(upbeat music)
Mary Loder- Welcome to Course Stories,
produced by the instructional design and new media team
of EdPlus at Arizona State University.
In this podcast, we tell an array of course design stories
alongside other ASU online designers and faculty.
On today's Course Story.
(upbeat music continues)
Ricardo Leon- Maybe we should just start.
Do you remember how we start the podcast usually?
(people laughing) Mary Loder- Remind me.
Ricardo Leon- It goes, "Hi, I'm Mary Loder from,"
wait, how does it go? (people laughing)
Mary Loder- Yeah, sorry, I'll be you,
you'll be me. Tim McKean- Want me to pull up
an episode? Ricardo Leon- Sure.
No, no, no, no.
Mary Loder- Oh, hi, I'm Mary Loder and I'm an instructional designer
with Arizona State University.
Ricardo- And I'm Ricardo Leon.
I'm a media developer at the same place.
Mary- We work together. Ricardo- Ooh, we did it perfect.
Mary- That's how it is.
(upbeat music continues)
Hi, I'm Mary Loder,
an instructional designer from ASU Online.
Ricardo- I'm Ricardo Leone.
I'm a media specialist at the same place.
Mary- We work together.
Ricardo- Let's get on with the show.
(upbeat music continues)
Hey, Mary. Mary- Hey,
how's it going, Ricardo?
Ricardo- It's going all right.
Mary- All right? (Ricardo chuckles)
You sound sad. (chuckles)
Ricardo- No, it's fine, it's fine.
What are we talking about today?
Mary- We're talking about a lot of things.
Primarily podcasting and primarily the OLC and conferences,
but we're joined by our colleagues.
Ricardo- Oh, wow.
Mary- So we're talking today about OLC Innovate 2023,
which happened back in April
and there was a lot to unpack.
Ricardo- And we were there. Mary- And we were there.
Ricardo- And we did a live.
Mary- We did a couple of lives,
not only in our own podcast,
but we were in Online Learning in the Second Half,
which we will post in the show notes.
You know how we do. Ricardo- Crossover.
Mary- Crossover, bam, bam, bam. (Ricardo chuckles)
We actually were asked to do another crossover, too
on Mat Talks. Ricardo- I can't wait.
I can't wait. Mary- You'll hear-
about those podcasts in part in this episode.
Ricardo- And so we did a conversation, not presentation.
Mary- Correct and we had no idea what we were gonna do,
but thank goodness for our colleague, Tim McKean,
who's also in the room with us right now.
Ricardo- Hey, Tim.
Tim McKean- Hi, everybody. Mary- Who ran the mic
and ran the show for us in our presentation.
Thank goodness for you, Tim.
Tim- That was a lot of fun.
Ricardo- And Liz is in the room, too,
so she can chime in if she wants to-
anytime. Liz Lee- Hello, glad to be here.
Mary- And Liz has so much experience
as well with OLC, in Reference to.
You went to Accelerate last year-
and presented. Liz- I did, I did.
It was a lot of fun.
I don't know that have a lot of experience.
It was just the one. (chuckles)
Mary- Fair enough. (Ricardo chuckles)
Liz- But it was a great opportunity, not just for presenting
what Tamara and I were working on at the time,
but also just to see what cool new things
other people were doing.
And it sounds like you guys got a very similar experience
from your adventures with OLC.
Mary- Tim actually shares some really good tips
along with some other folks in this episode
around conferencing in general
that I thought were great takeaways, at least for me,
listening to the conversation again. (chuckles)
Ricardo- Great.
Liz- Conferencing, going to conferences, it's hard.
You have to make some really critical decisions.
Mary- And there was a strategy
some other folks employed as well.
We talked to some people on the floor while we were there
in addition to the presentation that we had
and some great strategies on how to divide
and conquer conferences, too, with your team
and then also unique ways to use podcasting
was discussed throughout
and lots of good tips on how to podcast.
So absolutely, if you're a podcaster,
this is an episode for you even if you don't course design.
Ricardo- Absolutely.
So we brought Tim along here to join us
for the wraparound conversation for the episode,
which we will be playing for you.
We had some really great conversations
when we were out there that doesn't always happen.
Tim is the floor above us here,
but we don't always have these kinds of conversations,
'cause we're deep in the mix of things.
So traveling to another place
and being in that kind of setting really helped.
Tim- It was interesting to realize
that we traveled across the country
to network with people in my own building
(Ricardo chuckles)
and I had more opportunity to talk
with you guys specifically
during that week at the conference, like you said,
than an entire year of working.
It's so easy to get in our own silo and in our own projects
that sometimes we need that kind of excuse
to step out of our own departments
and just talk to our own neighbors.
Mary- It was so nice getting to know you better.
Tim- That was great.
When are we gonna do it again?
Mary- When's our next conference?
Ricardo- Let's plan it.
Tim- I think one of the things we talked about
was the value of mixing formal and informal media.
Ricardo- Ah, exactly. Mary- Yes.
Ricardo- You're the guy.
Whenever I think of that, I think of Tim.
Tim- Good, I feel like I talk about it too much,
so I'm glad to hear that it's still resonating
and that it's still finding an audience.
