Course Development and Support

The amount of time it takes to develop a course depends on a number of factors, but the biggest determinants are the instructor’s capacity for committing time to the process and how much content has to be developed. Typically, CITL recommends planning to work with an instructional designer for a year in order to create a fully designed and developed course. We understand that not everyone can make that level of commitment, and we are ready to meet you where you are at, and we are happy to help orchestrate a timeline for development that works for you and your schedule. It’s been proven that little changes in teaching can make a big difference in how your students learn, and many instructors work with us to make effective and manageable changes over longer periods of time.

Most of the instructors we work with are addressing smaller issues with their class instead of committing to a major overhaul. We’re happy to have conversations about anything connected to your course, and we can design a plan for any development that works with your schedule.

Here are a few examples of the way instructional designers have assisted UMaine instructors during the past year:

• Filming lecture videos for UMaine and UMM instructors for in person and online courses.
• Integrating the tools of the Hackerspace into multiple courses across many disciplines.
• Designing ways for instructors to enable their students to collect, analyze and visualize geospatial data using ArcGIS Online.
• Filming demonstration videos in the lab that students watch as part of their pre-lab prep.
• Developing video scenarios that help students prepare for future careers by asking them to respond to real-world situations in class.
• Filming guest presentations with experts in the field.
• Designing assessment strategies that allow instructors to provide meaningful feedback in a timely manner to large courses.