The Effectiveness of ID Based Activities by e-learning Support Staff witha Website and a Course Material Designed by an Extended ARCS Model
Koji Nakajima
Osaka Gakuin University and Graduate School of Instructional Systems, Kumamoto University, Japan
nakajima@ogu.ac.jp
Hiroshi Nakano
Graduate School of Instructional Systems, Kumamoto University, Japannakano@cc.kumamoto-u.ac.jp
Fujio Ohmori
Graduate School of Instructional Systems, Kumamoto University, Japanf-ohmori@ge.kumamoto-u.ac.jp
Katsuaki Suzuki
Graduate School of Instructional Systems, Kumamoto University, Japanksuzuki@kumamoto-u.ac.jp
Abstract: In this paper, we present information about the effectiveness of the Instructional Design (ID)based activities aimed to assist faculty to become using e-learning materials smoothly and appropriatelyby the help of e-learning support staff. We proposed the ARCS+AT Model as an extension of the ARCS
Model which is one of the representative ID theories by Dr. Keller. The ARCS+AT Model resulted in the
ARCS+AT checklist with the aim of promoting e-learning at universities effectively and efficiently. After
testing the checklist at ten universities, the first author, as an e-learning support staff at one of the
Universities, created an ARCS+AT website for faculty at Osaka Gakuin University, and started
distributing information about the merits, examples and procedures of using e-learning in classes to gain
their attention and show them how to start, how easy and useful it is. A web-based e-learning unit forincreasing Information Literacy is one of the contents on the website. This unit is designed toencourage learners to learn by themselves, on demand and step-by-step. At the same time, this material
allows faculty to start e-learning in her/his class or seminar without any complicated preparations and it
encourages them to go forward with e-learning right away. Because awareness of information literacy
concepts and skills are important to many fields, and therefore, the whole or part of the material is usableand embeddable in various courses. E-learning support staff will provide a complete set of course
materials with some assessments on LMS so that she/he need not perform extra work before starting.
During the course, the faculty only selects items that are relevant. She/he will be able to review the
progress of her/his learners at anytime online. These points are highlighted in the distributed informationon the ARCS+AT website to allow faculty to gain confidence. This year, eight faculty in fifteen courses
at the university responded to the call for using the course material. We report the results and feedback
from the faculty to explain how it is working. Then, we will see, from a Faculty Development (FD) pointof view, how they are assisted naturally to become an instructor who uses e-learning through theexperience gained from these ID based activities.

Introduction
Japanese universities have started activities to develop e-learning or use ICT in education only recently.
According to NIME (2009), more than 70% of universities are using ICT tools in education and more than 50% areoperating an LMS (Learning Management System). However, they are having difficulties with achieving efficientand effective outcomes. For example, many universities identified issues such as, We dont have enough humanresources for operating and maintaining systems or creating educational content or Many faculty dont haveenough skills for using ICT tools properly for their classes. Against these issues, the e-learning support staff orsection in a university is expected to play one of the most important roles. E-learning support staff often need towork on the institutional level actions if they are going to solve the issues like those above. However, sometimes it isbeyond their administrative authority to take such action. At the quality assurance for education point of view, it is㪉㪐㪌real fact that many of Japanese universities have various structural issues (Ohmori, 2008). These issues also aremaking it difficult for e-learning support staff to move forward.
FD and ID might be keys for e-learning support staff. Every university in Japan must implement FD by law. If
staff suggest their own FD plan and if they are accepted, such plans might become institutionalized. ID theories canbe effective, efficient, and motivational in various educational settings. However, FD and ID efforts are still needed
since ICT oriented FD work has been practiced at only about 20% of universities (NIME, 2008). Most Japanese
educators are not well aware of ID (Suzuki, 2005). In contrast, research has identified ID factors that are included in
the responsibilities of FD staff (Suzuki, 2009). This suggests that ID is an important part of FD. In addition, planningand implementing e-learning will help universities clarify institutional functions or instructional issues. It is therefore
necessary for university e-learning support staff to understand these factors when managing ID based activities. The
ARCS+AT Model (Nakajima, 2009) is the only one based on ID theories, although there are some examples of asimilar checklist such as that used at Victoria University of Wellington (2007).
In this study, we present a practice of the ARCS+AT Model at a University which was ready to take thefollowing steps: 1) Provide e-learning support staff ID based activities, 2) Promote e-learning at the University
effectively and efficiently, 3) Promote ICT oriented FD work at the same time, and 4) Promote improving the
University.