Ricardo- It's your brand man.
Tim- But I think there's, especially in the area
of instructor presence and the guys
from Podcasting in the Second Half, was it?
Mary- Online Learning in the Second Half.
Tim- They talked about- Mary- John and Jason-
Tim- Humanizing online learning.
And that's one of the challenges that we're in right now.
That's the phase that we're in right now
is online learning went very automated and very polished.
It swung to one extreme.
And now we're coming back and finding
that balance of where's all the polish
and where's all the high tech and the tools.
One of our guests in the podcast you'll hear,
will talk about one of the lessons she learned
was to keep things simple and to think iteratively
and use the tools you have.
And we're learning that it doesn't have to be
all publisher materials and high tech interactives
and all the things.
It's similar to the path that we did with PowerPoint.
When you go too many transitions
and then you realize to keep it simple, it gets better.
Online learning can be the same way.
We keep it simple, we use simple tools,
we make it accessible and there's more personality
that comes through with that kind of personal thing,
but with that kind of informal interactions with students
and there's a nice balance to be made.
If you have a nicely polished lecture,
but then some very informal jumping in,
"Hey, this thing is a current event
that applies to one of our topics."
Or, "Here's some feedback I have
on your current work that you're doing."
I find it has a nice balance of polished media,
but also that informal media as well.
Liz- That's incredible.
Can you define informal versus formal for us?
Tim- Sure, formal media being things that are scripted,
are recorded in a studio, edited,
produced with nice equipment and post-production.
Typically, I will use formal media
for things that are gonna last, that have longevity.
So you have a certain lesson that you teach
and it's gonna be in the course every time the course runs,
that's something worth putting some production into
and making really nice, putting some polish on it.
But there are also things that are timely
and are not gonna last.
They don't need to be in the course every time.
Like a current event that applies to the course topic
or specific feedback on the work that they're doing.
Those kind of things can be informal
and what I mean by informal is maybe you just picked up
your cell phone and recorded a five minute clip
talking to your students just as you would in class.
I think sometimes we forget that when we teach in class,
we are informal.
We make mistakes, we say we um, we stutter a little bit.
We're not perfectly scripted in class.
We're not perfectly polished in class
and that's normal, that's okay,
that's what our students are used to.
So when we are scripted and perfectly polished,
it doesn't come across as normal,
because we're not actors and we're not used to.
One of the things that actors really have to work hard on
is delivering a script in a way
that doesn't sound like a script.
And so most of us don't do a great job at that.
You've probably worked with instructors that came in
and tried to read off a prompter and just struggled with it.
Where just talking about their topic
comes across more cleanly.
So I think there is value in there
of just turn on your mic and talk to your kids
and sometimes those informal, impromptu recordings
will maybe even be more impactful
than the ones you spent hours scripting and producing.
Mary- And I like that you talked
about the accessibility nature, too,
because logging into an LMS system
is a barrier to gaining access to your content
and this whole episode's really around podcasting
and what a great accessible resource
if you're putting it in a space
where they can literally click a link
and then listen to it in their commute
or while they're folding laundry,
just general tasks that you end up doing,
but it ends up being a moment to deepen the learning
or reflect on the learning even more.
Ricardo- So as you listen to this episode,
you're gonna hear my voice sounds really bad,
'cause I had just gone from another conference,
the GSV conference
in San Diego. Mary- Oh, you were taxed.
Ricardo- And doing karaoke, I blew out my voice.
So you're gonna hear that in the recording.
Mary- At least it was for a good cause.
Karaoke is a good cause to lose your voice.
Liz- I was gonna say, can we get
a little preview of the karaoke?
Or sample?
Ricardo- We'll post a picture from me and Mike Angeletta on stage
singing karaoke. Mary- That's such a good photo.
Ricardo- So join us, listener, for our conversation,
not presentation at- Mary- That's right.
Ricardo- OLC 2023 in Nashville, Tennessee.
(upbeat music)
Ricardo- We're interested,
what was anyone's favorite aspect of the conference?
'Cause this episode, I think, will serve,
for our instructors and for our IDs,
what are the benefits of coming to a conference?
What kinds of things can you learn?
What kinds of things did you learn?
Mary- Oh, raise your hand,
gotta get Tim to you. Ricardo- It's podcast,
We need a microphone Mary- That's okay.
Ricardo- In front of your face. Mary- We're excited for you
to do this, but we wanna capture
every beautiful words you say.
Introduce yourself and then tell us what you think.
Christy Aceves- So my name is Christy Aceves.
I'm an instructional design consultant
at Boise State University
and one of the things that I really appreciated
at this conference was that there are simple tools
to use in courses.
It doesn't have to be complicated,
it doesn't have to be a lot of technology in it
and I think sometimes as instructional designers
and faculty, we think that we have to put
some bells and whistles and do all these things,
but I went to one of the sessions
where he showed us how to do an escape room
using just things that you have,
a document, password protection,
your learning management system.
So simple is good
and it's as effective as having some great technology.
Mary- What do you think, just stay there with her for a second,
'cause I missed that session
and I wanted to go to that session. (chuckles)
So this is selfishly.
