UBC

ETEC 511 – Project Retrospective

Posted on by Jon K.

I feel that this was an interesting project to be a part of, and coming into it late, eliminated some of my ability to influence the direction of the group, but I think my role became an early critic – asking pointed questions so that I could understand why decision were made – and help support them. One of the things I often did in meetings was try to help tie our decisions back to course readings, course content, and thinking about the project less as a project and more as an assignment. I think I also served as a bit of a wrangler of ideas, trying to limit scope creep.

One other thing I did was in my section (accessibility legislation) really try to refine the information into questions and answers, so that particular section became conversational. I recall talking about making our language plain, simple and understandable and how we could use that as an engagement strategy, and in turn making it more usable, which was I think my most important contribution to the process. I will admit my passenger-ness to the project, and did not feel 100% like it was my project (again, coming in late to it made it a bit of a challenge) so I always saw my role as a bit of a servant to the whole.

From a Nielsen (2003) perspective, Twine was at the same time easy to use and learn the basics of quickly. The simplicity of the design of the tool (questions and answers with expositional text) were easy to construct in Twine. The complexity of the subject matter however, made Twine a difficult choice to manage how each component piece linked. Had we not limited our choices to discuss, we absolutely would have been tangled in a web of, well, Twine. I think that the affordances of Twine’s output, especially in the way we designed the tool, kept the complexity down, which in turn allowed the tool to ultimately be more usable.

I don’t know if Twine ended up being the best choice as we had to bend it quite a lot to make it do what we wanted it to do. The tool ultimately configured us as designers, as we were pretty locked into Twine. While it ended up perfectly fine, it did limit us in some ways, that due to our technical understanding of what was possible and the time constraints it would have taken to further use Twine beyond what it is built for, I wonder if this would have been simpler to build using HTML and delivered a more accessible tool in the end?

References

Nielsen, J. (2003). Usability 101: Introduction to usability. Useit. 

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ETEC 511: IP#8 – Attention

Posted on by Jon K.

This assignment includes a requirement to do an attentional record. Here’s that:

TimeActivityDistractions
9-10Work tasks, email, tickets,Moving from task to task – completed chunks then moved to different task  
10-11Work meetingCataloging was a distractions
11-1211-11:30 lunch 11:30 – 12 work tasks, email, MS TeamsMoving from task to task – completed chunks then moved to different task  
12-1Work meetingDiscussion raised some questions that I searched for. MS Teams message came in from another team member, answered it  
1-2Work meeting (different) 
2-3Video Interview (2-6)Needed to be present during this, phone turned off, no distractions
3-4  
4-5  
5-6  
6-7Dinner prep and dinner, finish workNo phone/computer during dinner prep, work required focus and attention
7-8TV (listen to TV, not actively engaged)Doodle on phone, check email, play games
8-9TV (listen to TV, not actively engaged)Doodle on phone, check email, play games
Attentional Record

This is a bit of a curious exercise as it wants you to turn this data into some visual, but all my visual storytelling skills tell me that it’s not going to add any sort of additional information and abstracting this information one step further is actually obfuscating the information and making analysis harder. So I’m not going to do that.

This exercise for me was interesting, as the exercise was more distracting than my normal process. Typically, I am not a distracted person. I quite often choose not to look at my phone, or check email, or get distracted from what I am doing. If I am “distracted” chances are I’m bored (which is also how I relax, just not pay attention to anything, and stop being actively engaged). Setting out an activity where I have to pay attention to my attention – well, that’s going to be a recipe to double down my already disciplined approach to work, tasks and life. So, I don’t know that I have some great revelatory technique to deal with distractions – I’m not some ascetic monk, I just believe that being in the moment and present is important. In many ways, that’s what Citton (2017) is talking about in the Joint Attention section of the book – “we are always attentive in a particular situation.” (p. 83) In educational situations, attention varies depending on the student and their role – as if attention is social and co-constructed. However, there’s some social norms that drive attention (albeit younger students might adhere to this better than middle school students – who are more likely to be testing social norms). While I don’t necessarily agree that attention is co-constructed, it is (and our current social media world confirms) most certainly socially constructed. Peer groups can “pay attention” to certain musical acts, and ensuring you know those musical acts ensures your social status. Those relationships are social. Families and friends are often the most important people to drive attention and, in my chart, the times where I’m with friends and family, are also the ones where my attention is most undivided.

That sounds so high and mighty to write… but it’s true. The attention that I pay has the most value when I value the people around me. Thinking beyond this particular chart, but into the territory when I do use my phone for entertainment – it’s in transit, between places, and alone.

I will also say that Citton missing out on Neil Postman’s critiques of mass media for entertainment (and thus attention) is a gap that I paid attention to after reading the chapter.

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ETEC 511: Tipping Point: A Critical Case Study of the LMS replacing websites

Posted on by Jon K.

Dating back to the early use of the world wide web to produce websites, academic institutions provided space and access to servers to faculty. Naturally this early exploration of the space included a number of uses –personal spaces, spaces dedicated to research, community and academic teaching. The archive.org McMaster University archive goes back to 1997, however I know that website use for teaching purposes existed prior to 1997 and went back as far as 1994 (Cuneo et al, 2000). Outside of a brief resurgence of website use in 2010 (while the on-premises LMS solution Blackboard installation was besieged with technical issues) the decline has continued to the present day.