The ARCS+AT Model
The ARCS+AT Model is based on the ARCS Model (Keller & Suzuki, 1985), which is one of the representative
ID Theories. This model provides e-learning staff with a useful checklist for helping to motivate faculty to utilize
e-learning and improve the quality of the course. In addition, this model is oriented to lead a university tosuccessfully implement e-learning. In this model, the relationship between e-learning Support Staff and Faculty
Members (instructors) at a university is equivalent to Instructor and Learners (Table.1). The ARCS Modelfeatures the factor of Appealing the instruction which makes learners want to learn again (or more) when theyfinish a course (Suzuki, 1995). The ARCS+AT Model, also, is purposed to appeal to the faculty to make them feellike utilizing e-learning in a class again.
Details of the ARCS+AT model are described by Nakajima, et. al. (2009). Table 1 and Figure 1 are reproduced
to illustrate the ARCS+AT Model.

T ABLE 1. COMPARING T WO MODELS

Users
Targets
Objective

The ARCS Model
Instructors
will
use this.
Learners will be
motivated.
To motivate learners
to learn
To guidelearners tobetterlearning
outcomes

The ARCS+AT Modele-learning
supportstaff will use this.
Instructors will be
motivated.
To
motivate
instructors to starte-learning
To implement
e-learning
properly in class
To guidelearners tobetter learning
outcomes
To lead
University toefficient andeffective
e-learning
outcomes

University㪣㪼㪸㫉㫅㪼㫉㩷
Instructor
e-Learning
Support Staff㪫㪿㪼㩷㪘㪩㪚㪪䋫㪘㪫㩷㪤㫆㪻㪼㫃㩷㪫㪿㪼㩷㪘㪩㪚㪪㩷㪤㫆㪻㪼㫃㩷㪣㪼㪸㫉㫅㪼㫉㩷
㪣㪼㪸㫉㫅㪼㫉㩷
㪣㪼㪸㫉㫅㪼㫉㩷

