Introductions from class and the course overview have once again made me extremely excited for the future of this course and our professor. While many of the faces are familiar and I appreciate their thoughts and ideas on various subjects, I am also excited to get to know more about the new faces as well. Personality and interest rich, I think this course will provide a very unique learning experience due to the positions of all the people involved in the class. Some of the course work does seem intimidating at this point, but I am confident that it will be approached in an understandable way and that student collaborations on particularly tough tasks will be a hallmark, just as the last course I took with her was.
The One-Shot Workshop (Veldof, 2006) introduced the ADDIE approach, which seems to be the development approach this course will be taking. With the brief, concise overview of the approach, I can understand why it has been adopted. As I read, each step made sense, but the authors were also sure to be real about the situations that librarians face in the real world. The acknowledgement of group formation and the problems that sometimes result was very helpful. While I know that these issues occur in group projects, it is often not addressed when discussed in this context.
Bowels-Terry et. al (2010) addressed the idea of best practices for online video tutorials. This research could be seen as the A, I, and E of the ADDIE approach, as it was analyzing the target audience, implementing the tutorials, and evaluating their effectiveness and findability. The results of these findings then could be used to better the design and development of future tutorial implementation. It seems that the skills addressed in these tutorials (basic library navigation skills) may be where these types of learning experiences may be the most effective, as the authors and their participants are wary of using such techniques for more complex content. Some of the accessibility concerns that were addressed by participants included accessibility to videos off-campus and the usability of videos by non-native English speakers. These issues were addressed by suggesting the use of providing information in multiple formats, speaking slowly, and giving videos captions.
Flynn (2013) discussed the idea of providing screencasts that allowed learners to determine their own experience. By allowing for a “Choose Your Own Adventure” approach to Screencasting, it is suggested that learners will get more out of them and that they will be used in their entirety. This reading emphasized the need for correct design and development which requires proper analysis. Implementing these ideas in proper planning of execution allowed for use and Evaluation was discussed in the features offered by the YouTube informatics provided for the videos being discussed. This article also seems to hint that Screencasting may be most effective for databases, websites, or tasks that are difficult to navigate or have confounding instructions, but may be less effective for tasks and skills that are easily determined due to layout or other existing instructions on completion. Accessibility, of course, comes in the way of technology. Screencasting to explain skills or tasks for a target audience that doesn’t frequent videos or the Internet could be problematic, as would be a target audience of a lower means which may not have reliable access to such technology. Screencasting for the audience that Flynn is addressing, though, seems to have no problem with accessibility, and this type of approach was extremely successful for the objective.
The final reading provided some tips to make a good screencast which seems to be applicable to all kinds of online tutorials. These tips also seemed to address the ideas of Design and Development that ADDIE suggests. In all the readings, it made the first task seem less daunting and even doable, even before I have decided on a focus. They made me excited to find something to work on to implement these ideas in a way that will be beneficial to me.
Raven K 
I agree with you in that I appreciated the honesty in The One-Shot Workshop. They broke each step down in a way that is easily understood and the value is clear. Then they gave a shortened version because they knew there wouldn’t always be time to follow this method step-by-step. They could have went into more depth of problems that arise in groups, as you mentioned but I think that might have taken away from the point. A whole separate chapter could be written about group dynamics and how to handle them while facilitating a workshop. I’m very much interested in learning skills to handle difficult people in a library setting.
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