One challenge in providing proof of this decline is that there is no comprehensive way to catalog and decipher each department and faculty approaches to personal webhosting for academic faculty and no standard approach to naming and hosting. To this end, I did encounter a deep archive of links for the faculty of Humanities websites.

In a sampling of pages that I could find archived for the Languages and Linguistics department within the faculty of Humanities (out of the 26 courses listed) (Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics, 2001) – there were 4 courses with individual webpages, and a further 16 courses with course outlines linked from the page. Some of the courses with web presences beyond a course outline were last archived in 2005, however the last successful archiving of an actual active course was 2003. (Solo Testo, 2003). The later archives were of a redirect to the Faculty of Humanities homepage likely as a result of a restructuring of the website.

By 2004, as the proliferation of WebCT and First Class (known locally as Learn Link) at McMaster became more prevalent, use of websites for teaching started to decline. It makes some sense that this trend starts to appear at this point – historically the Learning Technologies Resource Centre (LTRC) began to support central LMS tools around this time, and nearly a decade after the technology started to be used at McMaster, there are likely to be some combination of the maturity of the tools and a convergence as commercial software begins to become commonplace at higher education institutions. At McMaster, while there was some standardization of tools provided by the university to faculty at no additional charge, there was also no mandate to use the centrally supported tools. In fact, the only mention of LMS like systems were Learn Link (First Class) and WebCT in the Central IT report for 2005 was a mention for both systems’ server requirements as part of the LTRC inventory (Barret, 2005, p.187) Alternatively, there was no mention of hosting websites as a service across any of the independent or central IT units at the time. Further to this idea, the archives I could find on the Wayback Machine for McMaster all seem to indicate websites were not to be used for teaching, rather it seems the commonplace use of websites were for communication. It is reasonable to say website hosting for the purposes of teaching was far less used than the central LMS’s during this first decade of the World Wide Web. If we look back at one of the first major commercial LMS, WebCT, it was designed initially by Murray Goldberg in the mid-90’s as a way to supplement his in-person lectures. (Chan, 2005) Most web-based LMS systems replicate the functionality of WebCT – certainly most of the ones used in higher education (Blackboard, D2L’s Brightspace, Canvas and Moodle) – and so a system of software based on the experiences and design of an instructor who was looking to improve grades in courses rooted in a lecture based approach has become the defacto location for teaching to happen in an online environment.

While websites as a course site was not a priority of the university, it is likely that the impetus for this displacement in teaching tools came from several different areas, in addition to the lack of support from the university, converging slowly in the mid-2000’s to the present day:

  1. Instructors were increasingly becoming sessional and labour to build one’s own site is not compensated. The LMS is provided (although not necessarily the simplest for all).
  2. Using an LMS is easier than managing your own website for teaching as much of the infrastructure is provided by someone else.
  3. Some instructors who are interested in using the LMS for teaching were early adopters and acted as champions for the tool.
  4. Instructors who moved from institutions who have mandated LMS use to McMaster, brought along that practice, expecting McMaster to also have mandated the use of the LMS.
  5. Students who experienced LMS use in secondary school have now graduated into higher education and expected the use of an LMS to provide materials and activities.
  6. Faculties and departments each have suggested over the years tool use based on their own experiences and desire to introduce efficiencies which the LMS can provide.
  7. Educational institutions being interested in reducing paper in the name of sustainability.
  8. Vendors of LMS products convinced institutions of the efficiency, redundancy, and security of the LMS.

While each of those individual claims, can be discussed at length, this transition has definitely re-entrenched the transmission model of teaching and learning. The LMS reinforces the transmission model by having a roles that allows certain members in the system more or less power to control other users. For instance, an instructor role could be designed to allow for posting of materials, whereas a student role could view those materials. In some LMS systems these are determined by the local system administrators (often with the help of the vendor) while others have these archetypes predefined. While a vendor might argue it is up to the institution to configure the system how they wish, the archetypal uses of the system are designed around fundamental assumptions of what an instructor might be. Very rarely are LMS structures built with features that promote constructive sense-making, and as such, they are often designed for behaviourist approaches to teaching. This is an example of what Woolgar (1990) might describe as configuring the user, especially when considering the history of the development of the LMS being from a limited perspective and for a limited purpose.

This shift from a more open website to a closed, more secure but also more deterministic LMS does not necessarily negatively impact teaching per se, it does make it more challenging to use a LMS with certain pedagogical approaches. For instance, if you are teaching in a constructivist manner, it is difficult to have people   If at every turn it is difficult and time-consuming to make the LMS do what you want to do pedagogically, and the education system is rewarding certain choices you make with your labour, it becomes even more challenging to teach in ways that might be more constructivist, so you might come to believe that it is impossible to teach in that way through the LMS. While it is true it is more difficult, and might make the LMS itself unusable, it might be impractical, or more time-consuming to teach in that way. In those scenarios, a stand-alone website would probably be a superior choice.

