Our version of questions to be asked about designing and running courses in virtual worlds:
Pre-course preparation:
Decision making process
What was your starting point in thinking about the design of the virtual course? For example, did you make use of any instructional design models from the literature or any other model? If you did not make use of any existing models, what initial decisions did you take to design your course?
If you used an instructional design model for your virtual course, was this model driven by any learning or teaching theories? Similarly, if you did not use a model, was your decision making about the design of your virtual course guided by any teaching or learning theories?
Aims/objectives
How were these shaped by the subject matter of the course, the age group of learners, the more general context of a)learners, b)tutors, c) institution running the course, d) other factors.
How will the mutual benefit of a virtual online course for students taking the course from different disciplines/universities/countries (etc.) be established?
Funding
How will the course be funded?What were associated concerns?
What issues may surface with respect to student fees? (For example, will there be state funding for students who are not registered to a univeristy but who are taking a online virtual course?)
Is it a commercial or non-commercial course? Fee-paying/non-fee paying?
Environment
Is it an open/closed environment? Why? What was the experience either way?
Learners
Are students of other institutions engaged in the course? When a learner appears how do we know it is the registered learner?
Have the participants received previous SL training? In which format [video tutorials, workshops]/ how long?
Logistics-timetabling
How will virtual worlds be implemented? As blended learning, as distant learning, compulsory,…
How are the sessions organized? [number of participants/ duration]
What are the roles of administrators?
What are the needs of administrators/ course designers/ course tutors/ learners
Course syllabus (didactics)
Have the activities/ tasks that are going to be part of the course been tested before the course?
Who has designed the activities/tasks? [instructor self or external]
Has the course syllabus been validated by external bodies?
Do all the activities/tasks have the same design format/criteria?
How are these activities/tasks linked to their actual course content? [if the course is not entirely given in SL]
What is the SL tasks/activities weight in the course grade?
Production (resources and materials)
What resources have been prepared for your course?
Do participants have access to preparatory documents before tasks/activities take place in SL?
During the course
Technical issues and support
Did learners have access to technical support during the sessions? [if so, in which form?]
What technical issues were experienced, if any? Most frequently experienced issues?
If there were technical issues, how were they dealt with/resolved? Most common ways of solving issues?
Interaction
How was the interaction/communication between tutors and learners/learners and learners during the classes/outside of the classes?
Resources
Were resources shared/used/distributed effectively?
Ethical issues
Did any ethical concerns arise (e.g. from students or tutors) and how were they dealt with?
Any discipline issues? How were they dealt with?
Post- course
Assessment
Was there any formative assessment (week by week), if so, how was this done?
What other types of assessment?
Accreditation issues?
How were any appeals against grades dealt with?
Evaluation
How was the whole course evaluated? [by what means-e.g. interviews? and who did the evaluation?]
Were perspectives of different parties (course designer, course tutor, administrator, learner) taken in the evaluation?
Evaluation of tasks/materials:
Were tasks/activities evaluated individually?
How have the tasks/activities contributed to the goals of the course?
How have the resources/materials contributed to the goals of the course?
How has the evaluation been used?
Dissemination
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