Hello Online BBA faculty!
The following guide will help you as you build out a iCollege course for the Online BBA Degree Completion program. These tips are intended to assist instructors and designers with design decisions on module structure, user navigation, imagery, icons, and more. Our insights were informed by a preliminary user research project, which included design analyses, interviews, and a validation survey with current GSU students. This feedback helped us identify the best practices for Online BBA interface designs. We recognize that these design suggestions may not apply to every course in the program, but our hope is that incorporating these insights can provide a more consistent experience for our students.
Course Homepage
When students begin a course in iCollege, the homepage is the first page they encounter. Student interviews revealed that when first entering a course, most students look for course announcements, schedules, instructor contact information, group project requirements (if applicable), and synchronous meeting requirements (if applicable).
We suggest:
- Implementing a two-column widget-based layout for the homepage, with Announcements and Calendar located in the top row.
- Include links to Course Home, Content, WebEx (if applicable), Assessments, and Grades on the navigation bar to simplify navigation.
More course homepage insights →
Welcome Module
The Welcome Module is the first module in the course, which serves as an orientation point for students when they begin a new course. Student interviews indicated that students need information such as course syllabus, weekly schedules, instructor details, course expectations, instructions for using external educational tools, communication policies, and guidelines for group projects during the first week of the course.
We suggest:
- Including three submodules in the Welcome Module: Course Syllabus, Welcome Activities, and Tips for Success, to provide information and resources for students to start a course.
- Including a brief welcome message in the description field of the welcome module to set a welcoming tone.
More welcome module insights →
Content Modules
A content module is a collection of related educational materials, resources, and activities. It can organize course content by weeks, topics, or other structures. Students preferred an action-oriented structure design, which breaks each content module into manageable, organized segments.
We suggest:
- Grouping module content and activities into three submodules: Study, Apply, and Review, each aligns with specific stages of learning.
- Creating a to-do checklist under the Study submodule.
- Featuring direct links to course materials in the Study submodule.
- Grouping actionable activities and assessments into the Apply submodule, and building assignment directions directly in the Assignments tool.
- Including a preview of upcoming modules and reminders about impending assignments in the Review submodule.
- Building special content modules that provide information about group projects and/or external learning tools.
- Including the Mid-semester Survey to collect student feedback.
- Carefully evaluating the user experience before incorporating tab or accordion HTML page layouts.
- Check that all due dates are updated at the beginning of each semester.
More content module insights →
More materials and activities insights →
Communication Tools
Our goal was to explore how instructors communicate with students via Intelligent Agents and Announcements in course designs. Intelligent Agents is an iCollege feature that automates various tasks, such as sending iCollege emails to students based on their course activity (e.g., logging in, grades, etc.) or lack thereof. Intelligent Agents were not present in every course. Online BBA courses typically used intelligent agents to remind students to access course content, nudge students to submit missing work, and provide automated feedback on assessments.
Announcements are a homepage widget where instructors can post important messages to the entire class. Typically, BBA instructors included a clear “call to action” in the welcome announcement.
We suggest:
- Including guidance for students to understand how agent messages work and how to set up email forwarding.
- Consider using Intelligent Agents to remind students of inactivity and incompletion, and providing feedback. Consider partnering with a CETLOE Learning Technologist to ensure that agents are set up correctly.
- Posting course announcements via both email and the Announcements tool.