Etivity 8-2

1.      What experience have you had personally in managing instructional design and development projects?

2.      How has what you have read in this topic challenged you to reflect on your previous experiences?

3.      What have you learnt that would have, or will, assist you in your management processes?

Many years ago I created a CD-ROM for remote students. We limited it to a CD due to bandwidth restrictions etc. for learners who didn’t have high speed internet access. My Head teacher was officially the project manager, but it was mostly up to me to decide what was used and how it was presented. Part of the project guidelines was that I was not to actually create material – just locate it, adapt if necessary, and package it. When I have created learning material, it was just a matter of necessity, not a project as described by Chapman and Nicolet (2003) with project leader, charter, processes and reports. Van Rooij (2010, p854) points out that projects for developing online instruction are often limited by a lack of resources. This explains why my project was so limited. Templates and processes would certainly streamline the process. It would be nice to have graphic designers and media specialists to help create a truly professional product.

When creating the CD-ROM, we inadvertently followed the Analysis, design, development, implementation and evaluation (ADDIE) instructional design model. The analysis was not very substantial – more that there was an identified need. The remaining steps were followed, even though we were not aware that we were actually following an identified process. Van Rooij (2010, p858) discusses the benefits of having a project manager with different skills to a subject matter expert or an instructional designer, but when resources are thin these various skills often have to reside in one person. For the size of the projects I have been involved in, I really don’t think project management skills are as important as subject expertise or an ability to work with online tools to create the learning material. As Van Rooij (2010, p.862) says, instructional designers can obtain project management experience on the job.

What I have discovered about doing these projects is that having a process, and planning what needs to be done, are very important starting points. In these times of budget restrictions, where large scale projects are not numerous, it is often only a single person who will be responsible for a small scale project. The best results can be achieved by following processes and guidelines as if it was a large project