ease Design Principles Tim Kelly University of Warwick

Today’s Talk  What is ease?  Design principles behind ease  Methodology / Process  Examples from ease discs  Not necessarily in that order!

What is ease?  Essential Academic Skills in English  Series of interactive CD-ROMs  Target users – tertiary students whose first language is not English but who study in an English speaking environment  Designed as self-access materials to improve academic English of users

ease CD-ROMs  Listening to Lectures Listening to Lectures Listening to Lectures  Seminar Skills 1 Presentations Seminar Skills 1 Presentations Seminar Skills 1 Presentations  Seminar Skills 2 Discussions Seminar Skills 2 Discussions Seminar Skills 2 Discussions  (English for International Conferences) English for International ConferencesEnglish for International Conferences

Why develop ease?  A lack of availability of good / authentic academic English listening materials for pre- sessional students  Commercial potential (finance)

ease: Design Principles  Research based  Data-driven

ease: Research Basis  Identified target users  Questionnaire – about difficulties

ease: Data-Driven  Do not assume you know the target language  Create a video corpus as a database of authentic language use

ease: Creating the Corpus  Filmed across faculties  30 + different departments

ease: The BASE Corpus  200 hours academic speech events  Transcribed into 1 million + words of academic English  Analysis using concordancing software  Able to know what authentic language use actually was

Ease: Development Process  Survey of user needs  Corpus of authentic video materials  Start development proper

Why bother?  Why not simply make up our exercises?  Research evidence reveals differences between authentic corpus and published materials

Research Evidence  Professor Hilary Nesi  Published materials vs. authentic corpus  Differences – lexical density, speed of delivery, interactivity, redundancy etc.  Therefore without the data you can get it wrong.

Analysis  Watch video clips  Use concordancing software to analyse transcriptions  Variation between functions dealt with in our materials and existing published materials  e.g. Comparing & contrasting / Referring to and evaluating sources

Content Development  Map out structure  Unit headings  Select video clips  Materials writing – activities and feedback  Editing video clips  Add audio

Programming  Agree authoring software in advance  Work closely with programmer  Programmer’s interests ≠ content developers  Maintain control  “It can’t be done.”  “It can!”

Error Identification  Error identification  Rewriting  Reprogramming

Piloting  Get feedback from users  Via questionnaires  Watch users working with your software  The floating vs. fixed window  Architect & arrows

Pedagogical Criteria: General  Scope & aims  Appropriacy of materials  Authenticity of materials  Integration of materials  Variety of exercise types  Appropriacy of exercise types  Gradual build up of skills (follow-up exercises)

Pedagogical Criteria: Exercise Level  Clarity of Instructions  Key language highlighted  Answers provided  Feedback provided: & quality of feedback: – explanations of why an answer is wrong? – staged feedback?

Technical Criteria  Tour / explanation of how to use courseware  Navigation – easy to find your way around?  Design: aesthetics & function: –user friendly?  Visuals: clarity & quality  Audio: clarity & quality  Help