Open Culture Initial Review

This week my course assignment asked me to choose a free open course site and review and reflect on what I have learned from designing instruction.  I have chosen to review Open Culture.  www.openculture.com

Does the course appear to be carefully pre-planned and designed for a distance learning environment? How so?

At first glance, the website seems to be very organized.  You can choose from several categories including audiobooks, ebooks, online courses and more.  You can also search their resources.  After your initial selection you can choose a category and subcategory to help find relative information.  I viewed a few psychology courses to give me an idea of what was in their courses.  Open Culture took me to a free itunesU lecture.  It was just the audio of the lecture.  I felt that it was very easy to navigate and find what I was looking for.  Simonson et al state that the componenets of a successful learning system are the learners, the content, the method and materials, and the environment. (Simonson et al, 152)

Does the course follow the recommendations for online instruction as listed in your course textbook?

Although the material seemed to be organized well, I felt that it did not meet recommendations for online instruction as listed in my course textbook.  For example, the psychology course was an audio of a traditional lecture from a class.  Simonson et al state that the focus of instruction shifts to engaged learners, alternate ways to illustrate key concepts and activities that encourage interactivity.  (Simonson et al, 152)  The course was more of a podcast.  That is not to say that you would not learn anything from it, but it did not include some of the activities that are important in distance learning.

Did the course designer implement course activities that maximize active learning for the students?

In the courses that I viewed, there were no course activities in any of them.  Most of the content was a video or audio of a traditional course lecture.    “It is important to remember that no matter which technological formats are used in distance education, the trend is to reduce the ‘amount’ of information delivered and to increase the ‘interactive value’ of the learning experience.”  (Simonson et al, 157)

References

Simonson, M., Smaldino, S., Albright, M., & Zvacek, S. (2012). Teaching and learning at a distance: Foundations of distance education (5th ed.) Boston, MA: Pearson.

Open Culture, retrieved on August 2^nd, 2014 from www.openculture.com