First, let us begin with the
scenario. A high school history teacher,
located on the west coast of the United States, wants to showcase to her
students new exhibits being held at two prominent New York City museums. The
teacher wants her students to take a "tour" of the museums and be
able to interact with the museum curators, as well as see the art work on
display. Afterward, the teacher would like to choose two pieces of artwork from
each exhibit and have the students participate in a group critique of the
individual work of art. As a novice of distance learning and distance learning
technologies, the teacher turned to the school district’s instructional
designer for assistance. In the role of the instructional designer, what
distance learning technologies would you suggest the teacher use to provide the
best learning experience for her students?
There are many things to
consider when choosing media for a distance learning project like the one
presented. The media should be accurate,
motivational, engaging, and unbiased (Simonson, Smaldino, & Zvacek, 2012) , but most
importantly it needs to address the goals and objectives of the specific
lesson. The instructor wants the
students to be able to evaluate two pieces of art work which would require the
students to take a virtual tour of a museum.
The first suggestion that I would make is for the teacher to visit the
Google Art Project online (Google Art Project, 2014) . Google has used the same technology that
brought us the street view feature to Google maps to provide a collection of
virtual tours of many of the most famous art museums around the world. One thing that I love about this project is
that it encourages students to explore and discover treasures throughout the
museum by providing different modes of exploration. The students can either browse through the
high definition photographs of the works from each museum or they can take a
virtual walk by using the floor map provided for each museum. By emphasizing the discovery of the learner,
it engages the learner in the content (Simonson, Smaldino, & Zvacek, 2012) . I also like that
the project meets all of the standards to make it SCORM compliant (Simonson, Smaldino, & Zvacek, 2012) . You can check out
the Google Art Project by visiting https://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/project/art-project.
There are many forms of
technology that would allow students to interact with the museum curators. One option that would be efficient is to
request a Skype session during which students could ask previously written
questions pertaining to their particular works of art. This choice would allow
students to discover more about the art work while making efficient use of the
curator’s time.
Finally, I would suggest
that the teacher have students complete their evaluations of the two pieces of
art on a wiki page. “A wiki is a
collection of web pages that are linked to each other, and reflect the work of
many authors” (Beldarrain, 2006) . Wiki are good tools
for collaborative writing and compiling information (Simonson, Smaldino, & Zvacek, 2012) and often offered to
educational institutions at no cost. BY
providing a group space for the learners, you give them the opportunity to
discuss and share ideas more freely (Simonson, Smaldino, & Zvacek, 2012) . Students would have
access to the wiki both at home and at school which would allow easy access to
the project. The wiki can also serve as
the presentation tool at the conclusion of the project. An example of a working
wiki can be found at http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Portal:Fine_Arts.
Today’s
mobile learner is demanding more control of their learning experience. This is placing pressure onto educators to
integrate new technology tools to meet the needs of the learner. “As new technologies emerge, instructional
designers and educators have unique opportunities to foster interaction and
collaboration among learners, thus creating a true learning environment” (Beldarrain, 2006) .
References
Beldarrain, Y. (2006). Distance education trends:
Integrating new technologies to foster student interaction and collaboration. Distance
Education, 27(2), 139-153.
Google Art Project. (2014,
September 19). Retrieved from Google Cultutral Institute: https://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/home.
Simonson, M., Smaldino, S., & Zvacek, S. (2012). Teaching
and learning at a distance: Foundations of distance education. Boston :
Pearson.
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