The Office of Distance Learning & Instructional Technology provides pedagogical, course design and course development support to UNT Dallas distance learning instructors. We work together with the instructors to answer questions about online/hybrid learning by offering one-on-one consultations, group work in faculty labs, online teaching training and workshops throughout the year.
After completing DLIT's Request to Develop Online Course Approval Form, you will be ready to begin UNT Dallas' online course development process.
Course Development Process
- It is highly suggested the instructor finalize their syllabi content using the Distance Learning Syllabus Template which has the foundational information needed for online/hybrid students.
- Once the syllabus is finalized, the faculty membercan begin the pre-development process by reviewing program objectives, course objectives, learning materials, activities and assessments.
- Once aligned, the faculty member can request previously-taught content or the Canvas Development Course Template content imported into their Canvas shell for faculty to begin the development of their online/hybrid course. This shell was created with best practices in mind and fully embrace the OLC quality standards that we have been utilizing for the past couple of years. Using the template would only require editing related to academic content, interaction, student assessment and evaluation needs for the course. If faculty is starting fresh on a new course design, we would hope that they would see the value in the course template content as a quality control tool and allow them to focus on the content and evaluation. (Note: If courses have already been approved as meeting quality standards or have been in development without this template, they can continue to develop outside of the template if the faculty wishes to stay in the current format or request the most current template shell by clicking on this Canvas Development Course Template Request link.
- Ideally, faculty would commit to a 14-week course design/development process to have distance learning courses approved prior to the beginning of a new semester term. However, if a course is added late to the official class schedule, DLIT can accommodate adding the course to the schedule of classes with the understanding the faculty member will commit to completing a development process that will result in an evaluation of the quality standards by the end of the upcoming semester. Faculty has the option to work independently on their course design/re-design or partner with our instructional designer and/or instructional technologist specialist for consultation, full course development or to answer questions about online teaching and learning.
- Conduct OLC Quality Self-Review. The faculty member is responsible for conducting their quality self-review of their course prior to meeting with the instructional designer. With the annotation of the (19) new standards (7 required and 12 support for required) highlighted in the new OLC Rubric Checklist 4.0 version, faculty are encouraged to review the annotated links on our Distance Learning Course Quality Review webpage. These quality standards are direct requirements from the Department of Education that stipulates the need for Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) between instructors and students in distance courses. New courses developed will be reviewed on these new standards as well as the old standards. However, DLIT will also need to implement a process to help current courses also meet these standards given that non-compliance could impact our ability to offer financial aid for our distance courses. (Click on the Distance Learning Course Quality Review menu link located on the For Instructor menu).