MIT 542: Internship

MIT 542. Internship (1). Interns with the approval of their advisors and the program director select an appropriate internship experience with an off- or on-campus organization, which provides opportunity to apply knowledge gained from the courses.

Product

• Student projects of PED 266 - Eating Disorders Facebook group and GoogleSites Wiki
• Intership Performance Review
• PED 266 syllabus
• PED 101 syllabus

Context and Conditions

These artifacts were completed for MIT 542: Internship. Dr. Mahnaz Moallem was the faculty advisor and Dr. Cara Sidman was the supervisor.The internship took place during the Summer session of 2008.

I assisted Dr. Sidman as she redesigned two courses for the UNCW Health and Applied Human Science department. Our task was to convert PED 101 (Physical Activity & Wellness) from a strictly face-to-face course, to one that offered both blended and completely online options. Additionally, I worked with the redesign of an elective course, PED 266 (Applications of Computers in Physical Education and Health).

Scope

The internship took place in the Health and Applied Human Sciences department of UNCW. The department needed to offer an online option for its foundational PED 101 course. This course is core course. It has over 18 instructor's and is a requirement for each student. My position entailed assisting in all phases of analysis, design, development, implementation and evaluation. Additionally, a "train the trainer" series of training events were planned, designed, and implemented for the 18 instructors of the course.

Role

I was the only intern working with Dr. Sidman at this time. I felt my role was to answer her questions about the technology and techniques of online learning. for both PD 101 and PED 266. The reconstruction was dramatic and total. We had to design a way for the same objectives to be met in both face-to-face, blended and online courses. This took careful analysis and design. Without the positive and enthusiastic attitude of Dr. Sidman, it certainly would not have been possible.

Much of my time was spent managing the process. The timeframe for the initial pilot course was extremely short and required creative problem solving. Additionally there were many opportunities to practice development domain activities. I created many graphics, documents and websites.

For PEP 266, I was able to teach some of the material in the course. I'm most proud of the active learning that was designed into the course. In this course, I saw how instructional design can truly make a difference for the students.

Reflection

I believe that this internship put me in close contact with two growing trends in higher education: The conversion from a face-to-face to a blended or completely online delivery; and the movement to more active learning, student-based activities.

The real benefit of my internship was working with Dr. Sidman. She allowed me to get a perspective of how faculty work with technology and course design. The importance of the enthusiasm and positive reinforcement that she gave cannot be understated. It is a major factor in my decision to continue with instructional technology in higher education. Our collaboration was rewarding on many levels, and it's my hope that we continue to collaborate in the future.

After the internship, I continued to work with Dr. Sidman in both PET 101 and PED 266. I am extremely proud of the latter course because I was able to work directly with students and was able to express more freedom to design a course that reflected my education philosophy.