Instructor㪣㪼㪸㫉㫅㪼㫉㩷
㪣㪼㪸㫉㫅㪼㫉㩷

F IGURE 1. DOUBLE S TRUCTURE OF TWO MODELS㪉㪐㪍The ARCS+AT Checklist
The ARCS+AT Checklist consists of checkpoints relating to each factor of A, R, C, S and AT to clearly identify
the points for improving the management of e-learning at a university. The author tested this checklist at ten
universities and received feedback that this checklist worked well (Nakajima, et. al. (2009). This checklist, whiche-learning support staff can use, will make the issues to be solved visible and encourage the staff to start planning or
implementing for improvement. This does not mean to force them to take on more than they can by providing ideal
goals that are too hard to reach. In this way, they will develop an idea of what can be done and what path to take togo forward.
As a practice for using the checklist, the author implemented it at Osaka Gakuin University and identified issues
that needed to be solved. An outline of the results is shown in Table 2. It is evident that this University has a functionof supporting faculty in the area of using ICT for education, but was not ready for distributing information about
e-learning persuasively. As a result, e-learning was not actively carried out. In fact, the e-learning support section has
only two staff and what they can do is limited. The ARCS+AT Checklist suggests that e-learning support staff could
create and open the ARCS+AT Website as a solution and this has been started. This indicates that the University
made a step for e-learning using the checklist.
TABLE 2. RESULTS OF CHECKING AT A UNIVERSITY (OSAKA G AKUIN UNIVERSITY )using e-learning.
A-1: Perceptual Arousal
ICT related portal siteAT-3 ID (Instructional Design)
Have instructors notice that for faculty has been
Guidance
there are effective e-learning running. But it was not
Give information about themethods for courses.
focused on e-learning.
know-how of ID that makes
e-learning
relatedeffective e-learning become real.
A-2: Inquiry Arousal
distributions
Have instructors feel that it is paper
Confidence: I can do it if I try!
has
been
useful to distribute resources of which
C-1: Instruction Requirement
their research or teaching to provided are not well
Share the point of completion of
Also,
their learners and to think that organized.
using e-learning concretely with
Mailing list must be
they would like to use e-learning
the instructor.
used in better ways.
A-3: Variability
C-2: Success Opportunities
Make explanations to instructors We need to re-organize
Preparetocompare
the
about
the
effectivenessof the environment foreffectiveness with and without
distributing
e-learning as simple as possible.
e-learning.
information.
C-3: Personal Control
Relevance: I see the importance!
Give the instructor the initiative
R-1: Familiarity
We have done almost
also for the things related toShow instructors methods of nothing for this factor
e-learning in his/her course.
e-learning that can realize their becauseoftheSatisfaction: Im glad I did it!
ideal courses by talking about environmentfor
S-1: Natural Consequences
their actual courses.
distributing
Prepare a check sheet to give theinformation which we
R-2: Goal Orientation
instructor an opportunity to see
Show instructors the importance have to re-organize.
how the course was improved byof improvement by e-learning We would work on thise-learning.
and have them set a goal for factor as we work on
S-2: Positive Consequencesthere-organizatione-learning in their own course.
Let instructor realize the value
above.
R-3: Motive Matchingor the importance of e-learning
Provide the information forby the learners outcomes.
e-learning that fits their IT
S-3: Equity
literacy level. Try designing theMaintainastandardof
best pace for the instructor.
evaluation for the effectiveness ofAttention: Interesting!

Assistance & Tools: It is reliable!
AT-1: Tool Information
Give
informationabout
e-learning tools or systems that
instructors can use.
AT-2: Assistance Information
Give information about staff
support or assistance which
instructors can get regarding

We have provided the
support section andshow what we canclearly.
We have not explainedor proposed about ID
yet.

㪉㪐㪎

e-learning. Keep the system ofassistance to provide instructor
support equally.

We have done almost
nothing for this factor
becauseoftheenvironment
for
distributing
information which wehave to re-organize.
We would work on thisfactor as we work on
there-organization
above.

We have done almost
nothing for this factor,
A working group withfacultyhas
beenmanaged, though.
No
incentives
fore-learning activities.
We would work on thisfactor as we work on
there-organization
above.

Links
to
A
R
AT
C
S
Page

Detail Information

F IGURE2. ARCS+AT WEBSITE AND THE INFORMATION P AGE FOR THE WEB COURSE MATERIALThe ARCS+AT Website
The ARCS+AT Website is provided to the ARCS+AT Checklist users as a supplemental resource for improving
e-learning environments. If the results of using the checklist show that the university needs more opportunities to
distribute information about e-learning, this website would be a good solution. This website has links to information
related to each factor A,R,C,S and AT. Details of the website structure are described by Nakajima, et. al. (2009).
This website is constructed using simple techniques so that any e-learning support staff from any university can edit
and use it.
As described above, the first author used the checklist at a university. The University initiated an ARCS+AT
Website as a result to distribute the information about e-learning through the website. One of the topics is about ane-learning course material which was planned, designed and developed by the e-learning support staff themselves.
In order to gain the attention of faculty, the staff chose a theme for the course material that faculty wanted
students to learn. Staff posted information related to the course material production to inform faculty of its progress.
Since staff realized that when extra work is involved faculty will hesitate to get involved, they produced all of thecourse material, LMS settings, and learner manuals themselves. In this way, e-learning support staff has been trying
to pull Expectation and Value for e-learning (Suzuki, 1995) from faculty.
For examples, the top page of the actual ARCS+AT Website and the information page of the actions for thecourse material are shown in Figure 2.

