Blended Content and Assignments

After reading this past week's reading assignment, key points of blended learning activities were realized from a holistic perspective. Using my current course development of CYC2001 Introduction to Cybercrime, I will attempt to apply the key points gained from the reading for adapting to the upcoming modules. Next, I will offer ideas on technology-integration within CYC2001, as learning activity types were discussed within the reading. Finally, a conclusion is offered for resolving my thoughts and perspectives with the coupling of technology and learning activities.

In designing effective modules for online and face-to-face interactions, focusing on learning activities was emphasized using three different approaches: direct, indirect, and online. Applying a direct learning method to CYC2001, students may gain new knowledge by witnessing hack attacks in real-time via a security emergency center or antivirus third party vendor. If a real-time experience is not available, simulating events of cyber hacking and attacks within an internal network may offer links between course concepts and observational experiences. Furthermore, role playing may also add beneficial knowledge linkages for students during in class simulations.

For considering an indirect approach for learning activities, the delivery of case studies within the classroom would be an ideal method due to the connecting of current events and learning objectives within the course. Another indirect approach related to case studies would be the offering of personal or third party stories of examples of cybecrime for students to engage other students from others' experiences. Even though online gaming was listed under indirect approaches in the reading assignment, one online integration possibility is the delivery of an online game for students to experience. From last semester's course on instructional game development, I developed a prototype cybersecurity game involving a simple network topology, a user, and a virus which infects computers on the network. With this type of learning tool, an online game may enhance the learning experiences of students because of its adaptive nature and the enticement for learners to play for fun. No matter which learning activity is implemented, all students will be asked to reflect upon their learning experience after each module's interaction within discussion forums representing a communicative method. In addition, learners may develop mindmap diagrams of the their newly acquired knowledge for producing or remixing their knowledge signifying a productive learning approach to blended learning activities.

In sum, integrating technology and learning activities is a core requirement for not only my upcoming course in cybercrime, but also all future courses. Offering learners the opportunities to engage in multiple interactive ways during a course is a high priority for this instructor for enhancing overall course delivery and increasing the level of engagement. From the reading assignment, indirect, direct, and online were three approaches which were realized for developing face-to-face interaction and online interaction within blended courses. Furthermore, three types of learning activities were discovered for implementing in my immediate course delivery: adaptive, communicative, and productive.

--Corey

Blended Assessments of Learning

In an effort to develop a blended course involving online and face-to-face interactions, formal and informal assessments will be implemented within my upcoming course, introduction to cybercrime. For formal assessments, three student quizzes are planned for my introductory course covering topics on cybercrime. Each quiz will assess students' understandings of the concepts within the first three modules on the first quiz, modules four through six on the second quiz, and the final three modules, seven through nine, on the final examination. A time limit will be set for each formal assessment along with the opportunity to retake the assessment a second time, if the student so chooses. Online essays in the form of discussion postings will also be utilized each week for allowing student-to-student interactions. In addition, I will also provide feedback to students' to build upon their critical thinking by posing alternative questions according to their posted reasonings. A quantitative assessment will be used for assessing discussion points as follows: one point for minimal effort, two points for below average effort, three points for an average effort, four points for an above average effort, and finally, five points for a superior effort and response.

For informal assessments two methods will be utilized during the cybercrime course, one-sentence summary and student-generated test questions. However, these two assessments will be implemented during face-to-face interactions rather than online which is in contrast to the suggested method from this week's reading assignment. During classroom sessions, time will be allotted for students to think about the current topic and synthesize a one-sentence summary. I will then randomly read these out loud in class for the students' to comment on the statements for drawing on alternative perspectives regarding the current topic in class. The other method of informal assessment will challenge students to develop three to five ideal test question for the final exam. From this method, students will not only benefit from the direct interaction of the subject matter, but will also gain valuable insight into the final exam which should remove an effort to memorize content for the sake of regurgitating it later on the final exam.