What were some of the tips that were given
around creating that space?
Christy- To think it through.
Make sure that your students are set up for success.
Some of them, he didn't realize,
didn't know what an escape room was.
So to prepare a video
or prepare something that will guide them
through that process
and then also think of them when they're in the exercise
or the assignment that to give them clues,
how can you use the technology that you have,
which was for him, Canvas,
how can you interact with them
so that you could give them clues
if they took or put in a wrong code
or took a wrong path or whatever.
So that was really helpful, too,
to think about the student.
And he said that it doesn't have
to be perfect the first time, it's okay.
It doesn't have to be perfect
and you can go back and adjust things
and learn from your students
and make those adjustments and improve upon that.
Mary- Awesome, thank you so much for sharing.
I really appreciate it.
Anyone else, what was a favorite experience?
What did you present on?
Maybe you wanna give a little plug
and then we can add your resources to our show notes.
Cris Emberton- Hi, I am Cris Emberton.
I'm with University of Tennessee in Knoxville,
instructional designer.
And actually something we've been toying with
and we're in the process of developing
is our quality assurance review process
and we want to include badges
and it was actually Christy's session
that enlightened, gave me some enlightenment
on how to incorporate badges and the importance of it
and faculty appreciating badges
and how it just gave me a lot of ideas
on how we can pull it in
and hopefully, they can use it,
maybe they can use it toward their tenure in the future.
That's something that we're hoping for,
so I enjoyed that one.
Mary- Awesome, thanks, Chris.
Jason Johnson- Hey, I'm Jason Johnson at the University of Tennessee,
director of online learning and course production there.
I think for me, I came to the conference both to present,
so I presented with a colleague
from the University of Kentucky
on how might we humanize online education.
And that's been my wicked problem,
tickling at the back of my head throughout this conference
and picking up little bits and pieces.
Had some great conversation
with you all yesterday around that - with vendors -
We've been talking to vendors with the same question
and I was in a really good session yesterday
with some people, from, that use InScribe
that were talking about belonging in the online course
and they had some really, really insightful ways
to think about how we're evaluating
where students are in the online course.
Mary- Yeah, that was a good one.
I did attend the belonging with InScribe.
I'm a big InScribe fan.
We use them in a few places.
And I caught the tail end
of your design thinking session with John.
That was excellent.
I felt bad 'cause I caught the tail end,
but there was so much work that had taken place.
I didn't wanna interrupt the work.
It was really going well.
There's a bunch of Jam Boards.
Are you okay with us sharing a link to-
Jason- Oh, sure. Mary- Fixed link.
Not the people can edit or delete on accident.
Jason- I'll send you that link.
We actually have a jump doc.
We already summarized all the different outcomes
from those different groups.
Mary- Awesome. Jason- I mean,
we just had great participation.
This is a amazing conference for people
to engage and participate and that was the perfect.
We were kind of in disbelief that it actually worked
as well as it did in some ways,
'cause we had 45 minutes to work our way
through this problem to prototypes
and it was super quick,
but people were just jumping right into it
and it was lovely.
Mary- It was fabulous.
Jason- Happy to share that out.
Mary- Great, awesome, thank you.
Ricardo- Anybody else?
Any tips for attending conferences
that we can give out to our listeners
about how to apply for conferences,
get the funding for conferences,
how to pack for conferences? (people laughing)
Ricardo- Does anyone have any- Unknown- Good shoes?
Mary- Good shoes? Ricardo- What's that?
Good shoes, yes, yes. Mary- Good shoes.
Ricardo- Tim, do you have any?
Tim- I'll say that one of the tips that I got ahead of time
and really helped me was to try to be intentional
about having a goal for being here.
I was telling my wife before I came,
I feel like I have this huge opportunity,
I'm just gonna blow it. (Ricardo chuckles)
There's so many options in each block.
There's 15 different things you could go
and everything you choose,
you're not choosing 14 other things.
I'm like, "I'm missing everything."
But I set myself a goal of really looking at things
that looked at building community
around courses and around programs
and about hybrid, hybrid learning and hybrid course design
and that really helped me as I was looking
at the 15 things that I had to say no to,
help me feel better about that doesn't align
with my primary goal.
Even though that's probably a really good session,
that's not the primary reason I'm here,
so it helped me a little bit feel better
about the things that I chose and didn't choose.
So that might be a thing,
but I was just shocked at how many
different options there were
and so many great sessions all at the same time.
Ricardo- I wanna take a quick vote.
Say you're in a session and you realize
that it's not for you, it's not really aligned
with why you're in there. (people laughing)
Do you get up and leave?
Unknown- Yes.
Mary- Yes. Ricardo- We got people nodding.
We got people- Mary- We do.
Ricardo- Put their hands up. Mary- We get up and leave.
(people chattering indistinctly)
Mary- Oh, that's fair. Ricardo- If you need to go,
you'll go up and- Mary- When it's awkward,
do you leave, you're the only person who came?
(people laughing)
Jason- If it's two or three people, you gotta stay, I'm sorry.
Mary- Socially. Jason- Nothing else
is more important than helping those people feel like
(speaking indistinctly)
Ricardo- Sure, sure, sure, sure.
