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 Technology
Requirements
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Some
students will take this course at a distance through
the College of Extended Studies. You must have
access to the following technologies for the successful
completion of this course at a distance.
- A
personal computer with at least 800 MHz speed,
250 Mb RAM, 40 GB hard drive, and audio board
and a 56 Kb modem.
- A
Microphone.
- A
video camera compatible to the computer used
for the course.
- Internet
Explorer web browser (latest version).
- Macromedia
Flash Player.
- Access
to the Internet without the interference
of an enterprise firewall.
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Goals
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| This
course will prepare you to become conversant
in the terminology of the field of distance education,
and use its primary concepts, instructional and
learning design strategies, and technologies
in their appropriate contexts. Historically,
distance education has been a response to social
needs. As such, you will also become familiar
with historical, economic, and social antecedents
to the current dramatic growth of distance education
in the US, and elsewhere in the world. |
| Objectives |
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This
course will enable you to:
- Use
terminology of the field of distance education
in appropriate
contexts
- Explain
defining concepts of the field of distance
education
- Select
appropriate instructional strategies for distance
teaching and learning
- Select
appropriate technologies for distance teaching
and learning
- Use
course authoring tools
- Use
videoconferencing tools, and systems
- Select
appropriate learning management systems
- Use
online evaluation and data collection tools
- Present
an overview of the history of distance education
- Discuss
current social issues, and trends affecting
distance education.
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Technology Teams
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In EDTEC 550 you will be working with state-of-the art technologies in the filed. This is to acquire hands-on experience with these technologies, and be able to use them. To accomplish this important task of the course, you must select a primary team in which you will be working on a particular technology. You will collaborate with your team members on a common goal, set by the team and approved by the instructor, but you also have to define specific tasks that you will accomplish for the team. This will, in part, determine the points that you will earn for acquiring baseline skills in the course.
This semester, the teams include the following:
- Open source (e.g. PostNuke, Moodle)
- Videoconferencing
- Breeze
- Distance learner support web development
- CastStream
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| Texts |
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Textbook
The text for the course is:
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Moore, M., & Kearsley, G. (2005). Distance education: A systems view. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth
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Online Resources
Some of the readings
for this course are assigned from distance-educator.com,
and other online sources. Distanc-Educator.com
is a site that was originally established by
the course instructor to provide resources for
students in the EDTEC department about distance
education. Since then, it has grown to a major
international resource for thousands of subscribers
in the US and around the world.
Distance-Educator.com also
offers a free subscription to its online publication
Daily News. The field is changing every day. There
is a tremendous amount of new information about distance
education published by a variety of sources. The
course instructor collects published information
from a variety of sources every weekday, and presents
it in the Daily News Digest. To take full advantage
of this course, you should subscribe
to the Daily News Digest.
Recommended Books
To complete this course, each
student has to write a research
paper and present. For this research
paper you can choose any number
of books recommended here, which
would be relevant to your research
paper, and other learning interests.
Berge,
Z. L. (2001). (Ed.). Sustaining
distance training: Integrating
learning technologies into the
fabric of the enterprise.
San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Khan,
B. (Ed.). (2001). Web-based
training. Englewood Cliffs,
NJ: Educational Technology Publications.
Ko,
S., Rosen, S. (2001). Teaching
online: A practical guide. Boston , MA :
Houghton Mifflin.
Mills,
R., Tait, A. (Eds.). (1996). Supporting
the learner in open and distance
learning. London , UK :
Pitman Publishing.
Rosenberg,
M. J. (2001). e-Learning:
Strategies for delivering knowledge
in the digital age. NY:
McGraw-Hill.
Shoemaker,
C. C. J. (1998). Leadership
in continuing and distance
education in higher education. Needham
Heights , MA :
Allyn and Bacon.
Simonson,
M., Smaldino, S., Albright,
M., and Zvacek. (2000). Teaching
and learning at a distance:
Foundation of distance education. Upper
Saddle River , NJ :
Prentice Hall.
Additional
Books on Distance Education
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| Grading |
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In
order to acknowledge achievements and monitor student
progress, the Department needs a realistic and
meaningful system for grading performance. The
University and the professional community expect
the Department to maintain standards that reflect
its reputation as one of the foremost programs
of its type in the country.
According to the University's Graduate Bulletin,
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| File
Naming |
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| Email
Every
time you send an email you must complete the
subject line using the following naming technique.
EDTEC
550 <your last name> <subject of the
message>
For example: EDTEC 550 Saba Review, and critique of an online
course. Following this technique will ensure that your message
will be sorted correctly, and read by the instructor promptly.
If
you had to attach a file to the email always
use the naming technique of: YourLastName_550_ProjectTitle
For
example: Saba_550_ResearchPaper
It
is important that you identify all correspondence
with faculty with your last name.
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EDTEC 550 Introduction to Distance Education