In sum, from this week's assigned reading I identified assessment strategies, formal and informal, for implementing withing my upcoming blended course on cybercrime. First, formal assessments involving quizzes and essays posting in online discussion forums will be assigned to students for evaluating using a quantitative grading rubric. Second, informal assessments, one-sentence summary and student-generated test questions, will be implemented within the classroom for building face-to-face interactions and higher levels of engagements with students. By implementing these two types of blended assessments, the hope for new opportunities of interactions between instructor and students should be a positive reinforcement during course delivery while enhancing the potential for students to build their knowledge of cybercrime topics and issues.

--Corey

Blended Interactions

After reading this week's Blendkit2014 reading assignment, several thoughts came to mind regarding methods of interactions between an instructor and students during a blended course, specifically for a course I am currently developing, CYC2001 Introduction to Cybercrime. From my past instructional experiences, adult learners in real estate education generally require additional guidance with concepts and principles since most are new to the industry. Furthermore, the majority, if not all, real estate learners are merely present to receive their licensure for moving onto residential or commercial brokerage work. Because real estate educational requirements are minimally set by state commissions, learners' knowledge of real estate concept may vary greatly, in addition to their technical competence. With this in mind, identifying learners' experiences within a specific knowledge domain may play an important role in the decision making process for selecting a blended interaction model as discussed in this week's reading assignment.

Three specific interactions models were found most relevant from the reading for implementation purposes. First, the atelier learning model was presented as a method for instructors to observe and interact with learners similar to how art instructors observe and interact within their art studio classrooms. This interaction method could potentially work for observing posted discussion question and answers within an online forum discussing issues and topics on cybercrime. Second, fisher's interaction method for continuously establishing connections between concepts draws similar patterns to network administrators who connect new devices within an organization's network. Fisher's model of forming connections was received as an ideal method for integrating with my upcoming course, especially for connecting issues in cyberattacks to methods in preventing future attacks. The third method that may offer beneficial learning experiences was the concierge learning, a method for directing learners to resources previously unknown. This interaction method would seem the most ideal since real estate learners may not have been exposed to prevention measures in cyberattacks, but also unaware of other cybercrime topics such as phishing, viruses, and physical asset attacks.

In sum, all three interaction models will at some point be implemented within my upcoming cybercrime course. For online instruction, the atelier and fisher models seem most likely to be implemented online since discussions can be easily monitored online while offering URL links to additional resources for learners so that they are able to create new learning associations. In contrast, the concierge interaction would best play a role within the classroom during presentations for creating new in class discussions, covering case studies, and possibly for integrating within role playing situations for enhancing learning experiences. After implementing, evaluating how successful these three interaction methods is also a key element for revising or eliminating altogether from future blended courses.

--Corey

Understanding Blended Learning

This summer I am enrolled in my second Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) offered by UCF and EDUCAUSE. Blendkit 2014 is the name of the course and my goal for enrolling is to apply blended instructional concepts and principles to the ongoing development of real estate courses I am currently designing. From my past learning and instructional experiences, there seems to be a gap in the effort to develop a hybrid instructional approach in the real estate sector, especially in residential. Salesperson courses tend to be either face-to-face or entirely online. However, applying a blended approach to the delivery of residential salespersons and broker salespersons courses not only seem to be likely ideal course candidates, but ultimately improve learning experiences of pre-licensed students.

After reading the initial chapter assignment, my understanding of what a blended course was confirmed by the definition given that a blended course is comprised of the traditional face-to-face instruction and online instruction. From the stated benefits of blended learning, the most important benefit that registered with me, as a current student myself, was the additional benefit of flexibility. Traditional instruction has been and still is the prime instructional mode for delivering real estate salesperson courses, even though e-Learning instruction is well established in other industries. My theory for this resistance is that the real estate industry is quite often constrained and restricted by older and traditional practitioners as well as instructors which in effect causes not only the adoption of technology to be slower, but also new approaches to implement within the industry. Annual reports routinely state that the average age of the practicing residential salesperson is 55 or older which reaffirms my theory each year.