Mary- You're a nice guy, Jason.
Ricardo- And we wanna thank everyone here for play placating us
and staying for the rest of this session.
Mary- We know there are other really good sessions
at the same time as this.
Ricardo- How am I just leaving?
Mary- That we're also like, "Dang." (laughing)
Ricardo- You can leave, but first, you gotta say your name
on the podcast. Mary- That's fair, that's fair.
That'll really put you on the spotlight.
Tim- But there are times when you realize
that the parameters of the session aren't gonna apply to you
and when you've already realize that there's other things
that you could get value from
or potentially could get value from,
I would say that mostly, I endorse getting up and going,
because you don't want to do the sunk cost fallacy
and say, I'm gonna sit here for an hour, because I sat down.
Instead I'm going to- Claire Wilkinson- I have like 15 minute rule.
Ricardo- I'm sorry? Mary- Oh, that's a good one.
Wait, come over. Ricardo- 15-minute rule?
Mary- If you don't mind, we gotta get that.
Capture, that's a good rule.
Mary- And what is your name, by the way?
And what school are you from?
Claire Wilkinson- My name is Claire Wilkinson.
I am from McLennan Community College in Waco, Texas.
We also have our own podcast
called Mac Talks Mary- Awesome, please feel free
to plug and send us a link, we'll put it in the show notes.
Claire- Oh, awesome, we'd love that.
But I have a 15-minute rule.
I sit down and if they don't win me over in 15 minutes,
I get up and walk out. (chuckles)
Mary- It's a good rule.
Claire- I mean it's the same as if you're teaching.
You need to engage your learners,
You need to engage your audience
and if I'm not feeling engaged, then I leave.
Mary- That's a good rule, time is our most valuable resource.
Wait, plug your podcast, don't pass the mic yet.
What's the name of it?
Claire- I'm a little shy, I'm sorry.
Mary- Oh, that's okay. (Claire chuckles)
Claire- It's called Mac Talks.
So our mascot is a Highlander and his name is Mac.
- M-A-C or M-A-C-K
or M-A-K? Claire- M-A-C-.
Ricardo- And Highlander like the movie or like a Scotsman?
Claire- Like a Scotsman. (all laughing)
But we're instructional designers.
We have a whole team and we interview faculty
and we wanna just reveal their awesome online course design
and share some great things that they're doing
that are kind of out of normal, you know?
Mary- How do you source your faculty?
Claire- How do we choose them?
So our director of center of teaching and learning
and our coordinator of instructional design and innovation,
they come together and they've been working there
for so long (chuckles)
so they know some great people
through what they've been doing
and they know some of the great things that they're doing.
So far, they have chosen but-
Mary- Awesome Claire- If we do,
through our IDI team, if we do see some great course design
as we're evaluating courses, then we wanna make sure
that we reach out to those faculty
and ask them to come on the podcast.
Mary- That's great, thank you so much.
Ricardo- How many of you here have your own podcast?
Mary- Yes, let's plug the next podcast.
Jason- I was only laughing because no one's really laughing.
(Mary and Ricardo laughing)
Jason- I was only laughing because we've run
into a number of people along the way that have
their own podcast. Ricardo- Their own podcast.
Jason- The aforementioned colleague who I did the session with
on design thinking session, we have one
that's called Online Learning in the Second Half
and it's found at onlinelearningpodcast.com.
Mary- Steal, we can't believe that was available either.
Jason- I know, it's amazing. Mary- That's so lucky.
Jason- This is more of a positive side-
tangent. Ricardo- Oh, great.
It's not what I was asking for, but that's great.
(all laughing)
Jason- I want to take your questions
and plug it into something that I'm interested in talking about.
(all laughing)
Ricardo- That's what a podcast is, ladies and gentlemen.
Jason- Exactly. (all laughing)
We went to Gruhn Guitars.
So we were talking to them,
because they have guitars.com, that's their URL.
Mary- Wow. Ricardo- Nice.
(upbeat music)
Mary- Oh, Online Learning in the Second Half,
that's their podcast, John and Jason.
They're awesome by the way.
Just fabulous human beings to offer us the space
to come in and have that conversation,
but their podcast is really fun to listen to,
so if you haven't actually gone to listen to their podcast,
we'll put it in the show notes, like I said again,
but fabulous dudes.
Ricardo- And if you need an entryway,
we appeared on one of their episodes.
Mary- We'll definitely post that episode.
Ricardo- Absolutely.
Mary- Online Learning in the Second Half.
(upbeat music)
Ricardo- So how many of you are here who would like
to start your own podcast at your institutions?
Christy- I'm intimidated by it.
And because I already have such a big workload
as an instructional design consultant
and I'm sitting here as you three have been talking about it
and I'm thinking, how much time do they dedicate to this?
And then how do they get their regular job stuff done
and so and so, and plus, you guys,
I see that you respond to people
when they post things or do things,
so then you've got that as well.
So is this a full-time job?
Mary- No. (chuckles) Ricardo- No. (chuckles)
Christy- No? Mary- We wish.
It would be so awesome if this was our only job.
Ricardo- I think with Course Stories, it takes a village.
