Summary of discussion - for scoping and plan
The overall project aim is to enable the existing textbook, self-tests and worksheets to be used in many contexts by different audiences.
- Development is to focus on ways to guide learners, clearly and simply, through the chapters of the existing text. Eventually the desire is to create a teaching and learning ‘package’ (or several small ones) that is visually rich (graphics, animations, video), is fun (quizzes, crosswords…), and light (but not childish).
- The target audience guiding design would be the distance students who currently undertake the course - Typically these people are … animal lovers, people who have some association with animals , for example through vet nursing, farming, zoology, police-dog handling etc, majority are women, mostly mature.
- As a guide to ‘how big’ to make learning chunks (notional learning hours) current teaching and learning is based on one semester full-time, or one year part-time.
- The main learning challenge we need to address is that many of the people who use the text are being exposed to anatomy and physiology terminology for the first time and find it challenging
- The first part of the current course is the most difficult because it involves the initial exposure to subject jargon, difficult words to say, let alone understand …and then use.
- Designing activities to engage with the text will become a main focus of this project:
Activities need to help learners
- come to grips with the terminology used in A and P
- apply/authenticate what they’re learning
- share what they’re learning
- get feedback/reassurance about what they’re learning [can come from each other, not necessarily the ‘experts’ and we can use wiki discussion pages / web-chat to enable this]
They also need to be
- fun [games, crosswords etc]
- portable
- localizable
- printable
[would be good to have discussion about these from others who’ve done it already]
[one implication raised was using the format/syntax of the pedagogical templates in wikiEd means they don’t transfer to other environments]
- This is an important consideration -- but not insurmountable. The pedagogical templates will transfer to any Mediawiki installation -- eg Wikibooks, Wikiversity etc. Its simply a question of copy & paste. WE has no problem with our pedagogical templates being copied to other free content projects -- in fact we encourage this. The pedagogical templates transfer well to the print versions of Wiki ==> print, and WE have a prototype which demonstrates that they will transfer to a SCORM/IMS content package (essentially the format used for importing content into an LMS.) --Wayne Mackintosh 01:40, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
- Images that are presently used (in PPT), enrich and illustrate materials well. But there will be copyright issues….will need new sources or new images [raises a resourcing issue].
- A substantial portion of the existing text is material that is directly relevant to people who need to know about human anatomy and physiology so it would seem ‘efficient’ –to make materials also usable by people interested in this level of human anatomy [materials have already been adapted and used with massage therapy students]
- Some of the content is only relevant to animal A and P so these parts of the text eg skin, skeleton…will require their own activities. Careful design and development will enable both human and animal A and P students to use the resources.
- How do we identify this? Is it possible to generate a list of the contents that is usable for both human and animal A & P. This is an exciting opportunity for reuse! --Wayne Mackintosh 01:40, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
- The materials for human anatomy might be required at a level higher [current NZ standard requirements] than the animal anatomy students require. We thought this could be addressed by clear objectives at the outset. Also, the activities should be designed to require learners to engage at different levels with the text.
If we decide to make the material usable by both vet nursing and human biology students it will be necessary to decide:
- whether we want both to be at the same level
- what level that is
- whether there is a clear core of material common to both
- what additional material is required for each
- is it possible to make the material relevant for other levels by including add-ons
My feeling at moment is all these things are possible but doing anything that takes us away from the core A and P material as it stands in WikiBooks will require considerably more input in terms of negotiation over content and writing that content. This will mean including consultation with others involved in the delivery of human biology and from my point of view will mean I have to devote a lot more time than I have available at the moment.
My personal sense is to avoid the temptation of "mission drift"
This core text was designed for vet nursing -- so why not build and add value to a solid foundation for the intended audience.
It is always possible at a later stage to take a small representative sample or subsection to explore the implications (technical, academic and otherwise) of recontextualising for human A & P.
What do you think?
I do like the term "mission drift". I would feel much happier building on what we have and know and then when we know what we are doing and what works and what doesn't then moving it out into other subject areas.
I'm all for what's going to be 'doable'. Ruth, you're probably the one with the best sense of how much work is really involved. I think your idea to focus on development of the work you have specifically done for animal A and P is the 'most doable' option and as you say, Wayne, we can look at what it takes to recontextualise later. We should hold it in mind as we go. --Fiona 03:25, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
