You are developing an online course and are looking at a syllabus for your fifteen-week traditional version. You just reviewed Cognitive Load Theory, that states that students learn more effectively when content is ‘chunked’ into smaller parts. But that is hard and you have a 15-week schedule already made.
Can’t each week be a module? This is generally not the best practice.
- Students should associate the module with specific content and a module titled, “Week 1,” is not very informative about the content and to anything other than the temporal relation in the course.
- Modules that are longer than week allow for much needed time for students to be more successful with learning activities. Discussion sections and other collaborative exercises are more successful when they allow for reflection and when that affords time for communication.
- This many divisions of concepts exceeds a person’s cognitive load limits. The students will struggle at connecting vital concepts of the course and their success will be impeded.
- The course cannot be easily be re-purposed for anything other than a fifteen-week session.
Remember: If you are going to spend the time making a great
course, you might as well make the most of your effort.