So we've actually pull in our IDs.
So the ID who's running the interview
will be doing scheduling, will be doing the pre-interview,
connecting with the instructor,
which also probably helps them,
'cause sometimes they're not always familiar
with the instructor that they're gonna be interviewing.
Mary- They write the show notes also.
Ricardo- They write the show notes,
the show page. Mary- Huge help.
First season, I did it myself
and I was like, "Oh, I'm dying."
I'm just drowning in work.
I would be up to nine o'clock at night,
trying to get the episode published for the next morning.
It was just a lot.
Sometimes I still do that.
Ricardo- But also it is a lot of work. (laughs)
Mary- It's a lot of work.
Ricardo- But also you can tailor it.
So we do seasons.
Instead of doing some weekly show,
we do every other week for a season,
so that way we have six episodes per semester
and that's a little better for our bandwidth.
Mary- We do find, though, we're still under the gun,
because the process of creating a podcast
and especially ours, 'cause we do two separate recordings.
We do the original interview
and then we do our overlay conversation
after the conversation's completed.
So that alone, probably around three hours.
Then the editing process,
praise all that is holy in Ricardo Leon,
because that is the hardest process for us.
Now he's also been training
other people on his team to do it.
So Jeff Aguila has been completing these for us.
Aubrey's gonna do one for us.
So we're starting to pull more people in
as we recognize how much work it is,
but we were doing all of the work in the first season.
Christy- And you have a pretty large team, right?
Ricardo- Yeah, we do have a lot of resources,
but also I'm producing other podcasts for ASU
and some of those are three episodes a semester
or they're doing quarterly episodes.
As long as you're sharing it out to your listeners
and making sure that people are informed
that you're doing episodes,
I think that you're okay not to have that quotidian,
every week kind of thing that we listen to every day.
You don't have to be responsible for that, I think.
(upbeat music)
Ricardo- How do you guys pack for a conference?
Any tips, anything?
Or is there anything, special consideration?
I know that for me, as a media person,
I've always got to have field recorders and microphones
and so I am often wrapping my mics with pajamas and socks
and all sorts of things to make sure
that everything is nice and safe.
Is there any special considerations that you guys make
in terms of packing or traveling when you are doing this?
'Cause you're at work, essentially, too.
Mary- Absolutely, but then you have to have fun clothes,
because every time you're done with the conference,
there's still hangout time.
You're still conferencing, really.
Like when you go to dinner,
you are going to dinner potentially
in your conference clothes or did you wanna change?
Maybe you need another outfit that day.
Liz- So I'll say, when I did OLC, we were in Florida
and of course we were at the Dolphin and Swan
right next to EPCOT, Disney World, the whole thing
and as a big Disney fan, my biggest struggle
was how many Loungefly matching backpacks
to take with my matching ears.
So that was a really hard thing.
The work stuff was actually really easy.
I just maroon and gold and black, matching ASU outfits.
Of course, my ASU ears,
but it was the post-conference outfits that really got me.
How do I Disney-bound professionally?
Tim- Ricardo, do you plan post-conference outfits?
Ricardo- Shorts, sure. (Tim chuckles)
Especially, we were in- Tim- It's not something
I would've ever thought of. (Ricardo chuckles)
Ricardo- That was a tough one,
'cause we were in Nashville, so it was a little humid,
but then also, we went downtown to the Broadway district
and so we wanted to keep our conference clothes a little bit
so we can look nice as we stepped out
onto the town that evening.
Tim- Do you guys use packing cubes?
Liz- I do. Mary- What?
Ricardo- What's a packing cube? Mary- I don't know what that is.
Liz- They're like fabric kind of compressing little cubes.
It's like a little square cube.
Tim- Bags within bags.
Liz- Yeah, it's bags within bags, I do use them.
I've taken a couple approaches.
Do I use the bag to put in one day's outfit?
So I just pull the bag and it's got everything I need?
Or do I separate by category?
So I have a bag for T-shirts, a bag for bottoms,
a bag for accoutrements, whatever.
Ricardo- What is this technology that it's compressing things down?
Liz- I don't know, I'm not a scientist.
(upbeat music)
Fred Telegdy- So, I'm sorry. Mary- Oh, name.
Fred- Gotta introduce, yup. - Thank you.
Fred- Fred Telegdy, I'm an instructional designer
at the University of Virginia's Darden School of Business
and we do have a podcast and I can't remember
the names of all the podcasts we have,
so I'm not gonna plug those, but my wife and I,
we have a personal YouTube channel that we do.
Mary- Oh, cool.
Fred- I'm actually not gonna plug that. (laughing)
Mary- That's fair, I get it.
Fred- Because we're not personalities.
We're behind the scenes
and we don't want to be personalities.
Ricardo- Is it ASMR? (laughing)
Fred- It's just me tapping my fingers on the table.
(people laughing)
But what I'll say is,
if you're interested in making a podcast,
just go ahead and do it, just do it.
But with a caveat.
Take the amount of content
that you think you want to do and cut it in half.
So if you say, "I wanna publish weekly,"
start by saying I'm gonna publish every other week,
because it's gonna take a lot more work than you realize
and that buys you double time right out of the gate.
