It's my intention to blog consistently over the next few weeks leading up to the conference. Some off it might be interesting...even insightful..some will be a stream of consciousness and snippets of my script and some visuals, all comments, critique and discussion will be valuable. Blogging is a new practice for me so excuse my sometimes meandering and loquacious writing style.
I have decided to break down the blog content into the topics i'm covering for the conference. My submission is just a short film (Multimedia format) themed on inclusion.
A big issue for myself is that my project was based on an ongoing work stream and was in many ways, simply a report on a real life design project. Unfortunately, the project has now been parked due to the primary SME leaving the business and more pressing priorities forcing it down the to do list. This has meant doing a little re-jigging and speaking about the project in the future tense instead of present and retrospective.
So about the design project itself, and what i'm going to be yakking about in the film. Firstly framing the context of the project then discussing each learning barrier and then discussing the solutions we intend to apply. Iwill be adding more academic references and stats to the final piece but here's a very basic overview of the opening topics.
Within my professional practice, when I am presented with a design project I usually employ the ADDIE system. (View the video) if you are unfamiliar with this workflow management approach.
So looking at the Analysis stage of the project we were presented with a common set of mitigations among the student cohort, as described in my abstract and previous blog post. So in consideration of these mitigations we had to look at our design approach, especially how we could deliver the learning materials.
The two primary constituents of the digital divide are Access and Digital Literacy. Both of these issues are broad and have a myriad of constituents and nuances, this case study it is has a very focused, subjective approach which relates to the wider issues of exclusion and the digital divide.
With regard to digital access, this project is situated within a modern economic environment, where ownership and maintenance of a mobile device, (the smartphone) which is able to connect to the web via a G4/G5 network or Wi-fi and can display multimedia and interactive content. Is achievable by nearly everyone including those in lower socio-economic circumstances.
so our first design decision was that the project needs to have a mobile first approach to design. This means that in order to meet learners needs the only feasible medium was online and the only ubiquitous hardware was a smartphone. All media and interactive elements will be constructed to be viewed and interacted with on a small screen.