Aesthetics are a very important part of almost everything, especially in the digital world. With the instrumental approach to education, students behave like consumers when it comes to education (p29 of the Manifesto) and expect a good educational experience for the fees that they pay. Whether a course is digital or more traditionally taught face to face, getting the learning environment right is of incredible importance. If a PowerPoint doesn’t work correctly or a text font is unreadable, this will detract from the learning experience, whether the studying takes place face to face or online.

The Learning Management System (LMS) (p 46 of the Manifesto) is an intrinsic part of learning now for all courses that are taught, not just digital courses. It is therefore imperative that the LMS is not only well designed, but has an inbuilt flexibility to allow for a variety of courses and teaching styles. As the Manifesto states however (p47) “Inevitably, institutional strategy and procurement decisions are unlikely to meet the pedagogical needs of every course of study or cohort of learners.” Which leaves the teachers with little room to make adjustments for their particular course or teaching style. Most LMSs are now designed by Learning Technologist hired specifically for this task by the institution for their expertise (p47, 48 of the Manifesto). One would hope then, that these Learning Technologists will work closely with the teachers and administrators on the (digital) courses the institution has available. The interfaces that are used for digital and other courses are generally well beyond the understanding of someone with average technical skills. It therefore makes little sense to rely on the teachers to create and design an LMS, if there are Learning Technologists who do have these necessary skills. One way to circumvent these issues, is for institutions to consider that course teams include academics, technologists and administrators to make sure all aspects of a course can work flawlessly together.

Since the start of the pandemic the Programme I work for has had to convert to taking place online, with some success. After looking at the variety of workshops offered though, the decision was made to shrink these to a more manageable amount of ‘courses’. The Programme is slightly different to most University courses since it is a CPD Programme and it is not credit bearing. This makes the use of the most common set up in the University where the students are on EUCLID and the course takes place in Moodle or Learn impossible. We are therefore working as a team with a Learning Technologist, our Academic tutors and the administrators to create a platform for our Programme that will be user friendly and educationally sound. I think the interaction between the different parts of the team is crucial to a successful outcome.

In Conclusion, aesthetics and the interface where learning takes place are central to the learning and the teaching experience. Teachers should be involved in creating the LMSs, but they should work together with the Learning Technologists as a team to use each other’s expertise to create a learning environment that compliments their course and their way of teaching.

Bayne, Sian, et al. The Manifesto for Teaching Online, MIT Press, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ed/detail.action?docID=6317960.

Aesthetics matter: Interface design shapes learning / Femke Morrison / An introduction to digital environments for learning (2020/2021)[SEM2] by blogadmin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0