View in D2L Brightspace
EMS 105 & 106 are two parts of the prepatory courses to take the NREMT: the national exam to become an EMT. Both courses were designed for hybrid, remote and face-to-face delivery. The course objectives for both are:
- Perform basic elements of patient assessment.
- Form a general field impression of patient condition based on basic patient assessment tools.
- Integrate knowledge and observations in the clinical setting to delineate the EMT roles and responsibilities.
- Assess, treat, transport, document, and verbally report for a variety of medical emergencies.
Specific Design Elements & Rationale
Conservative Design | Homework Site Support
This course utilized MyBrady Lab (Pearson) for the text, lecture slides, and 50% of the formal assessment. Therefore the goals of the development were to maximize the resources available through the publisher, and focus on how best to clearly communicate the responsibilities of the student. As part of the development template, this meant identifying the module work in the beginning and end of the module. In addition, rather than creating new, we chose to transform the existing slides into an HTML page with the homework site chapter mp3 reading available to support additional student use. Focusing on a smooth integration with the textbook site was the top priority.
Ill-Structured Problem Solving | Branching Scenario Simulations
In addition to the transformation and utilization of publisher materials, we worked with the SME to create potent instances of intentionally ill-structured situations that mimicked what the student would face in the field. The problems would include a basic scenario, and questions that could not be realistically solved “perfectly” with the information given up to that point. This encouraged students to learn the benefits of initial, secondary, and further assessment of the patient (a core skill and concept integration point of an EMTs work).
Connected User Experience | Pearson MyBrady Lab + D2L Brightspace
One of the most challenging aspects of building this course was to test and refine the student (user) experience of navigating both the homework site and D2L, and having the two communicate the necessary information in order to make the connection seamless. This included working very closely with the SME in defining, and redefining, the graded items given the benefits and limitations of both tools. Beyond just the integration connection points of these two tools, there was a pass-through (Redshelf) which presented additional challenges for seamless connection. In the second iteration of the course, we further refined the gradebook and created a manual for future instructors to pair the two sides of their course (MyBrady Lab and D2L).
Branching Scenario Example
Below is an example of one of two branching scenarios featured in EMS 105. This example comes early in the course, and is meant to be attempted multiple times. In EMS 106, we added this scenario for students to return to now that they have grown in knowledge to encourage them to reflect on their own learning process.