../It`t time to update everyone on a project I am working on. I hope you all will have a good read and tell me your ideas about WebCoursesBangkok.com
I am teacher here in Bangkok now for two years, teaching other peoples material as well as teaching a subject that at school, was my worst; English. So I thought why not start my own course on a subject that I am both passionate about and experienced in.
I have started creating my own course to teach people Web Design. Anyone can learn Dreamweaver, Photoshop and the other tools but its rare to find a course that teaches you all the other pieces of the puzzle that make up effective Web Design.
Got a question for you: "Why pay a stranger to interpret what you want, when you can do it yourself and know how you did it"?
It's a slighty retorical question in that if you knew how to do it yourself, you probably would. "If you want a job doing well, do it yourself" as the old saying goes and thats what I want to teach people to do. To create; to be Creative Creators.
First the story began at the place:TCDC (Thailand Creative & Design Center)
This is an amazing place and where I now do all my work as a freelancer. I am surrounded by thousands of creative books, and many creative peope. The vibe there is fantastic. It's impressive to look at and fantastic to work at. They have nice sound proof meeting rooms with four seats. Perfect for my small groups. So, stage one complete.
Then came the question of how I was going to teach. How would I get the users to learn the tools and how to use them all at the same time? So that is where the Blended Learning learning Idea came from. I would teach students at the TCDC but they would then complete self learning tutorials at home for Drewmweaver and Photoshop at home inbetween lessons. The timing quickly fell into place after asking friends. I would teach for 3 hours per session over a 1 month period.
Now the most important question, what was I going to teach. Well its important but also one that I enjoyed tackling. I went to a place called the Loft, which sells everything from stationary to pillow cases. I got myself a nice little notebook, because ideas for this course were flowing out of me like snot when you have a monster of a cold; quick bursts of sometimes messyness. I wrote down all the topics I think that make up what you need to know as a web desginer. I wrote down ideas for marketing forms, web site ideas, payment plans, worksheet designs... Everything. I then put the ideas into a excel spreadsheet which I then split up into the four week lessons:
Week1[ Planning ] - This is where CC's would learn what the web is made up of. From servers to domain names and everything in between. The main aim of this first week is to effectively plan for their web site. Their self learning task will be to learn the basic functions of Photoshop ready for next weeks design tasks.
Week2 [Design] - Students will then take their plan and begin designing their site. Using their new skills with Photoshop they will begin turning their paper designs into reality on the screen. This week will concentrate on design conepts. Their self learning goal will be to cut-up the design ready to create a HTML version next week.
Week3 [Development] - Students will learn how to create a template from their design, taking their imags and putting it into Dreamweaver. They will learn HTML and basic CSS as well as learning how to link pages, add forms and plan for Search Engine Optimisation. Their self learning task will be to finish adding their content to the site by creating additional pages from their newly developed template.
Week4 [Finishing] - This is often the hardest part of a site, finishing it off. The CCs will check their site after uploading it to a server. Here they can buy Hosting and Domain name and get ready to launch their site once they have tested it properly for usability, W3C coding standards, SEO and accability. Their self learning task will then to maintain their site.
Throughout the course I will give them support via the WebCoursesBangkok.com web site as well as answering any email queries they have. The main selling point of this course is that students will have a finished site at then end of the course.
"why pay someone else...."etc
Now I working on the Topic worksheets, start packs and I planning a Market Research push to find out what people want from a course like this.
So wish me luck and please give me any feedback or ideas you may have.
Thanks,
C
