It’s no secret that I love the process of developing new resources. That’s something that hasn’t changed over quite a few years of teaching and training.
My process for materials development has changed quite a lot of the last few years though.
I have 5 rules for myself for this process. Well, they’re more like guidelines.
- Solve a problem. My students tend to drive new resource creation. They just don’t know it. Most of my resource creation happens as a reaction to common problems in the learning process.
- At the moment, many of my students are stuck on Assessment 4 in the course that I teach. In this assignment they have to collate several different kinds of evidence. I have a checklist, but I wanted to create something visual. Here’s the checklist. For my poster though, I’m only interested in the far left hand side.
- At the moment, many of my students are stuck on Assessment 4 in the course that I teach. In this assignment they have to collate several different kinds of evidence. I have a checklist, but I wanted to create something visual. Here’s the checklist. For my poster though, I’m only interested in the far left hand side.
- Start analog. I make a point of starting with my non digital tools first. I like to get the shape of the idea sketched out on the white board or in my journal. Or usually both.
- Here’s my first draft of a poster for Assessment 4 on the white board. I started portrait and then redrew it in landscape on the left.
- Here’s my second draft. I want people to see the different kinds of evidence they have to collect. And then make the links to their Study Guide and Assessment Guide. This time I’ve redrawn the poster in my notebook.
- Here’s my first draft of a poster for Assessment 4 on the white board. I started portrait and then redrew it in landscape on the left.
- Finish digital. From the white board and journal, I move on to the digital tools. Currently, I’m learning to use Adobe Illustrator. This is a new tool for me and I’m still figuring it out.
- Here’s a couple of printouts from early versions of the handout that I was working on.
- Here’s a couple of printouts from early versions of the handout that I was working on.
- Iterate as fast as possible. I go through many different versions before I’m happy with the final product.
- Here’s the current version in Illustrator.
- Here’s the current version in Illustrator.
- Realise that it’s never finished. One of the things I realised early on in my teaching career was that my resources needed to be dynamic. The content needs to evolve, rather than remain static.
- Here’s a screen shot of the PDF of the resource (for now anyway).
- Here’s a screen shot of the PDF of the resource (for now anyway).
Very cool Graeme! I like the visual representation, it communicates the requirements so simply.
Thanks R…! Now I just need to send it out to everyone. Cheers, G