One of the ways I challenged myself during this course was to step outside of my comfort zone by exploring different technologies that could be used for writing centers and online teaching. Both programs I tinkered with, H5P and TechSmith Knowmia, had been praised for their accessibility features, which intrigued me. While it turned out that Knowmia was much easier to use than H5P, they both offered exciting potential and helped me to push and develop my theory of online literacy instruction (OLI).
Proposal: H5P for the Writing Center
H5P is a content authoring tool with dozens of activities that users can choose from to create interactive eLearning options. Some of the options are comprehensive, offering the ability to create an entire lesson from start to finish with interactive elements throughout. Many of the activities, though, are individual quizzes, activities, and games that could be incorporated into bigger lessons.The appeal of H5P is that it an affordable way for teachers and tutors to create engaging, interactive content for their students. While the program does have a learning curve, there are step-by-step tutorials for each type of content and an active community of users happy to assist with troubleshooting.
Writing centers could create quizzes, games, and low-stakes activities for their websites or online writing labs that would allow students to practice skills related to writing. For example, there is a memory game that could be set up to help students match terms and definitions and drag-and-drop activities that could be used for sorting information into appropriate categories. For tutor training, there are branching scenarios and interactive videos that could allow them to practice mock tutoring sessions.
Researching H5P and then using it to develop content for the GSOLE course and this ePortfolio allowed me to explore how designing eLearning content can add an exciting new dimension to online literacy instruction (OLI). It also helped me remember the importance of balancing solid pedagogy with exciting technology.
My proposal for a ROLE tech review of H5P can be read here:
Professional Development: Knowmia
TechSmith Knowmia is another tool that has terrific potential for helping writing centers diversify their offering of resources for students. Its main functionality is as a screencasting and video recording program, allowing instructors or tutors to record themselves, presentation slides, or even a paper. The program is very simple to use, with the added benefit of storing all of the users’ videos in a convenient and private online library.
One of the nicest features that Knowmia offers is that it automatically generates captions for recorded content, and it has an easy-to-use editor for fixing the occasional captioning errors. That makes it much easier for instructors and tutors alike to ensure any materials they create are accessible. Additionally, there is even an option to add quiz questions periodically throughout the videos that students would need to answer as a quick knowledge check before the video continued.
Between its ease-of-use and accessibility features, I think Knowmia has great potential to give writing centers many options for tutor training, student resources, and even asynchronous tutoring. I appreciated how engaging with my professional community through the initial training I attended not only connected me with colleagues who shared my interest in pedagogically sound online education but also introduced me to a new tool that has already proved useful to the writing center.
You can read my full overview and reflection here: