OK. here is draft 2. I also posted it in the general discussion forum in oncourse. Blogger makes my image tiny, even when I choose extra large, and if I choose actual size then it displays off the blog's layout and it looks horrible. So, I put a PDF in oncourse that will open at 8.5 x 11. Sorry for the inconvenience.

How to draw a 5 point star is better suited for a job aid than learning outcomes or authentic assessments :(

Ok, so after much thought I have come to the humbling realization that my original two ideas are just not well suited for a job aid. Creating authentic assessments, and how to write learning outcomes are tasks that require more depth of explanation, and a job aid is simply not the solution. For that reason I decided to do something more procedural in nature. Drawing a 5 point star does not require in depth  coverage since it is a simple procedure without much complexity.

I first learned how to do this about 20 years ago when I was perusing a book about "how to draw Islamic patterns". The procedure was so simple that it stuck with me for this long since all I need to remember is that 360 / 5  = 72 (3rd grade arithmetic!), and the rest is just common sense. Even though there are many software apps such as illustrator, inkscape, corel draw, etc., that have a star tool (and thus it is a one step process with software) I decided to do this, because everyone ought to know how to draw a 5 pointed star by hand. Right?  :)

Here is my draft. I remind you, that it is a D.R.A.F.T., but the steps of the procedure are pretty much done, but awaiting feedback for improvement :)

So, here:

Thank you in advance for any feedback!

ricardo

Books vs. video tutorials paradox

I have used Linda.com before and I am overall pleased with the quality of their tutorials. This semester I have used it mostly to brush up on my illustrator, and InDesign.

An exciting new (for me) software product is Adobe Captivate. This last week I spent almost 4 hours watching and re-watching the tutorials on Linda. I really like how the tutorials are structured, and explained, but I think that for any tool there is a moment when what one needs to learn can only be obtained by doing it. This software reminds me a lot of the old Macromedia Director. Going through this process of learning to use Captivate also reminds me of the days when I was learning to use Director. I have to say that I am feeling enthusiastic about this piece of software even though it creates Flash files I think I can get some work arounds to make them accessible (to students with disabilities), and to make the files compatible with iOS devices. I have ordered a couple of books on the subject to supplement the information from Linda. An interesting paradox about my learning behavior I realized this week is that I like to watch videos when I don't have the time to read a book, and alternatively I prefer to go directly to a book's page when I don't have time to watch a video!  :)

IST Conference 2013

It was great to meet everyone at the IST Conference this weekend. I think I speak for all the EdD students who were able to attend when I say that we got a lot out of the meeting with Dr. Brush and Dr. Glazewski. There were some interesting presentations, and it was really nice to meet a lot of the residential students as well. Unfortunatelly I missed the last 2 hours of the conference. I was a little ill (I was just recovering from the flu the day I flew out), and took a nap to sleep it off, and bummer I missed the basket raffle! But I won a mug! OK a scarf, but I traded it for a mug :)

It was also very nice to meet with Dr. Leftwich and Dr. Reigeluth (there were so many nice people to meet I can’t list them all).

Anyway; now that I have made the trip I know how to prepare better, so next time I come by I’ll be well nourished, better-slept, and definitely bring a better jacket  :)

I'm thinking either Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs) or Authentic Assessment.

For the job aid I think I'm going to work on one of these two topics since I would end up  with something that would be practical for my work, even if I may have to go through a couple of iterations to get it just right. I actually think that I will eventually end up doing both since I really can use them to help myself explain those things to a few people.

Although knowing these things and how to do them should be bread and butter for those teaching at our college; the reality is that only a handful of faculty work semi-regularly on these things. A majority of faculty work on their SLOs just as the accreditation cycle is about to renew itself. As for assessments; there is a large number (that I am unable to quantify at this moment, but large) of faculty who use publisher's quizzes only to assess student work. To a lesser extent than for SLOs accreditation also seems to get them interested in exploring alternatives to quizzes. 

I am still tossing ideas in my mind about which of these is more feasible and practical to do first. I am also assessing to what extent of preciseness to go into without making it into a book. These concepts/themes are not simple, and therefore require depth of coverage, but I think that for training purposes a job aid could be used to scaffold upwards towards a more comprehensive training.

