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A 5-Step Approach
#4 Brainstorm Activities
Now for the fun part...creating ways to make learning fun & make it stick!
Think of activities as short ‘bursts’ of learning—with no more than 6 minutes of content presentation. This keeps Learners engaged and helps with retention, especially in remote learning experiences.
For example, you could start with a ‘Quiz’ game or ‘Video Clip’ to grab people’s attention, then go into a 5 minute intro ‘Talk.’ These activities can be in-person, online, or both—it’s up to you.
Pro Tip:
* Need Activity ideas? Refer to tried and true tools like and the for ideas on digital/online activities to keep learning active, social, and applied.
* Want to re-think your design? Explore the (UDL) and to ensure your learning experience covers every aspect of ‘What’, ‘Why’, and ‘How’ of learning experiences and is learner-focused.
* Want to add your own Activity ‘types’? Just type it into the ‘Activity’ column and select your new type (the pop-up with the plus sign (’+’)) to add it to your list of Activity ‘types’
🤾♂️ #1: Suggest Learning Activities for each Topic
1. Select a topic from the ‘Topic’ dropdown list so you can work on developing the Activities and Content one Topic at a time
2. Add Activities to help Learners learn, reinforce, recall, and relate Topic to real-world examples
Pro Tip:
* To help Learners with engagement and retention, attempt to increase the ‘Learner Effort’ as you move through the module. The higher the 'Effort value’, the higher the level of learning.
* To learn more, see and the .
* Add some ‘Activity Notes’. Here’s where you can describe Learner options for in-person, participate via video, or watch recorded session.
* To learn more about hybrid learning solutions, check out this developed after the COVID-19 impact on learning experiences.
Topic: Welcome/Intro
Welcome/Intro
[ Estimated Time of Activities for this Topic: 10 mins]
10 mins
Activity Planning (Sorted by Learner Effort)
Add an Activity
Activities
Activity
Duration (mins)
Activity Notes
Approach(es)
Learner Effort
Structured Notetaking
10 mins
Welcome & Intro Video: Interview or short story
Active Listening
1. Remember
No results from filter
🧑🤝🧑 #2: Add Remote & Asynchronous Options (if applicable)
We’re ready to add the ‘remote’ and ‘asynchronous’ learning options for all our Activities, if applicable.
1. Use the following worksheet to design a few Remote options (’live’, online video/video interactions) & Asynchronous options (online, but on-demand) options for each Activity.
Pro Tip: This requires a bit of a mindset-shift, so check out the ‘Additional Resources’ page for some inspiration. To learn more, and .
2. Use the ‘Comments’ section to ask other co-creators for feedback and ideas on a particular Activity. Pro Tip: Use the in the Comments field to tag other members on the team to message them about something specific directly on each Topics page.
Search
Welcome/Intro
Welcome/Intro
Week 2 Intro
Week 2 Intro
Week 3 Intro
Week 3 Intro
Topic
Welcome/Intro
Keypoints
Related Learning Outcome
Learning_Outcome_01
🗺️ #2: Take a step back to see how it all looks
Now is a good time to take a look at the draft of your Design Plan to check the following:
Are the Topics sequenced in a logical way? Do they flow well? If something’s missing, go back to to work on the Topics
Are there too many Activities (or too few) planned for each Session, given the time allotted.
Pro Tip: Some universities use the following guideline:
* 50-min for classes that meet 3 times/week
* 75-min for classes that meet 2 times/week
* 2h 45min for classes that meet once/week
Is there a good mix of ‘Activity Types’ in each Session? Do the Activities require more 'Effort’ as Learners move along. Go back to Step #1 above ☝️ if you need to move Activities around.
Are the Lecture & Video Content pieces broken up into small enough chunks—of no more than 6 minutes? If so, how can you break them up?
View Activity Details by Week
[ Estimated Time of Activities for this Topic: ]
0
Select a session to view:Week 1
Week 1
Topic
Approach(es)
Learner Effort
Activity
Duration (mins)
In-Person
Remote
Offline
Session
No results from filter
View the overall Flow of Activities
Session
Topic
Activity
Duration (mins)
Learner Effort
Session 1
Welcome/Intro
Structured Notetaking
10 mins
1. Remember
Session 2
Week 2 Intro
RolePlay
15 mins
Session 3
Week 3 Intro
Lecture Content
6 mins
2. Understand
And, the last and final step: »
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