For better understanding development approaches for blended courses, several interesting points were made within the designing section. In particular, the concept of geographically distributed came up which is an important aspect for my development since future learners will be dispersed through out the state of Florida and eventually nationally. Again, flexible learning was brought up during the planning process of delivery. This is another interesting point for relating to real estate since the delivery of salesperson courses tend to be very deliberate in their linear, systematic approach of instructing towards the exam which is fully endorsed by state real estate commissions. Near the end of the design section, the topic of models or frameworks for developing learning courses was discussed. From my most recent research on interoperability and reusability of learning management systems, ontology development applied to e-Learning is a new research interest of mine and may extend well to the development of a blended real estate course. An ontological approach applied to blended course development may become an effective method for developing dynamic courseware along with a graphical solution for eventually establishing a knowledge base system for future courseware development. In sum, I plan to apply early concepts of blended learning for developing a blended real estate course while using an ontology tool called Protege for testing in Moodle, an open source learning management system.

--Corey

Spring 2014 Graduate Courses

This spring semester I am currently taking two courses at UCF. To begin the new year, I was admitted into the Instructional Design and Technology (IDT) Master Program within the Education and Human Performance College. With a concentration in e-learning, my goal is to complete the program within three years while appling concepts, principles, and theories directly to course development for the Global Real Estate And Technology University (GR8U) where I will instruct continuing education and eventually, licensing courses. This will be my second master's degree from UCF with my sights set on additional advanced degrees in the near future.

Currently, I am enrolled in the following courses:

• EME 6062 Research in Instructional Technology
• EME 6614 Instructional Game Design in Training and Education

--Corey

Telecommuting Contract

With telecommuting in the news, my human resources course covered the topic of telecommuting for nonprofits and public organizations. Our module assignment was to develop a telecommuting contract for future staff members. I chose to create a contract for an adjunct elearning instructor teaching for the GR8U.

Below is the mindmap I created for the telecommuting contract assignment:

--Corey

Filling the Void in Real Estate Education

The educational requirements for becoming a licensed real estate salesperson is low, very low. In the state of Florida, the minimum educational requirement is a high school diploma. Then again, this is well known by everyone due to the fact when there's an uptick in the housing sector, many attempt to sit for their respective state licensing exams to hopefully becoming residential agents. But, the problem is the licensing exam only covers the bare minimum for actual real estate knowledge and relative business concepts.

To thwart this void, I began researching missing areas not covered by the residential salesperson exam. The goal is provide additional education to those salespeople who need continuing education credits and to those who just want to increase their general knowledge. The courses will be online and use e-learning type methodologies.

For the first course, I am developing CRM1000 Introduction to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) in Real Estate. This course will explore theoretical concepts pertaining to the CRM value chain, the customer portfolio and retaining customers just to name a few areas. The key to the course is that the course material will remain theoretical in nature rather than a how-to with specificity. The benefit of this approach is relevancy and the ability to apply learning concepts to a variety of business activities using a vendor's CRM software solution since the course content abstracts proprietary solutions. Having said this, in the future I may develop a CRM course covering a specific solution such as Oracle CRM, Salesforce or SugarCRM.

Besides content modules, a syllabus will accompany the course for students to read and understand the course direction along with a required textbook, Customer Relationship Management by Francis Buttle. The current plan is offer multiple, two credit courses with a bundled version of eight or ten credits which offers students a choice of learning paths and tuition expenses. CRM1000 will be the first of many "missing" courses to improve the body of knowledge known as real estate as well as students' learning requirements within real estate.

--Corey

Continuing Education Course Development

From my research and and recent REEA conference trip, I realized a lack of technical and business type courses exist for real estate salespeople needing continuing education (CE) credits. The usual real estate CE courses cover ethics, law or other selling topics, however, my research shows other possible topics could be just as popular and important. But, the key to new course development is to remain theoretical in nature rather than developing a how to be successful salesperson course which would not be approved by any real estate state commission.

So this past month I began reading and researching a new topic for eventual CE course development. Customer Relationship Management is currently under development with associated course textbooks to accompany the online course. Using Moodle, I intend to publish this course and future courses online using e-learning methods and features. My goal is to have a beta version of the CRM course published online by the end of the month while submitting a course application to the Florida DBPR for CE approval. More CE courses will eventually be developed using this theoretical model along with applying real world use cases using specific software applications such as SalesForce and Google Apps.

--Corey