In our class readings, there is a similar issue with labour being reduced by choice being taken away by making the undesirable behaviour more costly for the worker to do. This was raised in Crawford (2021) with Amazon workers being restricted in unauthorized actions, one such example of unauthorized actions being too many breaks. (p. 53) By the design (and in many ways the usability) of the LMS rewarding efficiency and punishing inefficiency, there is a pervasive enforcement of “traditional” teaching methods. Individually designed and constructed websites have no preconceived notions of what teaching is, and in fact if the teacher is the designer of the site themselves, it can accurately reflect their pedagogy in as much as they can use HTML, CSS and Javascript to bring that reflection to life. While the course’s content is clearly about digital labour, one of the underlying currents of that module is about how digital labour is often not done by machines but by humans in often inhumane conditions. In much the same ways humans are doing the mechanical turk work or ghost work (Gray and Suri, 2019), the work being done to build courses in LMS systems are often not done by the instructor themselves, but by unseen labour. It might be offloaded to a teaching assistant, or an instructional designer or someone hired from outside the institution delivering the course to design a course virtually on-demand. Ghost work typically involves moving the production of labour to countries that have less labour costs than in western countries, this does happen in educational institutions where labour shifts from full-time, tenured and senior professors, to teaching assistants and lower paid members of the department or faculty.  In an institution it is entirely possible for some teachers to teach courses designed by someone else and built by yet another different person. While this undoubtedly happened with the people who were using websites to teach as well; getting a TA or instructional designer (or learning technologist) to build a website that the teacher could use to deliver content. Even in those cases, more design choices, more personalization would happen would require at least some input on those choices from the teacher and thus the system used to teach would also be closely designed by the teacher. With frequency, the labour for putting courses into the LMS have become the responsibility of teaching assistants. In 2021, McMaster and CUPE (the union for Teaching Assistants) agreed to paid training on various teaching related topics, including a module on the LMS use (An Introduction to Avenue to Learn). (McMaster University, 2021, p.2) While this labour previously might have gone uncompensated, and the teaching assistant may have had to learn this on their own or attend training, clearly the recognition from the university is that this activity is no longer in the realm of teachers alone.

Another aspect of LMS use is the ease of recycling course materials from semester-to-semester. While this is not a practice of all teachers using LMS’s, there are sessional instructors who are not compensated for the development of courses. If a fellow instructor or teacher chooses to share their content, and intellectual property, then the recipient is lucky. If the sessional instructor does not have access to content from a prior taught course, they are often designing the course as it goes, which does not provide an ideal learning experience. This is essentially a labour issue. As the university lowers the number of full-time and secure jobs to teaching faculty, it also creates a precarious market for labour, with faculty becoming sessional. If one can separate the course from the individual, and keep the course in a centrally maintained place, then that labour can be passed on without care for the individual who designed it. I am not saying that was the explicit goal of McMaster in instituting the LMS, but it is possible to separate the labour of creating a course with delivery of a course using an LMS, which makes it easier to retain beyond the employment of the developer.

            While the shift from open websites to a more closed LMS system also mirror the academic labour changes over the last two decades, in some ways both developments have been symbiotic – allowing for teaching to become more prescriptive, and the culture of teaching to be more limited.

References

Barret, D. (2005). University Technology Strategy. McMaster University. https://www.mcmaster.ca/cio/UTSMar05.pdf

Chan, L. (2005) WebCT Revolutionized E-Learning. UBC News. https://news.ubc.ca/2005/07/07/archive-ubcreports-2005-05jul07-webct/

Crawford, K. (2021). Atlas of AI. Yale University Press.

Gray, M. L. & Suri, S. (2019). Ghost work : How to stop silicon valley from building a new global underclass. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

McMaster University (2001). Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics @ McMaster University. Wayback Machine. https://web.archive.org/web/20010214022946/http://www.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~modlang/mlhome.htm

McMaster University (2003). Solo Testo. Wayback Machine. https://web.archive.org/web/20030928012724fw_/http://www.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~gargann/text.htm

McMaster University. (2021) McMaster University CUPE Local 3906, Unit 1 Mandatory Training Frequently Asked Questions. https://hr.mcmaster.ca/app/uploads/2021/08/Mosaic-TA-Training-Module-FAQs_FINAL.pdf

Woolgar, S. (1990) Configuring the user: The case of usability trials. The Sociological Review, 38(1, Suppl.), S58-S99.

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ETEC 511: Tipping Point, A Critical Case Study Proposal

Posted on by Jon K.

One of the observations I have made over the years, and particularly over the last decade at McMaster University, is that the LMS has mostly displaced the use of personal websites for teaching. The reasons for this are multifaceted and contextual to individual institutions, however, at McMaster, I have observed that it is most likely related to the course themes of Digital Labour (once in the LMS, it is easier, and less labourious to keep using the LMS and the labour of using the LMS can be offloaded to teaching assistants) and Attention (student preference is to have all learning in one place). However, there are secondary contributing factors, which would fall under Algorithms (enhanced ability to track and observe course activity) and Sustainability (not from an environmental standpoint, but a course sustainability practice). There is also a factor of culturalization – since 2011, LMS use has not been mandaked. The makeup of faculty has skewed younger and with that pre-LMS teaching has faded from institutional memory. In many cases, no one even thinks that teaching outside institutional systems is possible or even desirable.

