1 | P a g e

Open Education Resource-Basics of

Technical Writing

Submitted by

Dr.R.Latha Devi and Dr.B.C.Anish Krishnan

Nayar

Department of English

University College of Engineering, Nagercoil-

629004

Contents

Section I – Introduction

Section II - Content Decisions

Section III – Description of Open

Education Resources (OER)

Section IV - Effectiveness

Section V – Individual Effort and Collective Effort

Section VI - Collaboration: What Next?

2 | P a g e

Section I

Introduction

1.1 Brief Overview: This course, Basics of

Technical Writing aims at providing an

introduction to the field of technical

writing to learners who are new to it. This

course is makes extensive use of ICT. It

enables 360 degree, 24X7 learning

opportunity.

1.2 Rationale: Technical Writing plays an

important role in the academic and

professional life of Engineers and other

technologists. It has been found that more

than 50% of the lives of Engineers are

spent in technical communication. But much

attention is not given to it in existing

curriculum. Providing them with a basic

course would help them in their academic as

well as professional life.

1.3 Target Audience: The course is basically

designed for first semester BE students who

have to learn this as a part of their

Communicative English paper. However, the

course will be useful for any beginner of

Technical Writing

1.4 Tags/Characters: Writing, Technical

Writing, Flipped Class Rooms, Out of Class

Video

1.5 License: Creative Common License –Common

Attribute

3 | P a g e

Section -2

Content Decisions

It was decided that the course will provide

a basic introduction to students on Technical

Writing.

2.1 Content Decisions: a) The course shall

contain short videos not exceeding 10 minutes,

screen casted videos, power points. b) The

content shall be at a beginner level. c) The

content shall be simple, uncomplicated and make

use of simple language d) the content shall

have LbD activity space embedded in it.

2.2. Pedagogic Decisions: The Course shall

provide complete learner autonomy. The course

shall make use of assessment techniques such as

Knowledge Quiz and Reflection Quiz that helps

in recalling and application.

2.3. Technological Discussions: The course uses

technologies such as screen casting, movie

maker, wordpress blog https://basicsoftechnicalwriting.wordpress.com/

Google forms and such.

4 | P a g e

Section 3

Description of the OER

3.1. Learning Objectives: To provide an

introduction to technical writing and kindle an

interest in it.

3.2. Learning Outcome: Once a student has

completed this course he/she will be able to

define technical communication from normal

communication and understand the importance of

technical communication.

3.3. Structure of the Course: The course will

have three modules with questions after each

module. The modules will have videos/screen

castings/power points. The students will be

given an option to do the course in the

wordpress. Discussions will be moderated.

Feedback will be obtained through Google forms.

3.4. Given below are a few screen shots of the

wordpress blog.

Module 1

5 | P a g e

Module 2

Module 3

6 | P a g e

Module 4

Module 5

7 | P a g e

Section IV

Effectiveness of the Course

4.1. The effectiveness of the course was

analyzed with the help of a questionnaire that

was distributed through Google forms. Given

below is a screen shot of the same.

8 | P a g e

4.2. The course was found to be very effective.

The outcome chart is given below.

4.3.It was decided to include following changes

in the future.

a)To include more questions

b)To ensure the display of right answer and

rationale

c)To provide a progress report to the students.

9 | P a g e

Section V

Individual Efforts and Collective Efforts

The team consisted of two members,

Dr.R.Latha Devi and Dr.B.C.Anish Krishnan

Nayar. A log of discussions is provided below.

30/9/2017 : Preliminary meeting and

discussion

2/10/2017 : Fixing Learning Objectives

and Learning Outcomes

3/10/2017 : Lesson plan

4/10/17 : Evaluation strategies

5/10/17 : Technological Strategies

6/10/17 : Preparation of Scripts for

video lectures

7/10/2017 : Preparation of questions

8/10/2017 : Editing and review of

materials

20/10/2017 : Hosting of the course

30/10/2017 : Student feedback

01/11/2017 : Analysis of Student feedback

and preparation of report.

10 | P a g e

Contributions of Dr.R.Latha Devi(Team

leader) : a) Determined the appropriate

technological tools c)designed the word press

d)hosted the course in Word press e) prepared

the quiz questions e)Produced Screen casting.

Contributions of Dr.B.C.Anish Krishnan

Nayar: a) Identified the course b) designed

the course module c) produced videos d)

obtained and analyzed student feedbacks. e)

Prepared the report.

Joint Achievement: OER and an Online Course

on “Basics of Technical Writing” was designed,

developed and hosted. Feedbacks were obtained

and the course is now a part of OER corpus.

11 | P a g e

Section VI

Collaboration: What Next?

It has been decided to collaborate with similar

teacher developers all over the world and

develop a complete “Technical Writing Course”.

The current course “Basics of Technical Writing

“ will be the first unit in it. There may be

four more units.

Reference:

1. Anderson, Technical Communication,

Cengage Learning publications,New Delhi.

2. Farhathullah, English for Business

Communication, Prism ,Bangalore.

Thank You for the Patient Reading

Dr.R.Latha Devi

Mail Id – lathadevigiri@gmail.com

Dr.B.C.Anish Krishnan Nayar

Mail Id – anishkrishnannayar@gmail.com

12 | P a g e