Learning about Learning

Once upon a time, young Jamie enthusiastically enrolled in a high school course about HTML (hypertext markup language), through the fairly new Florida Virtual School (FLVS). My affluent public school did not have any computer programming related classes and at that time, Florida was pushing for students across the state to enroll in FLVS to supplement their public school course offerings. Using a personal laptop I already had access to, and with the help of my school, I created my FLVS account and signed up to learn all about HTML and I could not wait to get started!

Except I hated the course.

I was provided Dreamweaver, a professional web-development program by Adobe, yet none of the assignments were to use it and worse, I wasn’t even supposed to open the program. For what felt like an eternity, I wrote HTML code with CSS styles for formatting and created text document after text document following instructions and writing code that replicated a dictated hypothetical website without actually getting to publish a website.¹ It was all rather confusing, terribly boring, easy but tedious, and I didn’t know where the course was headed and if I would ever get to open Dreamweaver and make the website of my dreams! I avoided the course, didn’t open email, and consumed myself with other clubs, activities, a job, and forgot I was even taking an online course. In the last week of the semester I finished about 75% of the course after being on hiatus for a while and begged to drop out of the second semester.² What happened to my enthusiasm to learn HTML?

Fast forward through a few more poor online learning experiences and primarily face-to-face classes, and I am now a graduate student in the Masters of Learning Experience Design at Michigan State University. Over the spring semester, I have taken CEP 820, Online Teaching and Learning. Throughout this course, I have gotten the chance to re-evaluate those prior online learning experiences with a new perspective and more sophisticated lens. During CEP 820, I’ve learned why some online courses excel beyond a traditional counterpart and why some fall so short. I have developed a much better understanding of not just the why but also the how of humanizing online learning, refining and revising learning objectives, making engaging and accessible activities, creating assessment and supporting the learner throughout the process.

Although in 2026 our lives are filled with video and audio, back in 2009, Zoom would not even be a product for another four years. FLVS’ idea of humanizing online learning was through email communications with the instructor. Peer-to-peer interactions had not been implemented yet in FLVS. Perhaps videos would have helped me to feel less isolated, but I must admit I am personally not fond of learning through videos. Perhaps I did not get much exposure to educational videos other than substitute teachers rolling out a TV cart to fill the time.

I lost a tooth in front of a TV cart just like this one.

In a meta-analysis of flipped learning in higher education, Bredow et al. (2021) created criteria for inclusion in the analysis that took me by surprise. The first criteria is audio visual lecture content, or vodcasts, which they believe are “pedagogically distinct from other forms of preclass content dissemination” (2021, p. 879). The sheer volume of courses that met this requirement prompted a significant pause in my reading to consider my own absence of video based instruction for online content. The study served as a catalyst for my ongoing re-examination of the impact that lecture videos hold.

Perhaps we can forgive FLVS for its lack of vodcasting as the word was rather new at the time, but going past technology itself there is so much more that could have been improved. During CEP 820, I got a chance to learn about, study, and apply a variety of design principles and design frameworks for quality online courses such as OSCQR, Quality Matters, and Universal Design for Learning 3.0 (UDL). Although each carries its own merit, UDL resonated with me the most. The UDL guidelines are based around centering the learner, fostering learner autonomy, and designing for access, support, and executive function. It focuses on designing multiple means of engagement, representation, and action and expression to be approachable and effective across cultures, backgrounds, and neurotypes. The support and executive function framing has stuck with me the most and will continue to inform all of my future learning designs as I have benefited from these the most during my CEP 820 experience. 

So what went wrong in young Jamie’s online HTML course? At the time I was convinced that there was no instructor on the other side of the screen as I felt that the email communications were clearly automated and I had little evidence to the contrary until I wanted to drop the second semester. Suddenly, the instructor even had a phone call with me to try and convince me to stay in the course!³ Yet, I still did not see the “why” and there did not seem to be a path to learning that fancy web software. I was told it would look good on a college application. You are almost there just keep going! None of those reasons resonated with young Jamie’s undiagnosed ADHD. Looking back with the tool of UDL, it seems so clear. 

1. Purely text based technical content was not engaging.
2. Email communication was formal, infrequent, and not encouraged. 
3. There was no peer engagement. 
4. The learning goals and course path was not made clear.
5. There were not real world connections or ability to customize the content to my applications.
6. There were no reflective exercises.
7. There was no structure of timing or schedule of activities. 
8. There were no progress checks, accountability, or support for sustaining motivation.

Of course undiagnosed young Jamie struggled to conjure up a care for learning HTML!

At the start of the spring semester, I understood many reasons why young Jamie’s HTML course was such drudgery, but now I know I could could redesign that course in a way that would have gotten young Jamie into computer science about seven years earlier. Along with video and a functional learner management system (LMS), I would prioritize clear and meaningful goals and objectives, multimedia content, peer interactions, assignments that can be related to various topics of interest or personalized for different goals, and would provide many opportunities to connect the content to real world applications. Online learning is not about digitizing content, it is a process of building comprehension and constructing knowledge which is highly personal, social and active rather than passive. 