ID Based Course Material
Information Literacy was selected as a theme of the course material for the following reasons: 1) Information
Literacy is one of the most important skills that all the students should acquire while they are attending a university(MEXT, 2008); and 2) It is more readily accepted by faculty as supplemental material for a class. We describe thecourse material (design, management and assistance) that has been implemented since April 2010.

㪉㪐㪏Material Design
Upon designing the self-paced learning material, ID models or theories were referenced, such as the hint lists in
the ARCS Model, 9 Events Theory or the Systematic Approach Theory (Suzuki, 2002, 2005). For example,
information is included at the beginning of a chapter so that learners will realize where they are in the course andwhat will be presented in each chapter (Figure 3). A formative assessment was conducted for appropriate revisions
made to improve the quality of the course material.
The course material consists of 15 chapters and the contents of each chapter are presented as simple html pages
and a set of LMS (Figure 4). Learners will read through the text pages and then complete assignments available
through the LMS settings. The outcomes of the assignments will be shared in the LMS so that all learners will be
encouraged by others. The instructor is able to check easily how learners progress by reviewing the management
function of the LMS. As a result, the instructor can identify learners who are not doing well and easily follow up
with them, too.
The course designers developed the material by themselves so as not to expend any funds. For creating the html
part, they paid attention not to use special techniques in order to allow any e-learning support staff to edit thematerial. Also, the LMS portion was created using only the basic functions that is available in any other LMS system
so as to maintain the generality of the design settings. This may be a good example that shows how it is feasible for asmall e-learning support section to develop e-learning materials. In other words, e-learning support staff from any
university may easily initiate e-learning by adapting this material to their own environment.

Assistance & Tools
After preparing the products, the support staff moved to the phase of announcing to faculty. They had alreadystarted distributing related information on the ARCS+AT Website and had sent the information through a mailing list.
When ready, the course material was made available and announced for use in the coming new semester. At the sametime, they provided faculty with LMS settings for practicing.
Some faculty responded to the announcement. E-learning support staff interviewed the faculty to review andshare their class goals, their purposes for using the material as well as their expectations. The information was
documented so that it could be reviewed at anytime. For the next step, e-learning support staff set up the LMS foreach class and provided a brief manual for students. They explained to faculty how to request help and what toexpect from the support staff. The objective was to have faculty gain confidence in using the course material without
extra work for preparation or implementation.

Learners
realize where
they are.

㧗

FIGURE 3. S AMPLE S CREENSHOT OF THE COURSE M ATERIAL㪉㪐㪐

Learners
realizewhat they are going
to learn and what
to do.

List of Contents
Block1
Block2Block3

Chapter
1-3
Chapter
4-9Chapter
10-15

Basic
informationofsystems and tools
HowtoCollect andmanage the information
How to consider andpresent the information

Web Text Material

Instructor
Observe
LMS

Set all up
e-learning
Support
Staff

Learn
Ԙ  ԙ
Learners

FIGURE4. THE O UTLINE OF THE COURSE M ATERIALTABLE3. LIST OF CLASSES USING THE MATERIAL

Class

Student Numbers

Seminar Class

About 10-25
About 15-40

Regular Class
About 300

Style
Self Learning + Assisted byFaculty in between
Instructed in Class
Self Learning + Assisted byFaculty in between
Self Learning + Assisted byFaculty in between

Class Numbers

8
3
3
1

Implementation
Eight faculty in 15 classes (587 students, mainly freshmen) were registered and started using the course material
from April 2010. The learning methods used were: 1) Self-paced learning which was assisted by faculty online or
off-line, and 2) Direct classroom instruction (Table3). Self Learning learners were guided to study each chapter
between every class and submit questions by e-mail or face-to-face for items they could not solve. Upon finishing thecourse, learners completed a paper presenting what they have learned and practiced while studying the course
material. In many classes, using this material served as an opportunity to practice writing reports or a thesis.
After six weeks, the author asked the faculty to complete a questionnaire. In the questionnaire, questions such as
the following were asked: 1) How is the faculty managing it? 2) How are the students studying? 3) Is assistance frome-learning support staff adequate or not? 4) How is it going? Faculty answered each question by select one of fivelevels between Yes and No.

