7 Steps to Program Design

7 Steps to Program Design

Planning for a digital learning program can be overwhelming. There are many things to consider, from content, devices, to staff and facilities, and so much more.   Go back and read the previous sentence. Notice that the items specified are visual, touchable. Too often this is where the planning begins and stalls. After acquiring the “junk and stuff” little investment goes into the necessary steps of building a quality digital learning program that are less visual, but comes at the cost of time and effort, like professional development, planning milestones and benchmarks,  or documentation of policies and practices.   Like spokes in a wheel, if the strut is weak or missing, the wheel becomes wobbly and may topple over. So too can a digital learning program if attention is lacking in strategic areas. Having a roadmap or a checklist can guide leaders into investing time and resources strategically. Management and evaluation of the program design process is essential to ensuring that your digital learning program enables students to be successful and excel academically.   See Digital Learning Program Design: 7 Steps to Success infographic below.   Don’t get caught up in the bright colorful furniture, or the sparkling new devices, when you should be focused on operational procedures, or preparing your staff for new pedagogy and classroom instruction.   Successfully implementing a digital learning program requires analysis and thoughtful planning. Knowing all the steps you need to take and having a progress monitoring system in place will keep your team focused. At i3DigitaPD we help schools/districts with the seven steps to program design (see infographic below): Goal Setting Target...
What are Your Goals?

What are Your Goals?

Welcome to i3DigitalPD. We’re very excited to be starting a professional development adventure for something that we feel so deeply and dearly about – online and blended learning.  With more than 15 years in the business seeing the growth and expansion of blended learning to individualize and personalize instruction, I couldn’t be more excited about the opportunities for my daughters (who love soccer) and the future of education. It was spring of 2000 when I started creating my first online course. It was for 8th grade math students who had not earned credit, thus could not be promoted into high school. Actually I was there to assist others in create courses as well – learning the tools, best practices, and creating knowledge objects and training for other teachers  to perfect their craft and courses.  Since the beginning, I was always looking to help others. Even today that is what we’re doing at i3DigitialPD. Starting a business, after years in education, in much like starting a new online or blended learning program in your schools. The planning process in not all that much different. You start with a goal. Why are we changing things? Why do we need to change? What do we hope to accomplish with making this change? For us the goal is to help other create quality online and blended learning programs. After working with thousands of teachers and hundreds of schools to create online and blended learning classrooms and programs, we’ve seen it all – some good, others who definitely needed more planning and preparation and lots in between. Having attended the International Association for K-12 Online...