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ETEC 511: Project Proposal

Posted on by Jon K.
For the Assignment in Word Format (DOCX): assignment1-projectproposal-group-adult-ed-ldsDownload

Checking UDL and Accessibility: A Checklist for Educators.

Most countries have adopted disability legislation that requires legally compliant interventions at the organizational level, including businesses, services, and educators, to accommodate the broadest possible range of human experience (Doyle, 2020).  We are proposing a Universal Design for Learning (UDL) checklist tool intended to help adult educators in any context examine learning materials that they develop to address accessibility and neurodivergent users. 

This tool will function in a branching decision tree to help educators determine if their learning objects have the affordances they need to accommodate all learners. The decision points will be supported with an explanation of how to employ UDL principles for that criteria and a rationale for why it is essential to support that factor, including some examples of specific (dis)abilities the factor supports.

Intended Users

This tool is designed for educators (designers, teachers, trainers, consultants) who create learning materials (digital or physical) for adult learners.

Setting Adult Learners Up for Success

We aim to enable adult educators to create learning materials that accommodate all facets of UDL, so the educational experience can be inclusive and accommodating to all learners.

One in five people has a neuro-difference, such as dyslexia, ADHD, autism, or anxiety disorders (Doyle, 2020). According to Statistics Canada, in a 2017 study, 14% of Canadians aged 25 to 64 with disabilities reported having at least a university qualification, compared with 27% of those without disabilities (Statistics Canada, 2019). These disabilities included neurodevelopmental condition(s) (NDC), a mental health condition (MHC), or both. These are diagnosed conditions, so the number of undiagnosed people is likely far higher. Those adults with undiagnosed learning (dis)abilities have multiple barriers to learning in place and often must look for accommodations in the workplace or post-secondary education. In fact, 43% of employees with (dis)abilities (and neuro-differences) do not feel comfortable approaching their employer to ask for accommodation (Business Disability Forum, 2020). We want to create a tool that supports educators when creating learning materials for all learners, regardless of ability, and mitigating the need for after-the-fact learning accommodations.

There are increasing resources for UDL principles; however, educators need to learn how to apply them in an organized, straightforward manner to determine whether their learning object/module/course meets UDL guidelines.

“The UDL framework is grounded in three principles:

●      Multiple means of representation – using various methods to present information and provide a range of means to support.

●      Multiple means of action and expression – providing learners with alternative ways to act skilfully and demonstrate what they know.

●  Multiple means of engagement – tapping into learners’ interests by offering choices of content and tools; motivating learners by offering adjustable levels of challenge.” (TEAL Center Staff, n.d.)

Our checklist will help educators accommodate the three UDL principles. Other resources list what UDL considers but do not provide the depth or breadth required for someone to design learning materials with all the principles in mind. Given that UDL is a newer approach, many educators are unfamiliar with its benefits and drawbacks. There is a lack of resources that provide this sort of support and an easy-to-access and use tool that provides guidance and awareness on the full range of learner abilities, particularly those with unrealized and unacknowledged learning disabilities. This tool will be helpful for new instructional designers and educators to acclimate them to UDL principles.

Creating an Interactive Decision Tree

We believe Twine will allow us to create branches for different aspects of UDL, be accessible to all educators and be easy to use. If there is an overlap between resources or rationale, we can link to the same resources without having to create them twice. Twine allows for the inclusion of videos and links to web resources, which allows us to address the multimodal framing of UDL within our design.

Our tool configures its users by determining what can be checked. Our project group selects what is essential from a UDL lens to be incorporated into learning materials, focusing on adults with unacknowledged learning disabilities. We aim to provide educators and designers with an easy-to-use tool that helps all adult learners, regardless of barriers or learning abilities.

UDL Checklist Items

In our tool considerations, we would like to include factors such as:

●  What devices might learners be using and what are their technical capabilities?

●  Have you considered different (dis)ability needs?

●  By making it accessible for one group, are you making it less accessible for others?

●  Have you considered inclusivity (language, font style and size, colour palette, etc.)?

●  Does the approach have an alternative method of delivery?

●  Does it provide appropriate and sufficient cognitive support (organizing clues, background information, scaffolding)?

●  Does this approach comply with ACR standards? Are there additional provincial compliance requirements?

●  Does the mode of assessment consider necessities and fairness (time constraints, presentation method, learner option, authenticity, supporting resources)?

Using Inclusion to Necessitate Usability

This tool is a checklist. One of the limiting factors of checklists is that we will have to determine what is included in the list and how that list is sequenced. Woolgar (1996) would consider this an element of configuring the user. This limitation makes the tool more usable and less overwhelming for practitioners new to UDL principles. Gee (2005) states that we learn best when we understand how things fit into a larger meaningful whole.  By reducing the broad scope of UDL to more manageable subtopics, it becomes easier to digest and learn about the benefits of UDL. Chunks have long been proposed as a basic organizational unit for human memory (Laird et al., 1984). Chunking is an essential strategy for learning complex subjects. Laird et al. (1984) demonstrate that a practice mechanism based on chunking can speed up task performance and may be capable of leading to more exciting forms of learning than just simply improving the speed of acquisition.

The output of Twine creates accessible objects delivered on the web. It requires low bandwidth and does not require significant computer processing power to operate, allowing people to access this tool from a desktop or mobile device regardless of location or operating bandwidth.

Determining Usability and Success

Using the usability specifications (as defined by Issa and Isaiah, p. 34) we will examine performance measures such as the responsiveness of the completed site (is there a significant delay from clicking on an item?) and preference measures from a target audience focus group to examine whether this checklist tool improves their understanding of UDL. If time allowed, a longitudinal study could be conducted to see how the covered UDL principles were recalled one year after the user introduced the checklist.

  

References

Are Mental Health and Neurodevelopmental Conditions Barriers to Postsecondary Access? (2019, February 19). Retrieved October 9, 2022, from https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11f0019m/11f0019m2019005-eng.htm

Business Disability Forum. (2020). The great big workplace adjustment survey: Exploring the experience and outcomes of workplace adjustments in 2019-20. Retrieved October 13, 2022, from https://businessdisabilityforum.org.uk/policy/the-great-big-workplace-adjustments-survey-2019-20/

Doyle, N. (2020). Neurodiversity at work: a biopsychosocial model and the impact on working adults. British Medical Bulletin. 135(1), 108-125. https://doi.org/10.1093/bmb/ldaa021

Gee, J. P. (2005). Learning by design: Good video games as learning machines. E-learning and Digital Media, 2(1), 5-16. https://doi.org/10.2304/elea.2005.2.1.5

Initiative, W. W. A. (n.d.). WCAG 2 Overview. Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). Retrieved October 15, 2022, from https://www.w3.org/WAI/standards-guidelines/wcag/

Issa, T., & Isaias, P. (2015). Usability and Human Computer Interaction (HCI). Sustainable Design, 19–36. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-6753-2_2

Laird, J. E., Rosenbloom, P. S., & Newell, A. (1984, August). Towards Chunking as a General Learning Mechanism. In AAAI (pp. 188-192).

TEAL Center Staff (n.d.). TEAL Center Fact Sheet No. 2: Fact Sheet: Universal Design for Learning. LINCS. Retrieved from https://lincs.ed.gov/state-resources/federal-initiatives/teal/guide/udl 

Woolgar, S. (1990, May). Configuring the User: The Case of Usability Trials. The Sociological Review, 38(1_suppl), 58–99. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-954x.1990.tb03349.x

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ETEC 511 – IP #3: Algorithms

Posted on by Jon K.

Option I: Content Prioritization

“At a time when state funding for public goods such as universities, schools, libraries, archives, and other important memory institutions is in decline in the US, private corporations are providing products, services and financing on their behalf. With these trade-offs comes an exercising of greater control over the information, which is deeply consequential for those already systematically oppressed…” (Noble, p. 123)

Think and respond to the following questions:

  • Explain in your own words what “content prioritization” (Noble, p. 156) means (give some examples) and how (in lay terms) content prioritization algorithms work. With control over the “largest digital repository in the world” (Noble, p. 187), how have Google’s content prioritization algorithms been “consequential for those already systematically oppressed”? How do they impact your professional life? (give specific examples and briefly discuss)
  • What are some ways PageRank impacts your personal life? (specific examples and briefly discuss) (How) can you impact PageRank? Explain.

Content prioritization essentially is a resorting algorithm based on a myriad of factors. In Google Search, it is based on things like location data, prior search history, demographic information about your account, and other personalization. While this might seem like a good and useful thing, it does often lead one down a rabbit hole. Google Search, like most sites, wants your attention. The more time you spend with it the better. The more searches, means that they can build a better profile of you and what you want to see. I will come back to that in a moment.

When people started figuring out how to improve their own sites search ranking, they started to manipulate link text to manipulate Google’s algorithm for search ranking. This lead to using potential misleading link text (the early internet history’s version of being Rick-Rolled) to mislead users through a process called Google Bombing. As these became passed around early social media, they also caused Google to rank them higher in priority based on the number of searches being run for the search term. The one that might be memorable was during the second Iraq War, anti-war groups made an effort to link “miserable failure” to the White House’s website. Typically, these Google Bombs were not long-lasting, as you can see from Google Search trends for the phrase “miserable failure”. However, their impact was.

The manipulation of search ranking was seen as a strategy from radical right groups (McSwiney in Devries, Bessant & Watts, 2021, p. 25) to access, recruit and radicalize users. The sheer volume of racist propaganda online is almost pervasive. If one of Google’s search algorithm key ranking criteria is based on volume of links, it is no wonder that racist, biased sites get pushed up the rankings. One of Noble’s arguments throughout the book is that while Google builds the algorithm that pushes certain sites to the top of the pile, they are not responsible for it (Noble, 2018). So, it follows when Google autocompletes a search query with a stereotypical response, that has an impact on the viewer – either reinforcing a negative view or potentially introducing self-doubt and the ranking algorithm every time it is clicked.

