\n
In this video, Ziegenfuss suggests you begin your Backward Design by asking two questions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She calls your answers to these questions your \u201cDream or Vision for your students.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And, she points out that most of us want our students to evolve over the course of their educations, not just gain knowledge or understanding. What we want for is value-added content, where they don\u2019t just acquire content but change as people as they learn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She then shows how this value-added content is delineated in L. Dee Finks\u2019 Taxonomy of Significant Learning\u2014a revisions of Bloom\u2019s Taxonomy of Learning that reflects the human change we want often want to see in our students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In \u201cWhat is \u2018Significant Learning\u2019?\u201d Fink begins by reminding us that:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nStudents will always learn something, but good teachers want their students to learn something important or significant, rather than something relatively insignificant. This leads to a question that is key to the whole teaching enterprise: What are the ways in which learning can be significant? (1)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
And ends by challenging us with:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIn fact, the most<\/em> significant kind of learning experience is one in which students achieve all six kinds of significant learning. And that is possible\u2014if teachers learn how to design their courses properly with these goals in mind. That is the special capability of \u201cintegrated course design.\u201d (8)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
How do you implement it?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The point of Backward Design is to design your course goals\/objectives with your dream\/vision in mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To do that, you need to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n
- Determine your dream<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Align your course with your dream.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Structure and Sequence your course.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
Then, take that design into account as you develop your online build through the Quality Online Course Design Process: Design, Build, Teach, Revise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At Bellevue College, if you get stuck along the way, you can stop by Interactive eLearning to talk with an instructional designer.<\/p>\n\n\n