Any thoughts or comments are welcome and appreciated.

ricardo 



  

I had not used Illustrator for about five years, actually more like ten years, but it was nice to find out that I still remember how to use a lot of its core features. I had fun doing this!

This infographic is meant for print not for web, although it looks nice on my iPad. The actual size is 11"x17" (tabloid).

Ricardo’s 2 cents about infographic design principles.

Jerome Bruner, in The Process of Education (1960, p.52), said the following about curriculum, “For any subject taught in primary school, we might ask [is it] worth an adult’s knowing, and whether having known this as a child makes one a better adult... A negative or ambiguous answer means the material is cluttering up the curriculum.” 

I believe this is also true for infographic design. While it is tempting to include a lot of visual elements to enhance the look of the graphic representation for cosmetic purposes, we must ask ourselves what each element brings to our design to make it useful for the end user. In other words, we have to ask ourselves, “is this clutter?”, and if the answer is yes, or if we are hesitant about the answer then we need to eliminate that element even if it is what we had thought to be the centerpiece of our design.

p.s. this book (in my humble opinion) is one of the "must-read's" for anyone serious about education

How dos one change a picture in here anyway? in word press it is so straight forward, but here I have this huge picture of myself! It's like I've built a cyber shrine to myself :)

If I don't figure out how to change it for a smaller one I will have to start my own cult!

I decided to try making an infographic for my first topic: Learning Theories. My master's program was focused entirely on learning theories and design principles, so learning theory is a new animal for me. Ithe material can seem quite dense, so the process of creating the infographic will help me (I hope) aument my understanding o the material by allowing me to internalize the concepts as i go about finding relationships, and trying to decide on an oganizational and hierarchical scheme.

This is just a mock up (wire frame), and i am almost certain that my final will probably not look anything like this one :)

By the way, I used an open source software app called "Pencil" for wire-framing. It is really easy to use and runs on multiple platforms. I recommend it to anyone looking for a free and easy to use wire-frame application.

Infographics Topics.

Not sure how much detail we need, so I'll list he topics, and if necessary I'll elaborate based on any feedback.

1 - The difference between Instructional Theory and Learning Theory. I think it would be useful to have a visual to represent  what instructional theories are and aren't, and how they differ from learning theories, and other types of theories.

2 - Complex Adaptive Systems. Complexity Sciences and Chaos Theory have become important for educators to understand learning environments and how to apply a systems view to educational situations. It would be useful to have an infographic that explains those concepts and shows the analogies in education.

Infographic

I have been following Nicholas Negroponte's One Laptop Per Child Program on and off over the last few years, and I thought this infographic was pretty good. I do like that the author chose a color scheme that is faithful to the color scheme used for OLPC's marketing materials and to the colors used for the designs of their laptops.

I thought they grouped elements very well, and the graphics are pleasant in appearance. I did take issue with the orientation of the graphic. It is very long on the vertical axis, and does not work well for display on computer screens since they use landscape orientation. The portrait orientation of the infographic would not necessarily be an issue if the infograohic is intended to be displayed in print as a poster, but because of the conflict of proportions it is like trying to fit the proverbial square peg in a round hole. It seems that the designer did not use empathic design principles to understand how the user would interact with the information of the infographic. http://pinterest.com/pin/178173728978784582/ 

Hi all, this is my second semester in the IST EdD program. I'm not much of a blogger, so I apologize for the plain look on this blog. 

My name is Manuel Ricardo Flores, but I go by my middle name, so you'll see me signing my name as "ricardo"

A bit about me; I have a bachelors in liberal studies with a minor in education, and a masters in learning design and technology from some fancy university. I currently work for Cañada College in Redwood City California as an instructional designer/distance education coordinator.

Although I work in a community college my interests are broad, and I try to challenge myself to work on projects that lie outside the scope of my current work. 

I love  a strong cup of coffee as much as I love listening to NPR. My hobbies include tennis, running, doodling, and building electronics projects.

I look forward to all the learning we will do together in this class!

ricardo