to interfere with your teaching. p> 7.0 NOW YOU MAY START YOUR COMPUTER There is an ongoing debate as to whether one should do all or some of the web work oneself, or if the work should be jobbed out. I enjoy working with the web, I have instructional design training and have been involved in courseware development for quite a few years and so, as long as I have more time than financial resources, I will do the work myself. There are many very good professional agencies that can be contracted to produce courseware for you. These agencies can be contracted to do a wide range of the jobs necessary to complete any type of web-based application. There are probably agencies within your institution who specialize in instructional design and courseware development. These units should be consulted. For certain areas of the development that you do yourself, you will need some specific skills. 7.1 Skills and Talents 7.1.1 Essential Skills (Talents) You will need to be very familiar with these or will need access to people who are and can do these aspects of the job for you. 7.1.1.1 HyperText Markup Language - HTML Stands for HyperText Markup Language, and on a scale of one to ten, learning the basics of HTML is about a three. The web is a great resource (see the Resource list below), and there are a plethora of good books on the subject. I keep the most current version of Teach Yourself Web Publishing with HTML in a Week by Laura Lemay near my computer. As with all aspects of the WWW, the print support is changing constantly, but the most recent edition is usually the best. 7.1.1.2 Instructional Design Again, there a large number of excellent resources and my favorite is Jerry Kemp's The Instructional Design Process (New York: Harper & Row, 1985). It is however, out of print, and this is one case where I do think the next edition was not as good as the first. Another good choice is, Robert Branch's Common Instructional Design Practices Employed by Secondary School Teachers, Educational Technology, 34, (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Educational Technology Publications, 1995). 7.1.2 Optional Skills (Talents) 7.1.1.2.1 More HTML The more familiar you become with HTML, the more you will be able to enhance your course's web site. This can be a good thing, and it can also be not so good. Adding components and extra "Bells and whistles" to your web site should be done as a conscious choice to support your educational objectives and not just because the "Bells and whistles" are there. 7.1.1.2.2 CGI Stands for Common Gateway Interface and is the coding that allows the information collected from forms on webs sites to be manipulated. This can be as simple as allowing students to send specific assignments to you, or can be as elaborate as on-line registration. 7.2 Components of the Web Course Every Web-delivered course will have a number of components. These will vary depending upon your needs, your style and the degree of interactivity in the course. There are some components that should be part of your site, in order to make the course appealing to your customer. I feel that some components of a web-based course are essential and others are optional. 7.2.1 Essential Components These can be divided into static and dynamic. 7.2.1.1 Static Components These components change very little. They can be put on your web site and only updated as needed. 7.2.1.1.1 The Course Description This will often come directly from your University calendar. 7.2.1.1.2 The Professor This can be as informal or as formal as you like. What kind of first impression do you wish to make? How much do you wish to add? Do you wish to link to your own personal Web site (if you have one)? 7.2.1.1.3 Prerequisites Again, this can often come from your university calendar. It is always a good point to specify any particular computing hardware, software or skills that will be required for students to be able to take your course. 7.2.1.1.4 The Text Here is a nice place to put a scanned cover of the text - along with the ISBN, the publisher and all of the information needed for your potential students to acquire this text. Here is a good place to put a link to your institute's bookstore - assuming it has a web site. 7.2.1.1.5 Communications This is where you put as much information as you can about how students can reach you. Will you have office hours? Virtual office hours? Can they reach you via Email? How do they reach each other? Is there a listserv, a secure server? 7.2.1.1.6 Grading Students all seem to want to know what they have to do to get a mark. This is a good place to tell them about assignments, quizzes, mid-terms and finals, and any other expectations you have of them. 7.2.1.2 Dynamic Components These components may change often. They might be updated, or supplemented once a week or every few days. 7.2.1.2.1 Bulletin Board This gets used much more in the first part of the class. As the class gets "...
