Project 1: Static Multimedia Tutorial Analysis

This Static Multimedia Tutorial combines text and visuals to serve as a job aid for adjunct instructors in higher education. The applications that I used were Snip & Sketch and PowerPoint. The step-by-step tutorial is available as PDF.

Description of Technical Task:

The technical task of the tutorial is setting up the grade center in the learning management system Blackboard. The tutorial consists of five subtasks that are done in the order specified in the tutorial to create a functional grade center. All five subtasks are included because each subtask is dependent on the others to enter and display student grades effectively. The intended audience for the tutorial is adjunct instructors, typically retirees or new professionals, who have not previously used Blackboard and may be unfamiliar with calculating weighted grades based on specified student learning outcomes.

Learning Outcomes for Task:

Before Week 2 of classes ends, instructors will set up their Blackboard Grade Centers to calculate overall weighted grade and grades on each student learning outcome. Instructors' mentors will test the grade center setup. To do this, instructors will:

• remove unwanted categories from the Grade Center.
• add categories.
• create a weighted column to display cumulative grade.
• add weighted columns to display grades for each student learning outcome.
• create a grade column.

Analysis of Multimedia and Contiguity Principles: 

Clark and Mayer (2016) recommend that instruction deliver information through words and graphics and that designers should consider both during planning and development (p. 70). This tutorial demonstrates the multimedia principle through intentional use of representational graphics, organizational graphics, and text to guide instructors through the process of setting up a grade center. Text with directions or notes accompanies annotated representational graphics, screen captures from Blackboard, and organizational graphics, tables containing text information to be typed or selected in the Blackboard windows. The static nature of the representational graphics allows learners to study the steps at their own pace and to make connections between them (p. 81). The tutorial includes only graphics that facilitate the completion of the task.

Slide with representational and organizational graphics

This tutorial demonstrates the contiguity principle, that words and their accompanying graphics should be presented together, through placing text and graphics physically close to each other. Although the instructions for each subtask of the tutorial span several slides, the total number of steps is noted and each graphic and its text are kept together. This keeps the learner from having to navigate between slides while learning about a step of the subtask. In a revision of the slide below, I might use lines to connect the text directions to the relevant part of the screen cast for greater alignment (Clark & Mayer, 2016, p. 92). In addition, I intentionally wrote the text as concisely as possible so that it would fit on the sides of the slides or layered over graphics instead of at the bottom of the slides (p. 98). The integrated text and graphics of the tutorial limits unnecessary scrolling and keeps learners focused on each step of the task.

Slide with text placed near representational graphics

Reference: 

Clark, R. C., & Mayer, R. E. (2016). E-learning and the science of instruction: Proven guidelines for consumers and designers of multimedia learning (4^th ed.). Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119239086