WEEK #4 Summary and suggestions
LMs evaluation introduction
Welcome to week 4 of our LMS evaluations. This week’s focus was on accessibility. Accessibility is critical in our selection of an LMS because not only are there legal obligation but more importantly it is the right thing to do. As you will see in the explanations and screenshots shown below I tested several features to ensure that we will be able to deliver accessible content for our associates with disabilities and special needs. This week I have included videos explaining why accessibility is important how the two systems ensure the highest quality when it comes to this important topic. As always, I will close out the page with my suggestion for the week based on this topic.
LMS 1 - D2l lms evaluation
MODIFY DROPBOX ASSIGNMENT WITH DIFFERENTIATED RELEASE CONDITIONS
D2l has a very easy to use option for creating different deadlines and other options within the dropbox feature. Providing a student with additional time to complete his/her assignment was as simple as clicking “Add students” and adding the additional time. I liked the option to edit this selection as well. Once you added a conditional time for a student, you could easily edit the information right from the dropbox assignment details tab. |
MODIFY QUIZ WITH DIFFERENTIATED RELEASE CONDITIONS
D2l has a very easy to use option for creating different deadlines and other options within the quiz feature. Just like the dropbox feature, adding accessibility options to quizzes is as easy as clicking “Add student” and choosing the option. The available option for quizzes include changing the start and end date of the assignment, providing a different time for completion, customizing the grace period and the ability to allow for late submissions to be graded. |
PROVIDING ALTERNATIVE LEARNING MATERIALS BY UPLOAD YOUTUBE VIDEO W/CC
Adding alternative learning materials was as simple as clicking "add" and pasting the info. The difficult part about this was finding the right video that contained CC and was appropriate for class. Having the ability to add multimedia information to our lessons is very beneficial. It makes the lesson more interesting for the students and allows the facilitator to provide the class with a different perspective. This is an important feature if we want to remain relevant to our associates since more and more industries adopt a micro learning strategy. Videos allow for short, quick bursts of information to be shared in a meaningful way. |
USING AN ACCESSIBLE HTML TEMPLATE
HTML Templates are a great way to design a course. Specifically for our new instructors, HTML templates are a great way to ensure that the courses they create are visually appealing without requiring much work on their part. The only part of this assignment was difficult was ensuring that I loaded the right template and that I linked to the correct file. The process was a simple file upload from my computer to D2L. I would strongly advise that we use a template approach for our courses to ensure a consistent look and feel for all assignments. Done correctly this could also make it easy to update the look and feel based on the season’s focus. |
LMS REVIEWS BY ACCESSIBILITY ORGANIZATIONS
As I mentioned in the beginning having accessible course content is very important. In the video below, you will see just how important this is and you will see D2L in action with a screen reader. Please pay close attention to the student in the video as she shares how she uses the screen reader and why it is important that the content be set-up in the correct way for her. This is a great example of what the right set-up could mean for us.
As I mentioned in the beginning having accessible course content is very important. In the video below, you will see just how important this is and you will see D2L in action with a screen reader. Please pay close attention to the student in the video as she shares how she uses the screen reader and why it is important that the content be set-up in the correct way for her. This is a great example of what the right set-up could mean for us.
lms2 - Canvas by instructure lms evaluation
MODIFY DROPBOX ASSIGNMENT WITH DIFFERENTIATED RELEASE CONDITIONS
Canvas provides an easy way to add additional deadlines for students based on their individual needs. To assign a different deadline for a student based on his/her needs simply click “Add” and choose the student and the appropriate deadline. This feature could be made even more effective if the students who need additional time were placed in groups based on the additional time they needed for assignments. This feature will make it very easy for the instructors to customize the students learning experience. |
MODIFY QUIZ WITH DIFFERENTIATED RELEASE CONDITIONS
Just as with the dropbox assignment, Canvas allows you to easily add a different deadline for students on quizzes. However, there is not an option to specify a specific time for completion on the edit options section. To accomplish this you will need to create a copy of the quiz for students who need additional time to complete it. This would be a good best practice to share if we decide to go with Canvas, since this would be much easier to do in the beginning of setting up the course. |
PROVIDING ALTERNATIVE LEARNING MATERIALS BY UPLOAD YOUTUBE VIDEO W/CC
Multimedia is the difference between a course and a really great course. Adding additional media provides the students a with a better sense of engagement and prevent course burn out. Since many of the lessons we will be creating are required ones, it is important that we make the learning experiences fun and engaging. With more and more of our workforce coming from college/university learning environments it is important that we are staying in-line with higher education’s approach to learning. This will allow our associates to more quickly adapt to learning within our environment. Canvas makes adding videos and other multimedia options very easy for the facilitator. All that is needed is the embed code, which can be easily found on YouTube’s share options. |
USING AN ACCESSIBLE HTML TEMPLATE
Canvas did not have an easy to use HTML Template uploader that I could find. I was able to create my own template using the Paragraph indicators. This will not be easy to remember for our facilitators, so we may run in to some trouble with compliance. The page that I created, while technically correct for accessibility standard, was not very visually appealing. Having a template that I could upload would make this process much simpler. |
LMS REVIEWS BY ACCESSIBILITY ORGANIZATIONS
Ensuring that our LMS is accessible is very important. In the video, you will see highlights of why this is important, how Canvas ensures its accessibility and how one user uses the features. I chose to display a video that discusses the feature of accessibility since this is a very new topic for me. Accessibility options should be one of the heavier factors when we make the decision of which LMS to choose.
Ensuring that our LMS is accessible is very important. In the video, you will see highlights of why this is important, how Canvas ensures its accessibility and how one user uses the features. I chose to display a video that discusses the feature of accessibility since this is a very new topic for me. Accessibility options should be one of the heavier factors when we make the decision of which LMS to choose.
lms weekly recommendations
Based on this week's activities D2L is the preferred option for our new LMS system. Both systems allowed me to complete the tasks needed to evaluate accessibility; however, D2L provided more accessibility options than Canvas. Specifically, D2L had all of the options to customize a course based on accessibility standards right where you would expect them. In Canvas, you had to navigate to several different places to create the needed accessibility options. In D2L most of these options where an available in the next tab on the page or near the bottom of the main page.