In my professional work, I often am searching websites for documentation about educational technology products. I am often working on a work account which has little to no demographic information, never search logged in, with no location technology able to be queried. Essentially, my work account is a bit like a burner account. So typically, no, I do not see any evidence of discrimination, however documentation does have discrimination built into it – the types of archetypes used, the images of people describe more about the company than many think. However, from a search perspective, I do not use Google autocomplete ever, I do not use Google as a sole search provider, I move around (Duck Duck Go and Bing are two suitable competitors), so that there isn’t much to give to one provider.

Back to the popularity contest that is PageRank, and attention. While I do not use Google exclusively, PageRank’s algorithm strategy is pretty pervasive amongst search. It is part of what was taught at Udacity’s big “build a search engine” MOOC (I completed this in 2012?) and is what Yandex and Bing use to scrape the web for links, and to count the number of links that point to a site with a set of keywords. It is a common strategy and would like yield common results – except you do not have the ranking algorithm component, but both ranking and link scraping work hand in hand. The first way that PageRank influences daily life is the reliance on what is popular over what is factual. I have seen this over and over, popular misconceptions – and how tales take over the reality of what happened. Sure, we have context for some of that (in that disadvantaged groups often do not get their stories told at all) but Google’s focus on popularity assumed (when PageRank was developed initially) that people are mostly truthful. Instead, 15 years later, it is less about people and more about how many resources can be deployed to increase site ranking, essentially privileging the wealthy (who are disproportionally white, heterosexual and male) and resourceful.

Well, one way to circumvent PageRank is to Google Bomb it to uselessness. Essentially fill it with obfuscated information. However, that only punishes you – because it makes it less useful to you. One other way to make PageRank be influential is to pay less attention to it and SIFT the sources. Go straight to the source rather than Google Search everything (the number of times I have seen someone search for the website, rather than just type the site address is more than I can count in the last decade). Use other search engines. Avoid giving attention to things that are false. Support platforms that do not combine personal data with search results.

References

Devries, M., Bessant, J., & Watts, R. (Eds.). (2021). Rise of the far right : Technologies of recruitment and mobilization. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Noble, S. (2018). Algorithms of Oppression : How Search Engines Reinforce Racism. NYU Press.

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ETEC 511 – IP #1: Users, Uses and Usability

Posted on by Jon K.

1. Formulate a conception of usability (based on the Issa and Isaias (2015) chapter on HCI and Usability). Use what you’ve learned about usability from that chapter—but you are not summarizing or repeating their ideas. Rather, you are setting out the idea of ‘usability’ you have put together from reading that chapter. Do NOT overly rely on quotes. And remember to use proper citation practices. If you are using text that is not your own, quote and cite it, including page numbers.

HCI (Human Computing Interaction) is essentially a translation service, in that it attempts to communicate between a machine and a human the purpose of the machine. Usability is the measurement of the success of that translation. If a piece of software or website is usable, then it is described as intuitive, easy to use, simple. To be usable, a designer must examine the functionality, efficiency, effectiveness of the software and take into consideration the user’s needs, context and satisfaction. (Issa and Isaias, 2015, p. 30) While this article was written only seven years ago, it seems like the authors only consider positive usage of technology and do not consider, or consider deeply, the idea of designing around bad actors. Wiegers contends that you should design around bad actors, and to prevent users from possibly misconstruing the information conveyed – in that usability should factor in not only the positive uses of a system, but also how it can be misused. (Wiegers, 2021)

2. Then, think about what is missing from this conception, from a specifically educational perspective, and on that basis try and patch together a reasonably grounded and defensible conception of educational usability.

While usability is a key concept in designing learning – especially the examination of context, and user/student needs, it is missing two other key components. While Issa and Isaias (2015) suggest that the user factors in HCI include motivation, enjoyment and experience level (p. 28) it does not adequately address cultural factors of the user/student. While culture will contribute to levels of access and equity, these factors are often great indicators of success in an educational context. This framework is very much built on western ways of knowing and draws from behaviourist theories of development. For instance, when the designed system works, the user is rewarded (by receiving information, having the computer complete a task, etc.). There is no real opportunity to design for remediation and it appears to have a very binary approach to solving complex problems.

3. Revisit Woolgar’s (challenging but rewarding!) account of “usability gone wrong,” which demonstrates several ways a usability study ended up configuring ‘users,’ thereby undermining the usefulness of usability. Identify and discuss 2 of Woolgar’s examples.

At the crux of Woolgar’s arguments of configuring the user during usability trials it was particularly interesting how he suggested that physical location of user testing is a factor in the results of the testing. Of course, when conducting research, you try to control those variables, and it is very clear (to me) that usability testing is far less rigorous than controlled, double-blind research. However, Woolgar (1990, p. 78) recounts how recalling computer features at Brunel University was different than when in the Stratus offices. If we take this as a common occurrence across users, then how we interact with computers will be different based on physical location. So, it follows that bringing users into a testing area to gather feedback on usability will be different than if the device were provided in their usual operating environment.

