Shake and Bake: The Power of “And I Helped” in Learning Design
The Shake and Bake Principle If you grew up watching television in the 1980s or 1990s, you may remember the old Shake ’n Bake commercials. A parent would be making dinner, a kid would help shake chicken in a bag of seasoning, and at the end the child would proudly announce, “Shake ’n Bake… and […]
Rethinking Video Length in Online Learning to Align with Cognitive Demand
Why Do We Question How Long Videos Should Be in Online Learning? When designing and working with faculty, we have tried to maintain our suggestions for video length, recommending that videos be no more than 5-7 minutes in length overall. This guidance has been backed by our own team’s experience, as well as much of […]
Belonging by Design: Building Trust and Connection in Online Learning
Online learning has solved many problems of access. It has made it possible for working adults, military-connected students, parents, caregivers, rural learners, and place-bound professionals to pursue education without stepping away from the rest of their lives. But access is not the same as attachment. As AI becomes embedded in online learning, institutions face a […]
Emotional Safety in Online Learning: A C.A.R.E. Framework for Human-Centered Digital Teaching
Introduction It is Monday morning, and a learner logs into an online course to begin the week. The assignments are posted, discussion prompts are visible, and an announcement outlines upcoming deadlines. Yet before engaging, the learner pauses. Is it acceptable to use an artificial intelligence (AI) tool to brainstorm ideas? What does the instructor mean […]
Accessibility Isn’t a Compliance Problem. It’s an Organizational Change Problem.
Higher education doesn’t have an accessibility problem. That sentence probably sounds strange coming from someone who spends much of her professional life helping my college prepare for the April 2027 ADA Title II compliance enforcement deadline. Yet after working with faculty, instructional designers, administrators, and accessibility specialists across my institution, I’ve become convinced that accessibility […]