So if you wanna do every month,
start with every other month,
because you can always go faster down the road
and what I'll also say is definitely invest
in good microphone equipment,
because the audio quality matters the most, even with video
and then just have fun.
Have a lot of fun and just be prepared for that pace.
It'll buy you some time.
Mary- And you would actually be surprised.
Your iPhones and probably Androids, too,
although I'm an iPhone user, they have really good mics.
So when we do our remote recordings, we started on Zoom,
but the processing, is that what it is,
the processor of Zoom, it just diminishes
the quality and so it was obvious
that someone's in studio Ricardo- And there's some sync
issues as well. Mary- And some were.
And so we actually have people participate
when they're remote.
In Zoom in a meeting, they put some headsets on
so that that sound is not coming into their open space
and then they have their cell phone
recording their voice very close to them
and then we overlay those files and then sync them up
and that, we've found, is actually the best way,
for our purpose, to capture
the sound from a remote location.
(upbeat music)
Liz- What's everyone's favorite thing to take?
What's your big thing that you're like,
"I gotta take this."
Either you gotta have it for the plane ride
or for the hotel?
That little creature comfort from home?
Mary- My toiletries, I just like all my stuff.
I might not use it, but I want it there
in case I wanna use it, that's kind of silly.
Liz- No, I get that, that's the hardest part.
It's very hard to not pack my entire house
into this small suitcase for a three-day trip.
Mary- I'm by myself, what if I wanna give myself
a facial or do my nails? (laughing)
(upbeat music)
Mary- Good! And there was a question over here, Tim's already
on it. Stephanie Ferguson- Not so much a question,
my name is- Mary - Wait, hold on, who are you?
What school are you from?
Stephanie- My name is Stephanie Ferguson
and I'm an E-learning designer with Trent University,
which is in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada.
And we are here actually, 'cause we won one of the awards-
Mary- Awesome, congratulations. Stephanie- For a project.
But what I was gonna suggest is sometimes,
it can be overwhelming for podcasting if you're thinking
like you indefinitely have to turn out these episodes.
Like for this project, we have a podcast,
but right now, there's 35 episodes, it's finite.
Obviously there's room to if they wanna update
and add more episodes, but as it is,
that was a manageable, kind of, finite package
that we produced and people can listen to.
Ricardo- It's a publication regardless of its form
and it's something that you can point to and say,
"Hey, this is something that you can engage with
and learn about what we're doing."
Stephanie- When we first brought the idea to the faculty member,
she was just like, "Oh, we're already doing YouTube videos
and text content and H5P interactive activities.
Do we really wanna take on a podcast?"
And so because we had the finite goal,
you don't have to keep doing this for years to come
and that was kind of more doable.
Mary- I have a question.
How long are each of those 35 episodes?
Stephanie- They range from around 20 minutes I would say.
So not crazy long. Mary- A commute.
It's great, thank you. Ricardo- And we're
producing some podcasts for courses as well.
Those are definitely,
you're not gonna have continued listens
across semesters with different students.
You're gonna have this document,
this publication that will exist and be reused.
Mary- You guys are playing the podcast game
very well, by the way.
Thank you so much, but also- Ricardo- It's fabulous, thank you.
Mary- We were like, "How is this going to work?"
(Mary and Ricardo chuckles)
Cris- I'm Cris Emberton and I have to leave,
but it's not because I'm not engaged.
Mary- That's okay, you were already engaged.
Ricardo- She's playing the game better than anyone.
Mary- Thank you for sticking with us as long as you did.
Beyond the 15 minutes so I feel like we did a good job.
Thanks, Cris. Ricardo- I think we got
someone sneaking out right with her, too.
Mary- That's okay. Ricardo- That's okay.
Cris- I have to make some edits.
Mary- And that's okay.
We're gonna come to session next.
Cris- She's with me.
Mary- That's fine, Jennifer.
I see you. (laughing)
Thanks to both of you for coming and participating.
Cris- Thank you.
Tim- So I had something to add about your question
about quality and about the amount of time investment
and Ricardo and I have been talking about this
that there's a threshold of effectiveness
that you can hit pretty well pretty easily
with some minor investment.
Some correct microphones.
A little bit of training on mic technique
or how to use your recording software.
But then at that level, it becomes effective
and it becomes valuable,
regardless of how much post-production you do.
This team does amazing post-production.
They create a very produced and very polished product
and that's great if you've got those resources
and you've got those time.
But let time be your consistent
and quality be your variable.
So if you know you have two hours a week to put into it,
then put two hours and get something that's good.
And then as you get better, you can up the quality
or up the production as you want to
or as you become more efficient
in your recording or your editing,
but there's gonna be so much value
in just having a thing that's good enough.
I know and I'm one of those.
There's always that conversation of,
"Is good enough, good enough or is it bare minimum?"
Mary- Done is better than perfect. Tim- If there's
instructional quality, if there's instructional value
in a good enough product, then it's worth doing.
Ricardo- Right. And I think one of the things, one of the rules
that we follow when we're producing podcasts
is that the format is the king,
is if you can have something that's consistent,
something that people can rely on, like a format.