A second instance of configuring the users is the selection of who is eligible to participate in user testing (Woolgar, 1990, p. 83) – in this case it is noted that often early adopters, and people who are predisposed to like the product would be ideal testers. However, it is entirely unlikely that these people would provide you a new user’s perspective, or someone who was predisposed to not like computers, or be unfamiliar with computers. In fact, the opposite would likely be the case – users who were familiar and comfortable with computers. It only follows that someone who was familiar with computers would be at least more capable of using them, having a concept of what to do with them.

4. Finally, discuss the two excerpts quoted at the top of this IP, that have been drawn from your readings for this unit, and discuss differences you see in these 2 positions on the uses of usability.

Issa and Isaias (2015) are suggesting that user testing is a feedback mechanism to further improve software and hardware and Woolgar (1990) is suggesting that user testing is a confirmation mechanism – to confirm the assumptions made in designing software and hardware. I see both of these linked to a philosophical debate as to the role of computers in human’s lives – whether humans control computers, or computers determine the actions of humans – and the truth is somewhere in the middle.  It is dependent on your role with the computer. Computer programmers control what is possible and what is not within a game, or website. Human users subvert those possibilities through speedruns and other bending of the rules that humans put in place in the first place. Usability in the early days of computing would never have envisioned some of the ways people would have used computers.

References

Issa, T., & Isaias, P. (2015). Usability and human computer interaction (HCI) In Sustainable Design (pp. 19-35). Springer.

Woolgar, S. (1990). Configuring the user: The case of usability trials. The Sociological Review, 38(1, Suppl.), S58-S99.

Wiegars, K. (2021). Designing around bad actors and dangerous actions. UX Collective. https://uxdesign.cc/designing-around-bad-actors-and-dangerous-actions-8fc7984c510d

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ETEC 511 – Truth and Reconciliation

Posted on by Jon K.

The project brief was to find a document and explore how it portrays indigenous and First Nations peoples – and while it might have been easy to pick something historical, where you would judge the historical figure outside of the time, I thought that I would take on something from my lifetime.

The document I chose: People of Native Ancestry, A Resource Guide for the Primary and Junior Divisions (students).

I chose this document for a few reasons. One key reason being that it is a document from my lifetime and I certainly would have experienced the suggestions of this document from 1975 in my early elementary schooling experience (I started kindergarten in 1978). I am curious to understand the thinking of how teachers would have been instructed to teach about indigenous peoples during the time, and how my experience and admittedly limited understanding of the local Six Nations people growing up might have been reflected in this document. I really do not recall any of the lessons, or even if they were delivered.

This document serves two purposes. One, to help teachers understand and teach people with Indigenous ancestry and two, to teach “[a]s all Ontario children grow in their knowledge of native peoples, both native and non-native people will benefit. Tolerance in a multi-cultural society is built upon active participation in the process of learning about cultures other than one’s own.” (p. 8).

In searching the document the following terms were used to describe indigenous people(s):

IndianIndigenousAboriginalFirst NationsNativeNon-Native
619411

Specific Nation Mentions:

Cree: 9

Mohawk: 6

Ojibwe: 10

Algonquin: 1

One strong theme that arose throughout the writing is the othering of indigenous peoples. They were to be recognized as distinct, but the text treats indigenous people as if there was little to no history between indigenous and white people (outside of the foreward by Chief Dan George of the Burrard Indian Reserve, and the Appendix A, which spans 2 and a half pages -with a paragraph of veritable whitewashing of residential schools, which likely some parents might have experienced). How can one attempt to integrate into a “multi-cultural” society without at least a deeper understanding of history, and the injustice of the history which had been happening for (at that time) hundreds of years, is in modern context, unthinkable.

One other theme, and it is probably a key thing to note, this being a government document, it has chosen to use Native rather than any other language. Indian came up as part of a historical quote, or in the context of naming an act of Parliament or group. In fact Native was the most common reference, and when other children were mentioned they were non-Native. The act of constantly comparing, as if non-Native children might not have their own complexities, histories, familial demands, and approaches to learning and authority. There was a subtle, but present, holding up of (ostensibly white male) children as ideal, and Native as other. In many ways, the othering that was done throughout the document, undermines the front-and-centering of indigenous children by acknowledging their indigenousness. It is definitely a subtle thing, but definitely present.

ETEC 520 – Planning and Managing eLearning

Posted on by Jon K.

Taking this course was a mistake. Well, for me it was. You might need the information. There were a few moments of learning, but for me, who plans and manages “elearning” (whatever that means) as a daily activity, the course was frustrating as it lacked the nuance of the day-to-day, it placed the institution at the centre of the planning when in reality, in my experience this is not planned at the institutional level – it requires a grassroots approach for many years before the institution codifies and standardizes it. The assignments were almost too focused on institutional needs (and I understand why they went this route with the design) – but in all likelihood, only a few of your graduates are going to be at that institutional level to influence change and by the time they get there, Tony Bates’ book will be horribly out of date and the lessons learned will not apply. I also never really got into a rhythm with this course. I’d literally read the readings on Monday, then think for four or five days, I’ve got to do the discussion…. Some weeks I couldn’t even do that. This course, for whatever reason broke my spirit. I’m not egotistical enough to suggest I know it all, I don’t. I think I never was able to connect the readings to the assignments, and the things that we were to do in the class didn’t ever really gel for me. Some of the gaps in the content were glaring for me as well.

