What is Instructional Design and Online Learning?
We asked Drew Shipka, Director of Kent State Online, to tell us more about instructional design and online learning.
Drew works for the Office of Continuing and Distance Education and has helped improve online classes at Kent State University for over a decade. He leads a team of instructional designers whose primary responsibilities are developing fully online graduate programs.
Read on for a short interview with Drew about instructional design and online learning.
Tell us about yourself and your work at Kent State University.
I’m the Director, Kent State Online. I’ve been working in the Office of Continuing and Distance Education for Kent State for over a decade, helping build and support online courses. I’ve got a small team of great instructional designers who help increase the quality of our online offerings.
What is instructional design?
Instructional design is the process of designing and developing a course to help meet its learning outcomes. Quality instructional design ensures those outcomes are measurable and builds assessments that will measure how well a student meets those outcomes.
What does an instructional designer do?
An instructional designer assists faculty in the development of a course. They may find or review materials for alignment with course outcomes, design assessments that measure course outcomes, or create materials to add to the course content.
How do you measure course design success?
We use an evaluation rubric we developed that looks at several factors; the variety of content, alignment with course goals, the presence of formative and summative assessments, authentic assessments, instructor created content, use of rubrics, the level of rigor in a course, as well as some others. Primarily, the success of a course design comes from the students learning about the materials and meeting the course’s outcomes.
Can you define good instructional design?
Good instructional design is one where a course can have students meet the course outcomes through engaging content and assessments.
What skills do you need to be an instructional designer?
Primarily, an understanding of education and learning theories. Comfort with technology as we use many different systems and programs. Creativity and an enjoyment of learning about many different disciplines as well as empathy and compassion for each instructor and their teaching style.
What can you do with an instructional design career?
Most institutions of higher education employ instructional designers as well as many private companies that are focused on educational materials. In that career path, you’ll be able to assist faculty and students to have an improved learning experience in their courses.
Learn more about Kent State Online.
Kent State University Online Master of Education in Educational Technology
The Online Master of Education degree in Educational Technology is appropriate for teachers who wish to develop greater sophistication with technologies and want to use them effectively in their classrooms. It is also an excellent choice for those who want to develop skills in instructional design, corporate training, multimedia production, web development, administration of technology centers, and other positions involving the instructional application of information and communications technologies.
For more information on Kent State’s Online Master of Education in Educational Technology degree, visit https://onlinedegrees.kent.edu/degrees/master-of-education-in-educational-technology
