• Background
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• General Insights
• Questions & Considerations
• Content
• Development Teams
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• Design
• Introduction
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• Features
• Courses
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• Building a Course
• See and Say
• There are Limits!
• Influence and Change
• CLASS Courses
• Content
• Extras Designed
• Extras Linked
• Class Assessments
• A Bit of Dreamweaver
• Proofing
• Graphics
• MOUs
• Detailing Treatment
• Course Credits
• CLASS Style
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Full Course versus Module

The full course versus module question is an important consideration for online course building. On one hand, creating full courses -- as CLASS™ did -- makes design and engineering easier; however, it disallows end user content selection for reasons discussed in detail below. Modules, on the other hand, allow users to pick and choose what aspects of a course to use; however, they are a great deal more difficult to construct -- both from an instructional design and engineering viewpoint.

In the HTML-dominated world of 1995, there was little debate about whether to create full courses or modules. Hypertext markup language (HTML) didn't make it easy to break off a section of the course and use it with another section. Because of the way the courses were built, all pages were tied into a whole through the use of a Java-based system. Break off a page, and it was uncertain just how -- and even If -- the course would work. In addition, it was believed that because CLASS™ courses met national and state subject matter standards only in their complete form, no one would want to break the course up -- and compromise standards.

The issue of creating modules became more relevant with the advent of the idea that the end user--whether an individual, school district, learning center, etc.--might not want an entire course. Perhaps the end user just wants to choose an element of a course that is lacking in local schools. For example, a student might have access to basic Spanish, but might not have a Spanish teacher that can teach advanced principles. For that student, being able to "break off" the last section of an online Spanish course that only taught advanced principles would be very beneficial.

The downside to modularity is that doing instructional design on a modular course is much more difficult than that of a full course. The designer cannot assume that a person has already read an element from a previous chapter, understands a previously-discussed term, or knows of a previously-shown topic, simply because the designer doesn’t know what parts of the course--if any--the student has seen before. Modularity also eliminates the possibility of using a metaphor in a course because metaphors, by their very nature, use a storyline or elements that run throughout the course. Removing a small segment of a metaphor course and dropping it somewhere else makes the segment very difficult to interpret.

Although modularity might seem more trouble than it's worth, appearances are deceiving. Allowing the end user to pick and choose what materials are necessary not only expands the material's usefulness, but it also greatly increases the size of your possible market. With the development of advanced learning management systems (LMSs) and database-structured Web languages, modularity is possible and its possibilities should be explored.

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