Donkey's Belong on a Farm - Not in Instructional Design

In the United States, companies spend BILLIONS annually on consumer research. It is no secret to the developers of consumer products that knowing the customer is key to consumer happiness. This reinforces the value of the learner analysis in an instructional design product.

My goal for the week was to complete a learner analysis. I have ample experience teaching the population who will engage with the curriculum, so I definitely entered this task feeling as if I was just jumping through hoops to say that I followed a process. However, with analysis complete, I will definitely admit to a few “aha moments”.

The biggest moment of awareness came when I realized that the students I work with have a schedule dictated by a single teacher. The students I am writing the curriculum for, in contrast, have a full high school schedule with multiple classes and are required to leave their school for their work experience. This means that the amount of time I am able to fill with curriculum will be cut to minutes per week instead of hours per week!

My analysis also helped me to reconcile concerns over meeting the needs of two diverse audience groups. I was struggling with how to create an e-learning course that met the needs of one group who dislikes online coursework with another group who strongly values technology and education. What I uncovered is that limited access to the internet in one group paired with a strong desire for hands-on learning in another paved a clear path to short, online lessons to be coupled with more interactive, offline activities. In a very lucky twist, this push for shorter online bursts works well with the time constraints that I identified.

There is a well-known saying about the hazards of making assumptions. I am grateful that I took the time to complete this step. I am also hopeful that this lesson on the danger of assumptions will help me approach the customer design specification research with curiosity instead of conviction.

Lesson learned: Donkeys belong on farms, not in instructional design.

The Journey Begins - A Project Timeline

The journey has begun.  I've created a website to add visual documentation of my work.  I've started conversations with my supervisor about expectations and desired outcomes.  Part of these planning conversations included the development of a project plan.  Every good project plan has a timeline to promote accountability and to allow for progress monitoring. It was also important to allow for ample time for customer input, socialization, and edits.

To make sure my soft skills curriculum has progressed through to the Develop Phase of the ADDIE Instructional Design Model by May 1, I  have set the following deadlines:

• Week of January 22 - Audience Profiles 
• Week of January 29 - Customer Design Specification 
• Week of February 5 - Research and early design suggestions to customer for approval 
• Week of February 19- Content outline complete and to customer for approval 
• Week of February 26 - Tier 1 content and assessments identified and organized 
• Week of March 12 - Tier 2 content and assessments identified and organized 
• Week of April 2 - Tier 3 content and assessments identified and organized 
• Week of April 23 - Developed content to customer for approval 
• Week of April 30 - Edits and final approval

Check back next week to review my progress on evaluating my audience.

Revisiting the Wheel

In 2015, I joined a team of individuals at my organization to reimagine the delivery of our curriculum and youth apprenticeship program. Tapped for my skills in content integration and curriculum development, I was joined by a technical education expert, a character development expert, and a corporate training expert. As early as our first meeting, we discussed the development of a character and leadership component to our new program development.

It is now January of 2018. Since the early days of the team assembled three years ago, our character and leadership curriculum has gone through an annual revision. As the face of the team has changed, and as we are no longer only providing service to our own students, I have been (re)tasked with creating a stand-alone soft skills curriculum that can be delivered online and supported through a blended learning model.

Image from Max Pixel; 
Made available through CC0 Public Domain 

I have to admit, on the surface it looks (and even feels) like recreating the wheel. Soft skills curriculum providers fill educator and career training conference vendor rooms. So, this project doesn’t even have a novel stance with outside customers. At least, that’s a what an onlooker might think without digging deeper.

Truthfully, in my last year as a masters student in the Online Teaching and Instructional Design program at Lenoir Rhyne University, I have learned the value of an iterative process. Last year, I didn’t even know that “iterative” meant repeated or that an iterative process was similar to a model of continuous improvement (I understood that cliche phrase). Now, I understand that my task isn’t to reinvent the wheel, rather, I am revisiting the wheel.

This blog will track my design progress and process as I embark on the task of creating GPS Soft Skills 4.0 - the next iteration of our character/leadership and employability curriculum and assessment. Please feel free to comment, add suggestions, and provide encouragement.

Resources
For more information iterative design models, I really like this article:
Makhlouf, Jack. (2016, August 21). Iterative Design Models: ADDIE vs. Sam. Retrieved from: http://elearningmind.com/iterative-design-different-strokes-different-folks/