Are you behind the 8 ball ---or ahead of the curve?

Sharon Fratta-Hill, PhDVice President of Distance Education

• Do you need to make your training:– more cost effective?– more agile?– more engaging?– produce measurable skill improvements in

employees?

• …..(and do it without travel funds)

Evaluating Your Training

Heading Down the Right Road• We wanted to create a high end distance education

training platform.• We wanted to move away from the text-based point

and click experience that was so familiar to the government and military employee.

• We wanted to find out how to change skill levels and hold the interest of an adult student.

• We wanted to provide the right technology and pedagogy for a new generation of federal learners.

Choosing the Right Distance Education Modality & Pedagogy

• Page turner format may be able to produce Bloom’s Taxonomy Knowledge (rote) level learning, but student engagement is needed for Application (or higher) level knowledge acquisition.

• Students must have the opportunity to:– Acquire basic knowledge.

– Share and analyze knowledge with their peers and instructor.

– Engage in hands-on activities which apply the newly acquired information or skill set.

Our Survey said:• We needed a platform that allows students to chat or interact with the

teacher in a real time collaborative manner.• We needed:

– The ability to share video and audio with students– To create a continuous learning environment– The ability to allow students to privately work and speak with each

other– To be able to share simulations and application software with

students

The Journey

Blackboard• Used v. 6 of Blackboard to

create initial online classes– Federal clients wanted more

interaction with faculty and fewer independent activities

• Blackboard version 9.1.4 was adopted with an Adobe Connect Building Block

• Bb Collaborate now provides the options in one portal.

Adobe Connect• Used Adobe Connect 7.5 to

create asynchronous and synchronous online classes– Asynchronous classes lacked

structure

– Students could not determine the sequence in which learning events should be completed

– Bb provides a building block for seamless access

Accessible Collaborative Compelling

Easy to Use Personalized Responsive

What Makes an Experience Engaging?

How Do YOU Get There?

STARTThe Graduate School DE Program started with:•A huddle room•2 face to face ISDs•1 designer with Blackboard administration experience•A Bb managed hosting agreement

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Use a contractor to help you design your first courses.

What Do You Want to Add to Your Courses to Make them Engaging?

Interactive Features• Captivate Simulations• Quizzes• Flash Content• Video and You Tube links• Polling• Wikis and Blogs• Recorded lectures

Down the Road -----Staff Wish List

• Project Manager

• Flash programmer

• ISDs with rich media

experience

• Help desk contact

• Video/audio editor

How Did We Measure Success?

• We were able to meet contract training needs when travel dollars were gone. (HUD Leadership)

• We were able to measure and improve student engagement.

• Student and agency satisfaction ratings

Asynchronous Training

It’s Also About the Experience

• Starbucks is more than a cup of coffee.• Amazon is more than shopping.• iTunes is more than music.• Why shouldn’t your elearning programs be more

engaging and effective?

Dr. Sharon Fratta-Hill

sharon.fratta@graduateschool.edu

202-314-3600

Questions?