AAA 090 Hybrid
Overview
Currently, the curriculum of AAA 090 is designed for on campus/in person only delivery including paper assignments, lectures, class activities and guest presenters. The D2L course shell is used only as a supplement primarily for the online gradebook. Through this project, AAA 090 curriculum will be completely re-envisioned to be effectively delivered in an online format and adhere to the same learning outcomes for AAA 090. The elements and content of AAA 090 that would be difficult to replicate online such as presenters, workshops and practice of skills will be planned during class sessions. The work of this project is planned to be completed by Summer 2016 and piloted in a Fall 2016 section of AAA 090.
The rationale for this project is to allow AAA to be responsive to the scheduling needs of new students and prepare them to be successful in online or independent learning formats.
- Retention Advisor, Trish Schier approached the AAA Leadership team representing the Student Success Center advisors on 9/25/15 with concern regarding the limitations of the AAA 090 offerings for students that need to take courses online. Comments from advisors suggest an anecdotal need of this format to meet either preferences or needs of students. Advisor Feedback & Comments.docx
- Alison Easley, instructor of the online section of CCR094 Fall 2015 informed us that only one out of the nine students in her course was also enrolled in AAA 090 during the same semester. After further investigation, there was only one other student out of the nine who had completed AAA 090 before Fall 2015. This indicates that seven students were not able to enroll in AAA their first semester even though it is required as dictated by institutional policy (2-250F), and suggests the need for a hybrid AAA course to help facilitate the success of new students.
- This course is proactive in meeting needs of students that are pursuing the AAA online degree or degrees that include many online classes such as Oil and Gas Technology, students needing to take primarily online classes for personal reasons, students on satellite campuses of Ft. Lupton, Loveland or Windsor that have limited offerings, and reactive to the movement of developmental classes being offered online including CCR 094 and MAT 050/055.
- Completion and retention rates for online classes are low especially for community college students. A recent U.S News and World Report article stated "students are 11 percent less likely to pass an online version of the same class." Here is data specific for Aims online courses Summary of Online courses success rates 2009 to 2015.xlsx. This class might fill a need for students and for the institution to help students to be more successful as independent digital learners.
Objective(s)
As a pilot, the objectives and challenges of this project will be to change the AAA 090 curriculum to be offered online, achieve similar levels of student engagement and learning and enroll students that have the necessary technology and skills to be successful. It is our hope to achieve the following:
- A D2L course shell that is designed for students to be oriented well for learning online, participate in discussion threads, have a high level of communication and feedback from the instructor and work through self-directed content to learn time management/organization, reading, note-taking, test-taking skills and other learning objectives in AAA.
- Lesson plans for on campus sessions that will facilitate students in the course to build community through class activities and discussions as well as meeting key individuals on campus to learn about services and resources.
Outside of the main objectives, it is hopeful that new innovations that come from this project will be used to enhance the on campus delivery to allow students additional access to learning the course content online.
Project Outline
The products created from this project will include 1.) D2L course shell including content/elements outlined below
2.) Syllabus with redesigned course outline, assignment descriptions and grading metrics 3.) Lesson plans for on campus sessions
Tasks to Ensure Proper Enrollment
- An initial digital literacy assessment and/or advisor override process for enrollment to guide advisors when registering students into this format to ensure they have the technology and skills necessary for success.
Tasks To Re-Envision Current AAA 090 Curriculum
- Re-create assignments that are online and interactive in nature including assessment of learning.
- Create avenues for teaching general student success strategies tailored to E- learning such as constructing a time management plan, reading an electronic textbook, taking notes online, using academic and student services resources, etc.
- Design engaging discussion prompts and format to build a community of learners.
- Design format to allow for a high level of communication with the instructor and receiving feedback (e.g. mandatory phone conferences).
Tasks To Convert General Course Practices – Assignments & Discussions
- Orientation to Online Content
- Create digital literacy assessment (google forms) to help assess student success in a hybrid format.
- Create instructional documentation:
- How to…access quizzes, discussions, gradebook, calendar, etc.
- How to…google forms, voicethread or any other software we decide to use.
- Basic LMS tools, basic word processing tasks, effective online communication skills, using the Internet for a variety of educational purposes, etc.
Assignments
- Create assignment instructions
- Create Drop Box & Grade items for all of the assignments
- Create online rubrics for grading for all assignments
Quizzes
- Create short answer & scenario questions to accompany multiple choice quizzes to allow for students to demonstrate their comprehension of the material through active based learning techniques (9 chapter quizzes).
Voice Recordings
- Record unit introductions with transcript for ADA purposes (12 units).
- Record unit summaries with transcript for ADA purposes (12 units).
Discussions/Class Interaction Online
- Create unit discussion questions and/or find videos or articles to supplement weekly discussions (15 weeks).
- Set-up voicethread, google hangout or other software for vision board and/or career presentations.
- Create or modify class activities to be done using web based technology.
- Tracking/Communication with Students
- Set-up “Intelligent Agents” to monitor and track students that are demonstrating behaviors that are concerning
Tasks for Assessment
- Questions will be added to the AAA post assessment to gain student self-reported data about their experience and learning in the course.
- First time students who complete the hybrid course can be compared to students who complete general AAA sections. Sections can be compared in terms of completion of AAA 090, GPA in the course and learning gains (pre/post assessment).
- To determine effectiveness of the course to enhance instruction for learning online, the completion rate for online courses taken by students who complete the hybrid AAA course can be compared to general completion rates of first semester developmental students enrolled in online classes.
Fall 2016 Pilot Results
- Success (students earning a C or higher grade): 66.66% based on the 12 students that completed the course.
- The general success rate of AAA 090 which is 67.51%, so it is just .85 lower and only based on a small class of 13 students.
- 15 registered but 2 were "no-showed" and dropped from the course. Of the 13 students in the courses, 3 stopped attending after 2 sessions (mid-late Sept), 1 stopped attending after the 4th session (10/31) and 1 student withdrew because she tested out of MAT 050 (10/21)
- Grades: A - 6 students, B - 1 student, C - 1 student, F - 4 students (the 4 that stopped attending), W - 1 student