In one assignment there’s an elearning readiness check – which assumes that the institution wants to engage in elearning at all! They can’t be ready if they don’t want to do it…. Then the tools that we could use to “assess” readiness were outdated and almost laughable. There was no mention of diversity, equity, accessibility or privacy in any of the assessment tools. Security was an afterthought. Interoperability, standards… those were not addressed as well. Cost was reduced to a line-item. Those are requirements in 2022, as in not optionals or nice to have, but as an institution you must look at technology and learning through those lens’. For a course to just skip over these issues is a bit disheartening.

Even if the assessment tools didn’t have those present – it’s easy to build that into the course by redesigning it to instead have the student design the readiness tool (which then releases the faculty from the dating of the material and the readings can be updated without requiring re-writes of the assessments) and build common factors through discussion and then design a “rubric” for assessment. Make that your first assignment. The second assignment is to look at implementation plans that are available. Analyze them for how your rubric might apply. This rubric could also be used for an RFP like scenario outside of the curriculum. Then re-write the rubric to address any gaps seen in implementation plans. Show some other rubrics. Critique the rubric as your final piece. Or have a reflective piece. Then you have a student-driven, student-centred course.

Admittedly I coasted through and put little effort into this. So I did the required minimum, slowly faded from discussions (which I hate when they’re so structured and stilted and non-organic). This wasn’t a fault of the course, it’s well designed, and was delivered by a facilitator that seemed to care (I would write truly cared, but I don’t know if that’s true or not). I, as a student, did not care. And for that I am sorry somewhat, because I should’ve been able to find a moment or a spot to hold up as worthwhile, but I couldn’t find that spot. So in some ways I failed this course, not marks-wise, but failed to be a good contributor. I was really disheartened by the lack of modern resources. I was really disappointed that this class, that I was honestly looking forward to at the beginning, was really frustrating for me. I can taste how close this is to a useful class for the modern context, but it just falls short. In a little bit of hindsight, it’s probably just a course that’s been in need of a refresh and probably is due up for a change shortly (fingers crossed!).

Oh, and to top it all off, I reused an APA cover sheet from a previous course, and the first time I copied it I didn’t know how to spell the facilitator’s name, so I gave it shot – as a placeholder – with the intention of correcting it later. I never did. To compound my utter stupidity, I submitted it, not once but twice, because the second time I just reused the same cover sheet and didn’t even bother checking. I did pull it together for the last submission, and sent off a mea culpa letter to the prof just to let them know I’m an idiot.

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ETEC 500 – Research Methodology In Education

Posted on by Jon K.

This is the beginning of my Master’s work at UBC in the Master of Educational Technology program – which culminates in a project. I’m not sure where that will end up – I would (despite my media background) prefer to do some length of writing around digital literacy, information seeking behaviour online and informal learning communities (and why they are effective). I decided to take ETEC 500 first because it is a core course, and required, and it would provide the biggest challenge to me as it’s one of the few things in the curriculum that I feel is somewhat unknown to me. Like, let’s face it, I’ve been at some level of LMS administration since 2008, supporting eLearning since 2001, and overseeing a team of educational technology folks for just under a year. I’ve read most of the texts that are offered as readings, I know some of the authors’ work quite well. I’ve seen some of the authors speak multiple times, so I’m familiar with the arguments they will put forth. In scanning the curriculum, I’m thinking that I’ll have to be mindful of the amount of commentary with my history, experience as that will limit discussion honestly.

AND that’s why research is a good place for me to start because the novice brain I bring to the subject matter will be truly a novice brain. I love the academic rigour that research demands. I suspect that where I fell down is getting too bogged down in my own machinations and not being clear enough with outlining my thinking about a subject. While I did well, it was hard work. It will be interesting to see how this sticks with me, and while I really enjoyed the process of taking apart research papers to see what makes them tick.

I learned a whole lot about qualitative methodologies – and understand better why education (or at least progressive education) papers typically use quantitative – qualitative are often structured assuming that there is one, or a few, reasons for learning happening. Whereas, qualitative tend to be better at understanding the context of learning. I am absolutely much more interested in qualitative. Maybe that comes from my history of developing media objects – and the subtleties of those projects. Subtlety requires a bit more finesse, and a well designed media bit has some subtlety, whether it be in framing the subject or just working within constraints. A lot of the similarities between the two are immediately apparent to me, working creatively in a media and working with data is fundamentally similar.

The fact that it was unknown territory, and procedurally all different than any previous online course I had taken, was so refreshing, so new. Novelty will wear off, from the program and from the course of studies. Not everything will be new. Dealing with that and making it interesting for me will be a sub-challenge for this whole Master’s. I wonder how folks who have been professionals who have gone back to school for higher degrees in the same discipline manage it?

NOTE: I wrote this back in July. 2021, so I dated it as such, but decided to make this public so that I can add it to my (future) portfolio.

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