E-learning Course
When looking over the topics on Openlearn.uk, I noticed a topic that I thought would be a good one. I chose Designing the User Interface as my topic. We have all taken classes in Information Architecture and User Centered Design, and we were told a few things that make sense as to why we do things a certain way. This e-learning module gives more reasoning behind these rules. We know not to put alot of banner ads, refrain from putting blue text on a red background, and not to have overly load music blaring on the start-up page. This module tells you why.
This class had some very nice items to it technology wise. They asked you to do some thinking, and instead of giving you the answers right away, it has a link with the answers that through AJAX drops down the answers to review. I thought this was a neat feature. Instead of testing you over the part you read, it asked you to think about the hows and whys of the subject. Then you relate what you read to their questions.
After completing the four hour class, here is what I took away from it.
Color choices:
There are a few things to remember when choosing your colors for a website, who is it for, what are its goals, and what are its users used to. Color psychology is important to convey the mood of your website. The red that you use to promote excitement, might be offensive to certain cultures. Certain colors of text on certain colors of background can cause a crawling effect on the screen. Blue and red are perfect examples.
Text:
Although there are only certain fonts that are available for web designs, typography is extremely important. The heirarchy that can be used to give visual excitement with the same font. This also allows users to see what is most important on a page and what is considered not as important. Once again, these are things we should know, but this module gives the reasons why.
Images:
Of course we all know that the images we use on websites need to be smaller and 72 dpi. This module helps in learning how we can use our images to greater effect. If you are building a website on the White House, diagrams and pictures would be necessary to show what it looks like. There are other instances where images are not needed. It is important to know when to use them and when not to. There is also a part on moving images, animation and video. This section goes over when to use animations and video and when not to and why. I found this particularly relevant.
Audio:
This section goes over screen readers and how important it is to provide viable text for these devices. We sometimes forget that there are users that will visit our websites that will be using these items. This module goes over the imporatance of sound, and how to use it effectively. Some great common sense items are here.
I would say overall that this would be a great learning assignment for beginning web designers, and those that want to design better designed user friendly websites.
Technology applications for E-learning
The technologies I chose for this assignment are Skype, Wiki, and You Tube. I think that these are the most influential and instrumental in establishing and maintaining an e-learning site. These technologies allow for the ability to communicate thoughts and ideas rapidly and in a variety of ways. They allow for collaboration on long term projects and allow users to reach each other quickly and efficiently.
Skype
This is a really great program. The ability to talk to partners and project collaborators instantly via instant messaging, video, and through voice is an invaluable tool. The fact that you can IM someone allows partners to go over important data and changes instantly, then if they have questions or concerns to be able to ‘call’ each other or send video is awesome. An example- A project is due tomorrow, Bob and Mark have been working on it all not, and Bob forgot to add an important piece to the presentation. Bob Skypes Mark and then Mark adds the information and gets the presentation up to speed. This is much faster than an email, and allows communication in a variety of ways.
Blogs about skype..interesting things-
http://share.skype.com/sites/en/
Wiki
What can you say about Wiki? This is an awesome advancement in collaborative media. This program allows for users to get information, and with the use of wikispaces and wikimedia to share ideas and information on assignments. A few quarters ago we used the wikispaces to work on a project and it was great. The big advantage here is the allowance of multiple users to work on the same project conceivably at the same time. This is great for group projects and allows everyone to have access to the project materials online.
A cool blog about Wikispaces working for 2.0
You Tube
This technology took off and hasn’t stopped yet. The social learning application of this technology has yet to be fully tapped, and I’m not sure if it will ever stop innovating. The great thing about You Tube is that anyone can use it to showcase their talents, their ideas, their opinion, etc. When I was thinking about the various uses for e-learning I came across information that said that You Tube EDU has been launched. Information from over 100 universities and schools are on You Tube now. Amazing.This technology allows students and people who are interested in certain topics to get information from trusted experts in the field.
Here is a blog about You Tube and E-learning with some nice links
http://elearningweekly.wordpress.com/2009/03/28/youtube-edu/
Proposal for E-learning site
My proposal for an E-learning site is based on Flash. I would like to do a basic flash e-learning website. The features/lessons would include creating a menu system – a drop down menu and regular button menu system. I would like to include an audio tutorial, a tutorial for implementing videos, a basic overview of flash, and an XML read tutorial. These are tools that we learned in flash 2 class and I think that having a reference for students to review would be beneficial to those in school at the Art Institute, as well as a refresher for those who want to review.
E-learning Posts
Well, here we are, another quarter. In trying to get grips on what E-learning is, I have looked across the web to find many examples. These are the five that I liked the most and that are most representative of E-learning.
http://www.e-learningforkids.org/index.html
This site features games that are used to promote learning for children. I think this is a really good idea and I liked this site because it was what I was trying to do with storybook.com. There are a lot of learning tools featured here and I particularly like the use of games as a learning tool.
http://www.jidaw.com/e-learn.html
This site features a really straight forward way of teaching computers. I think this site’s information is good and is a perfect way to start teaching someone all about computers. The problem here is the interactivity and the dryness of the materials presentation. I think that with a few videos or an interactive quiz at the end of the lesson would help this alot. I only show this to show a bad example of presenting good material.
This is one of my favorite e-learning websites. W3 schools has great information and is pretty interactive in its presentation and examples. I really like the try-it-yourself examples. Being able to look up what you need to know and seeing exactly how the code works is a great way to learn. I particularly like how each section is broken down and each section has examples and a code list for proprties and methods. Personally, this is the way I like to learn.
This is one of my favorite websites for learning new techniques and skills. This website has come a long way, and actually helped me alot when I was doing 3D animation at school here before. This website has great tutorials. I like the way that this site has a wide variety of tutorials and how each tutorial has detailed directions (and files to download in most cases). In particular, check out the modeling of Joan of Arc under the ‘complete projects’ page. This is the other way I like to learn online. I think that this is more of a hands on approach to learning, and although there are no videos and little interactivity I think this is a great resource and e-learning site.
Overall, the best learning website I have come across in my opinion. I think this is because I am a visual learner and like to get my hands dirty. Lynda.com is a video tutorial based website that allows you to download or work online. As a pay site, this is one of the best overall for self study. If you want to learn a specific program, this is the place to learn it.
I know there are other websites out there that focus on degrees and training for jobs and emplyee training for companies, but the websites I chose above are more my style of learning. I do believe there are online campuses and sites that have interactivity and real time chat features, and I think those have value, but they do cost money and personally I prefer to either go to a campus, or teach myself through tutorials.
