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[The appropriate heading level is shown after each heading. Of course, you wouldn't do that on a "real" page. ]

Designing Online Courses (H2)

Online courses attract a wide student diversity due to its convenient nature. In an online environment, there may not be an opportunity to meet your students "face-to-face." Do you know who your students are? Their abilities? Even if you could see your students, for example, would you be able to tell if he or she needed video captioning? Probably not.

Design for student success. You'll never know who will be needing additional support. It's much easier to initially design with intention, rather than build your course to support diverse learners in the middle of a semester!

Where Do I Begin in Designing? (H2)

When designing courses, there are two major considerations:

-Design a course to provide students enough time to complete assignments

-Give yourself time to design a course that benefits all learners

Is There Enough Time for My Students? (H2)

Think about how timelines impact student. Analyze your audience: how and when do your students access course material? Online courses provide certain degrees of flexibility, which may appeal to students working a full or part-time job, a parent, and also taking multiple courses at a time. Consider designing your course to give students ample time to work on projects or assignments. You can also help remind students of due dates with announcements and prompting students to visit the Course Summary in the Syllabus. Also, make sure students have time to respond to discussions posts. Also, for students who need additional time to complete a quiz, Canvas allows for time extension options for quizzes. All of these contribute to creating an accessible (and equitable) learning environment.

How you create course activity timelines greatly impact your students.

Is There Enough Time for Me to Design an Effective Course For All Of My Students? (H2)

Design & Then Develop! (H3)

Give yourself time to design and develop a course. Wait, are those two the same thing? Not quite.

-Designing is a brainstorming and drafting stage. This could be creating assignments that support course objectives, or curating videos and resources. While there are many programs that can be used to design a course, creating a simple outline works just as efficiently. This phase is very time-consuming.

-Developing a course is building content and formatting into a Canvas shell. This phase can be equally time-consuming based on workflow and technology-proficiency.

3 Levels of Design: (H3)

1. Content: Designing and curating content, mapping out course navigation, adding multiple methods of delivery, and adding various formative and summative assessments

2. Usability & Accessibility: Can all of your students access your course?

3. Technical: Building and formatting content in Canvas

Note: Although these are listed in numerically, Usability & Accessibility Design, Technical Design, and even Content Design can occur simultaneously.

Pace yourself and give yourself plenty of time to design. All three levels of design take a great amount of time, energy, dedication, and effort!

[Just sections with the lists are included.]

Where Do I Begin in Designing?

When designing courses, there are two major considerations:

Design a course to provide students enough time to complete assignments
Give yourself time to design a course that benefits all learners

Is There Enough Time for Me to Design an Effective Course For All Of My Students?

Design & Then Develop!

Give yourself time to design and develop a course. Wait, are those two the same thing? Not quite.

Designing is a brainstorming and drafting stage. This could be creating assignments that support course objectives, or curating videos and resources. While there are many programs that can be used to design a course, creating a simple outline works just as efficiently. This phase is very time-consuming.
Developing a course is building content and formatting into a Canvas shell. This phase can be equally time-consuming based on workflow and technology-proficiency.

3 Levels of Design:

[If you look carefully, you'll see the list is slightly indented. That's one of the visual clues that it's been formatted properly.]

Content: Designing and curating content, mapping out course navigation, adding multiple methods of delivery, and adding various formative and summative assessments
Usability & Accessibility: Can all of your students access your course?
Technical: Building and formatting content in Canvas

Here's the Canvas Guide for viewing my feedback in the gradebook.

First, please watch the Getting Tech Ready video Links to an external site. . (The page offers transcript or audio if you prefer to listen or read instead of watch.) Then complete the Computer Readiness Test. Links to an external site.

You have been provided with a free 3C Media Solutions account Links to an external site. , courtesy of the Chancellor's Office.

Read about the role and structure of US courts and US Supreme Court procedures.

Click this link for a great website about language and culture.

[If you use the WAVE tool to check this page, you'll see the top row in tagged with column headings.]

Weekly Schedule
Date	Module	Readings
Week One: 8/27-8/31	Module One: Introductions/Course Overview Introduction to Sociology	Review Syllabus and Orientation module Chapter 1, Intro to Sociology (OpenStax text)
Week Two: 9/3-9/7	Module Two: Intro to Sociological Research	Chapter 2, Sociological Research (OpenStax text)
Week Three: 9/10-9/14	Module Three: Intro to Culture: Values & Identity	Chapter 3, Culture (OpenStax text)
Week Four: 9/17-9/21	Module Four: Intro to Society and Social Interaction	Chapter 4, Society & Social Interaction (OpenStax text)
Week Five: 9/24-9/28	Module Five: Intro to Socialization	Chapter 5, Socialization (OpenStax text)
Week Six: 10/1-10/5	Module Six: Intro to Groups and Organizations	Chapter 6, Groups and Organizations (OpenStax text)

[Any variation on a visual indicator in addition to color (bold, different font, etc.) would work.]

Example 1

The main problem subjects are math, all areas of science, geography, sports and art but some aspects of other subjects, such as languages, can also cause issues.

Maps can be extraordinarily difficult for colorblind students to interpret and they will frequently miss important information unless maps are also fully labelled or shaded using patterns. All geography textbooks should be revised by the teacher if necessary to ensure maps, graphs, pie charts etc contain secondary indicators for the colorblind to be able to use them with confidence.

Example 2

Items in PINK CAPS are due on Wednesday, items in green italics are due Saturday.

WEEK	DATE	ASSIGNMENTS	CHAPTER
1	Aug. 29	INTRODUCTIONS / Homework or Quiz	Chapters 1 & 2
2	Sept. 5	ESSAY DRAFT / Quiz	Chapter 3
3	Sept. 11	DISCUSSION / HW/ *Exam #1 (CH 1-4)**	Chapter 4
4	Sept. 18	PEER REVIEW / Final Essay	Chapter 5

Your actual alt text may differ somewhat but this should give you an idea.

Example 1

A young dog walking attentively at heel.

Example 2

The_Scientific_Method_(simple).png

The steps of the scientific method: observation, question, hypothesis, experiment, analysis and conclusion.

An Important Note for Complex Images

Ideally, when you have a complex image (a graph, for example) or one with a lot of text displayed (a quote, perhaps), rather than trying to fit it in the alt text field, you'll create what's called a "long text description." This allows you to provide a full explanation beyond the recommended 20 words.

Create a separate page in your course with the complete description. It can help to think about how you'd describe the image to someone over the phone. Use formatting as appropriate (headings, columns, lists, etc.).
- Title the page "Accessible description of [image title]."
- Be sure to publish the page.
At the bottom, include a link back to the page with the original image so the student can easily return to their starting point.
On the main page, create a link directly above the image saying "Accessible description of image" which links to the long text description page.
(The image alt text can just say "link to accessible description above image" or it can be a very concise depiction of the image).

This description page does not need to be included in a module; as long as it's published, the students who need it will be able to get to it using the link above the image.

Want to see a long text description page in action? Long text description example

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