3.2 Content creation tools
With online learning comes the potential to use a variety of media within online learning materials and to use content creation tools to package them all together into a coherent learning experience. As well as providing interesting ways to use audio and video media in teaching, there are online tools available for production of graphs and infographics, animations, storyboards, and more. The teacher’s role in respect of these kinds of tools is to browse and trial a range of software and to discover which kinds would help bring their online teaching alive with a variety of media and presentation formats. Week 3 of the course provides some guidance on this process. Once you have an idea of what you want to create, you will need to identify how the outputs you create with these content creation tools can be integrated with the course management system to create a dynamic and engaging online learning experience.
In addition, you may design your materials to enable learners to use these tools in their online work. Beetham (2007) points out that:
‘Applications can even be shared to enable collaborative representations to be built, as happens face-to-face with electronic whiteboards or blackboards, and with wikis online. Learners’ representations can of course be used for assessment but they can also be re-integrated into the learning situation for reflection and peer review, or even as learning materials for future cohorts.’
3.1 Course management