So on our program, we have the intros,
then we have the interview, we have the injections
and then we have a closer.
It's a very simple format
and it makes it easier for you, too.
You start realizing,
"Wow, we hit 40 minutes almost all the time,
because we have this consistent format."
Fred- I wanna add on to Tim's comment,
because the question of time always comes up.
Our time is valuable.
So often we measure how long something's going to take
by the first time we do it and I can tell you right now,
the first time you do a podcast,
the first time you do a video, any of those things,
the first time is gonna be the longest.
The fifth time is gonna take longer
than the 10th time you do it.
The 10th is gonna take longer than the 50th time you do it.
Over time, I've developed efficiencies.
I've got keyboard shortcuts and all these kinds of things
that now, the amount of time it takes me
to produce a higher quality video,
and easily the same thing with a podcast,
the amount of time it takes me
to create a higher quality product
compared to what I did the first time
or even the fifth or 10th time, it's night and day.
And so make sure that you're not using those first few times
that you do it as the measuring stick
for what it's gonna be in the future.
Ricardo- And you can always remove those older episodes
if you feel like you've evolved beyond them.
Jason- And I'll echo that as well.
You can use our podcast as a,
people that are listening as a comparison.
We have a team of two,
which we do very much in our spare time
And we decided on the front end
that we couldn't dedicate that much time to it,
so one of the things we do
is use technology to our advantage.
We do use Zoom, we just use the Zoom recordings,
not 'cause I don't know how to get a better recording,
but because we don't want to deal with it,
the time that it takes to even layer
in the digital workstation or whatever.
And so we also use a program called Descript,
D-E-S, script.
Our Zoom file goes right into that.
It transcribes it and then it's shared
like a SharePoint or a Microsoft Word file
that both John and I edit like a Word file.
You can hit a button, it'll take out all your "ums"
and all your filler words if you want to.
It doesn't sound fantastic.
Yours admittedly sounds better and we're okay with that
just because we don't have a team
and we don't have the time.
But it's functional.
And we try to get a good quality enough
that it communicates.
We can take out filler words,
we can copy and paste things around.
And then if you wanted to, you could export it directly
to a audio file then to put up
and actually will even go right to your podcast platform
from Descript if you wanted to do that.
We do a little bit of editing with music afterwards.
Ricardo- But at this point, it's a template.
You have your music and you're just dragging
and dropping to the next- Jason- That's right.
Once you get the first episode done, as you were saying
and you just put it in there
and it's pretty simple in that way.
I really encourage people if they want to do it.
It's just talking and writing
and having these conversations.
It's thinking, it's thinking through things.
It's opening up a wider conversation to other people
and I think it's so important and it's so good.
Tim- And that's how the academic thing works.
Share ideas and then get feedback.
If we all keep our ideas to ourselves, it doesn't work.
(upbeat music)
Mary- Anything for you, Tim, any must haves?
Tim- No, I try to keep it simple.
I pack with the rule that you pack
and then you take out a quarter of the stuff.
Ricardo- Anything that doesn't bring you joy?
Tim- Intentionally scaled down,
more than you think you're gonna need.
Ricardo- We're dudes. Tim- Because you probably
won't need it. Ricardo- It's different for dudes.
Liz- I was like, "That's the Coco Chanel approach."
You look in the mirror- Ricadro- Take one thing out.
Liz- Take one thing off,
it's like the Coco Chanel for packing.
We'll call it the Tim McKean packing trick.
(Ricardo laughing)
Tim- It comes from a camping background.
Like if you're backpacking,
you don't wanna carry stuff that you're not gonna use.
I mean, did you bring home clean clothes?
Probably. Mary- Oh, that's funny.
So it's like there's the plus one model
for integration of things into your course,
just pick one thing you can change.
And then there's the minus one model for packing
for conferences. Tim- For packing, there you go.
(Mary laughing)
Plus one minus one.
(upbeat music)
Ricardo- We do have a call to action though, don't we?
Tim, can you kind of?
With the Uber drive back. Mary- Oh, that's right.
Ricardo- You gave us a great call to action.
Tim- So one of the things we talked about
was that the value in interviewing faculty
and using faculty as your resource for training
is that faculty really value
each other's opinions very highly, right?
And as an instructional designer,
I feel like sometimes I am seen as an outsider,
but if I can go and interview a faculty member
and it sounds like several of you
are doing very similar things of interviewing
and using that as training, that is so valuable,
because they see their peer doing it
and that gives it legitimacy,
but it also establishes that community of,
"Now I know that Jason's doing
a certain strategy in his class.
If I want to try that, I can go talk to him."
And another thing that came to mind, too,
was this idea of locality.
As you all are talking about your podcast,
since I'm thinking they're all doing the same podcast,
do we need 18 podcasts about interactive course design?
And, I thought maybe yes.
There is value in that locality of,
"This is the people I know on my campus that are doing this
and so now I'm building community
and I know what other people are doing."
There's so many silos and divisions in schools
that even if the audience is just in your own location,
there's still incredible value there
and incredible community to be built.
So we would encourage you to give it a go
even if you think, "I don't need to do it.
Mary and Ricardo are already doing it.