Results and Expecting Effects
Although classes are still continuing, we attempted to determine how well the course material was working byreviewing responses to questions that were asked prior to the start of class (Questionnaire-1, Table 4) and in the
middle (Questionnaire-2 Table 5). In Questionnaire-1, faculty stated that This is worth doing. or We will be able
to work it out. This indicates that they understood and agreed with the goal and the impact of this material. We may
think that we were successful in guiding faculty to initiate e-learning.
However, the results of Questionnaire-2 must be carefully analyzed. The results indicate that some faculty arehaving difficulty managing the course material. Some are worried about the rest of the semester, although they feelthat the assistance received from e-learning support staff is adequate. This suggests that actions relating to factor C(Confidence) from the ARCS+AT Model are not enough. Conversely, we may be able to improve the situation bytaking appropriate actions relating to factor C from now. We will suggest that the e-learning support staff prepare a
new hint list for faculty and for students and that it should be released before this semester ends.

㪊㪇㪇We want to emphasize that the eight faculty, who identified problems that need to be solved, are the pioneers of
e-learning at this University. What they expressed will have the strong influence upon other faculty on campus.
Therefore, e-learning support staff will incorporate the information of their assessments in the ARCS+AT Website
after the implementation or evaluation of the course material. This information, including positive and negative ones,
will be shared with other faculty on the website and will encourage others to start thinking about e-learning. At thesame time, the eight faculty will revise their classes for the next implementation. Also, these faculty will present atconferences about what they have accomplished which will serve as meaningful information to other faculty visiting
the ARCS+AT Website. Through this cycle of activities, all information accumulated will help to promote e-learningat the University (Figure 5).
TABLE4.THE RESULTS OF THE QUESTIONNAIR-1

Q. Did you use LMS for your classes before?
Q. Is it easy for you to understand how to manage the course material?
Q. Do you think the course material can be useful to your class?
Q. Do you think the learning outcomes can give influence to his/ her other study?
Q. Do you recommend others to use this material?

Yes
4
7
8
6
6

No
4
1
0
1
1

(None)1
1(N=8)

TABLE5.THE RESULTS OF THE QUESTIONNAIR-2

Q. Are you running the material with no trouble?
2.43
Q. Is there any problem in the contents or structure of the material?
3.29
Q. Do students realize how to learn with this?
2.29
Q. Is it going along with your plan?
2.43
Q. Do you worry about any future trouble for the rest of the semester?
2.71
Q. Assistance from support staff: Is the information enough for you?
3.29
Q. Assistance from support staff: Is the support enough for you?
4.14
Q. Tell us what you noticed.
࡮ I am having trouble because the speed of each students study is getting different.
࡮ I dont understand well enough to know my own role in the management.
࡮ I need to arrange for integrating this material and my class.
࡮ I am having hard times to have students work on this.
࡮ The contents of the material will be a little difficult for my students.
࡮ In the future, it is better to arrange for providing another version of this material which should be
divided into some parts, so that it will make faculty easier to integrate with his/her class.
The numbers above are averages (maximum 5.00) for each question rated by faculty from one to five. (N=7)

Refer to the information.

Provide the informationof the results like theoutcomeortheassessment etc.

The ARCS+AT Website
Planning
for e-learning
Faculty

Assisted by e-learning support staff
F IGURE5. THE CYCLE OF THE ACTIVITIES㪊㪇㪈Implementation
at class
Faculty
Students

Conclusion
In this study, we presented information about the effectiveness of ID based activities for e-learning bydescribing an implementation project at Osaka Gakuin University. E-learning staff reviewed the e-learning
environment using the ARCS+AT Checklist and developed the ARCS+AT Website through implementing the ID
based course material. In the future, we will continue the activities and fully evaluate their effectiveness forpromoting e-learning. We plan to share the outcomes with the FD section at the University to institutionalize oureffort. Additionally, we will strive to improve the quality of the ARCS+AT related activities and demonstrate its
credibility as well as its general applicability in e-learning environments.

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