This online training is based on the first module of the curriculum Safe Futures. The curriculum was originally designed to be an instructor-led training conducted with Head Start staff who work with families experiencing domestic violence (not people currently experiencing domestic violence).

Due to the nature of the content, I felt it was appropriate to follow a social constructivist model of learning. For this reason, I designed a facilitated course that includes a lot of interaction with the facilitator and learners’ peers.

The original curriculum employs a great deal of collaborative learning experiences, many of which I kept. However, I also changed some and added to others. I incorporated the use of digital stories and online resources, which expand upon the information in the text and provide a different perspective for learners. I then ask learners to revisit the digital stories to see how what they’ve learned is reflected in the stories.

I also tried to increase opportunities for application in this course. In week 3, learners talk with people they work with to see how they can focus on a specific topic covered in the training. Learners then return to these ideas in the Action Plan in Week 6. The Action Plan is greatly expanded from the one in the original curriculum. In the original, the trainer just asks participants to write down some ideas if they have them, but does not focus on this. In this course, I have the learners develop an entire Plan and submit it to the class and the facilitator for review and comment. This also allows other learners to get ideas from their peers. There is also a detailed tutorial users can do through to help them generate ideas for their Plan.

This Web-based training was developed for ESI, a small Federal government contractor. Many of ESI's projects include communications components that require developing different types of products, such as publications, conference materials, Web sites, videos, or marketing materials.

This training was developed for ESI staff who are asked to work with computer graphics but who do not have any background or experience with them. Often, ESI's clients provide Web-quality graphics and expect them to be able to be using in print documents, or vice versa. Other times, people want to make changes to graphics but they don’t understand the type of graphic that they need in order to do that.

While most ESI staff do not want to become graphic artists, much time and frustration could be saved if they knew the types of graphics to request from their clients and how to identify and edit graphics once they get them. This training was developed to achieve that goal.

In private child care settings the availability of well-trained teachers is key to achieving positive outcomes for preschool children. However, early childhood teachers face many barriers in furthering their education, including cost, time away from work and family, and location of the education program. This Web-based training for Early Care and Education (ECE) Providers focuses on child development, how children learn, and identifying developmentally appropriate practices. The training is targeted to those with little or no formal education. The goals of this course align with the goals of the Child Development Associate (CDA) National Credentialing Program, a major national movement to improve the quality of child care.

This training includes a mentoring relationship between the learner and a more experienced person or mentor. Whether it be a director in a child care center, an Education Specialist in the center, or a teacher in a high school program, the mentor will observe the learner in his or her interactions with the children in their care, see how they are applying the information they are learning, and provide the learner with feedback. To facilitate this, we provided mentors tools to help them conduct assessments such as forms, sample observations reports, and checklists. We will also provided guidelines for “reflective supervision,” giving tips to create an open dialog between the mentor and the learner.

This proposal was developed in response to a fictional Request for Proposals (RFP) from a fictional company, Health Care Cooperative (HCC). For this project, we developed an identity for a fictional company, Osmosis, and a proposal in response to HCC's RFP.

The proposal outlines Osmosis' approach to instructional design, our ideas to develop training in response to HCC's needs, and a detailed management plan and budget.

This paper defends my definition of learning:

Learning is the process of acquiring new knowledge, skills, and attitudes that can be applied in new and familiar contexts. It is dependent on learner motivation, both extrinsic and intrinsic, and is affected by the environment and those in the environment.

The paper provides a rationale for the above definition, describes my observation of an adult learning experience, and describes suggestions for improving the adult learning experience based upon adult learning theory.

In response to Autodesk’s request for usability testing of the help systems in AutoCAD 2006, we performed a formal usability test with participants who were representative of product users. We tested six users with varying levels of experience—two novice, two intermediate, and two advanced.

We conducted our test in two separate usability labs. We observed the participant from another room while they completed a range of tasks using functionality new to AutoCAD 2006. Testing new functionality forced participants to use the help systems rather than rely on previous experience.

The test results and post-test interview revealed several strengths and weaknesses in the help systems, as detailed in the final report.