Why should I redo what ASU is doing?"
And the answer is because it's valuable
to your faculty and to their students.
Ricardo- And we'd also like to maybe extend our community,
our Course Stories community out to you all.
We've given you the links there
if you would like to just, on your cell phone,
interview one of your faculty about a course design
and we'd love to share that out
and make that part of our program
and part of something that we share out as well.
And so that's our call to action is to please follow up
and if you just wanna share a personal course story
or something about the OLC conference,
it's a form that you can just upload an audio file to
and we'd love to hear from you.
Tim- And if you wanna get more audience to your podcast,
sending them a Course Story- Ricardo- Yes.
Tim- Will help expand both audiences.
Ricardo- Yes and all of those of you who have podcasts,
we'd love to do some more crossovers.
We were able to join in on another podcast earlier yesterday
and we'd love to continue building
that community with you all.
Mary- And that is a great segue to the closing of our episode.
So does anybody have anything they'd like to plug?
We've already heard from Mac.
Claire- Mac Talks. Tim- Mac Talks.
Mary- M-A-C-T-A-L-K-S, Mac Talks.
Where can they find you, anywhere podcasts are found?
Claire- Anchor? Mary- Anchor.
Claire- Basically anywhere.
Ricardo- So if you're not familiar,
wherever you host your podcast,
wherever you upload your podcast,
usually it's a subscription based thing,
it'll create what it's called an RSS feed
and you can just submit that to iTunes,
Stitcher, anywhere you listen to podcasts,
that'll become part of a subscription thing
where people can subscribe to your podcast
and make it available to everybody.
That's one of our philosophies
we had discussions early on.
Do we want this to be available to everyone?
Yes, absolutely.
We want to be able to be agnostic
when it comes to where these things are being shared.
Mary- And then we have Online Learning in the Second Half.
Online learning podcast?
Jason- onlinelearningpodcast.com,
that's it. Mary- Boom.
Any other plugs in the room?
Stephanie- Ours is Understanding Homelessness in Canada.
Mary- Understanding Homelessness in Canada.
Stephanie- It's on Voice and Radio.
Mary- Awesome, on Voice and Radio.
And that's in Ontario? Stephanie- Yes.
So there's 35 episodes, we'd love (indistinct).
Mary- I will likely go listen to that.
I like the social oriented podcast.
We definitely wanna highlight you
and your bravery in speaking today,
'cause it is awkward being in these spaces and sharing
and so we thank you and thank you to all who have attended.
We hope that you found something from the session.
Ricardo- Thank you for being here.
(audience applauding)
(upbeat music)
Ricardo- Our first live show, thank you.
(upbeat music)
Ricardo- Thank you so much for listening to this episode.
Our first live episode at the OLC 2023.
Mary- I think it went pretty well,
considering we didn't know what we were doing
until the night before when we go to dinner with Tim
and he's like, "How about I hold the mic and I go
around the room and we're like, "Thank God." (laughing)
Ricardo- That was great, that was great.
We plied Tim with enough barbecue that- (chuckles)
Mary- It was a pretty good barbecue.
Tim- It was great. Ricardo- He joined in with us.
Tim- No, it was fun.
Mary- That was great, thanks for helping us out, Tim.
It was actually super fun to not only do the experience
of presenting at the OLC, highly recommend,
but hanging out with our colleagues,
getting to know each other a little bit better
and being there to support one another.
It just felt really like a awesome
community building opportunity for all of us.
Ricardo- Absolutely. Tim- Community building is key.
Ricardo- Does anybody want to add anything
before we wrap up this episode?
Mary- Go to the OLC's website, check out what they have offered.
I mean there's definitely two conferences every year
that we would recommend, Accelerate and Innovate.
There's a different program that they have
for online learning leaders, the IELOL.
So there's a lot of opportunities to engage in their space
and they offer a ton of workshops and certifications
and all kinds of goodies on their website.
So go there and check them out.
Ricardo- Great. Tim- Other conferences
like Canvas' conference coming up?
Mary- That was so fun.
Tim- QM does some good conferences.
Anytime you can get a chance to get out of your bubble,
interact with others from your own school
or from other schools.
I've met a few people from other schools
that do a similar job to me
and we've still been in communication.
So I would say 80% of the benefit that I got
out of going to the conference
was just in the connections and in the conversations.
Seeing what other people are doing,
knowing what other struggles are,
knowing that other people struggle with the same thing,
it's all beneficial.
Ricardo- And if someone wants to have a conversation with us,
have a little get together with us,
how can they reach out to us
to make sure that we're gonna be attending
the next conference that they're at?
Mary- If you wanna sponsor us, feel free to reach out
to coursestories@asu.edu, we're all available.
Tim- Have microphone, we'll travel.
Mary- That's right. (Ricardo chuckles)
Wrapped in a T-shirt. (laughing)
(upbeat music)
Ricardo- Course Stories is available
wherever you listen to podcasts.
You can reach us at coursestories@asu.edu.
Course Stories is produced
by the instructional design and new media team
at EdPlus at Arizona State University.
If you're an instructor at ASU online,
tell us your course story
and we may feature it in a future episode.
Thanks for listening.