In CEP 820, I never doubted my instructor’s existence – even in the new age of generative AI deepfakes! I had an exceptionally positive experience with the amount of support and executive function support that was woven throughout the course from clear time estimates for learning activities, accountability through a shared class tracking spreadsheet of completed assignments, practical applications and practice, and scaffolding for assignments. One of my favorite design elements was the Design Guide – a document that provided guided activities corresponding to consent and larger assignments. Moving from practice with scaffolding to practical implementation of a learning design pushed my comprehension and helped me develop further than reading content ever could – because learning through doing is at the heart of my pedagogy.⁴

I created a unit called “Flat Fabrication: 2D Digital Fabrication” a unit that teaches one to use 2D vector design for digital fabrication using tools like a laser cutter or electronic cutting machine. Incorporating Design for Fabrication, Iterative Design, and prototyping fundamentals, this unit takes the learner from completing a basic tutorial to creating their own designs, learning various digital fabrication technologies, and exploring material possibilities as well as limitations. I focused on the initial two modules of this hypothetical project. 

Relying heavily on my own teaching and learning experiences, and empowered with UDL 3.0, I designed my unit to be highly interactive, humanized, and foster learner agency. What this looks like in practice is a module dedicated to setting the tone, access, learning about the learners, and helping the learners begin to relate to me as the instructor. Using short engaging videos, clear learning objectives, multimedia content with reflection and other guided questions, customizable activities for different methods of learning and allowing the learner to fit the activity to their goals and interests. Each module includes at least one instructor video, road map of the module, rich content with reflection opportunities, engaging hands-on projects, scaffolded reflection activities, and wraps up with a Check Point Survey for accountability and frequent feedback and communication. If you’d like, you can hear more about my Flat Fabrication learning design and Canvas course in the video below this paragraph.

Click the “Watch on YouTube” button for full transcript and captions.

As my unit came to fruition, I took some time to review videos I made for my position at the Makerspace and was aghast at how few of my newfound guidelines were in place! I am looking forward to revising and iterating with newfound knowledge and a functioning video creation process.

Perhaps if UDL was incorporated in that HTML course, young Jamie might have stayed for the second semester. But would she have turned into a learning designer? Perhaps not.

Footnotes

1. No knowledge from that HTML courses aided me in the creation of this webpage. I used Google Gemini for guidance to attempt to embed a script or iframe code which is unfortunately blocked by WordPress on accounts that are not self-hosted, such as mine. ↩︎
2. In the 2007 comprehensive assessment of FLVS by the Florida TaxWatch Center for Educational Performance and Accountability, data from the academic year of 2005-2006 depicts high withdrawal rates when compared to traditional school enrollments. Withdrawals in the subjects of computer science and business technology are notable in Chart 34 on page 65 (2007). ↩︎
3.  Based on the 2009 report by Mackey, K. and Horn, M.B., it seems that the primary motivation of FLVS was to reduce the cost of education in the state of Florida and effectiveness was measured by quantity of enrollment which resulted in the program’s funding allocation. Studies had not been conducted to compare FLVS learning outcomes against traditional high school courses (2009). ↩︎
4. For more about my online teaching pedagogy, see my Online Learning Manifesto. ↩︎

References

Bredow, C. A., Roehling, P. V., Knorp, A. J. & Sweet, A. M. (2021). To flip or not to flip? A meta-analysis of the efficacy of flipped learning in higher education. Review of Educational Research. 91(6), 878–918. doi/10.3102/00346543211019122 

CAST. (n.d.). The UDL guidelines. CAST.org. https://udlguidelines.cast.org/

CAST (2024). Universal Design for Learning Guidelines version 3.0 [graphic organizer]. https://udlguidelines.cast.org/static/udlg3-graphicorganizer-digital-nonumbers-a11y.pdf 

Florida TaxWatch Center for Educational Performance and Accountability. (2007, October 31). Final report: a comprehensive assessment of Florida Virtual School. https://floridataxwatch.org/DesktopModules/EasyDNNNews/DocumentDownload.ashx?portalid=210&moduleid=35706&articleid=16048&documentid=930 

Mackey, K., & Horn, M. B. (2009, October). Florida Virtual School: Building the first statewide, internet-based public high school. [Case Study]. Innosight Institute, Inc. https://www.flvs.net/docs/default-source/research/flvs-innosight.pdf

Moriarty, J. (2026, May 2). CEP 820 – screencast of ultimate unit flat fabrication [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/rK0GbheJDfg

SUNY OSCQR. (n.d.). OSCQR – SUNY Online Course Quality Review Rubric. https://oscqr.suny.edu/ Quality Matters. (2023). Specific review Standards from the QM higher education rubric. Seventh Edition. https://www.qualitymatters.org/sites/default/files/PDFs/StandardsfromtheQMHigherEducationRubric.pdf