Unit 1 work overview

Tasks are described below. The hyperlink in the title jumps to the task reply by the student.

SCENARIO:- You are employed as an IT training officer and have been asked to prepare some training guides on the use of Email for IT users within the company. You are required to prepare written training materials in two different versions: one for non-technical users and the other for users with good technical knowledge of IT.

Task1 - writing for a non technical audience (P3).

You need to write a beginner's guide to using Microsoft Outlook. Your guide must explain how to carry out all the basic tasks required in detail, including:

How to open Microsoft Outlook.
How to receive an email
How to send an email
How to add an attachment to an email.

It is very important that you communicate IT-related information in a non-technical audience effectively and as such should avoid technical jargon. Think about the features you can use that would help a non technical person best understand the information that you are communicating.

Task2 - writing for a non technical audience (P2).

Develop your guide to make it suitable for a competent IT user. The guide only needs to cover the basic tasks briefly and should have more detail on advanced features, including:

How to add folders to the inbox to help organise emails
How to add a rule to help manage spam
How to create mailing lists
How to organise the viewing panes to suit the user.

It is very important that you communicate IT-related information to a technical audience effectively and as such you can assume that the audience has a better understanding of Microsoft Outlook.

At the end of the two tasks you should write a brief summary to detail who the target audience is for each of the guides. You should also state how the styles and features of the two guidews contrast and what malkes the features useful for the particular guide.

SCENARIO:- Your user guides have been a huge success. A new company directive means that all email users are required to include an email signature on their emails. Your manager has asked you to communicate this in three different ways to the entire company.

Task3 - Effectively communicate and exchange information (P1)(P4).

Prepare and give a presentaton on setting email signatures which is designed for non-technical users of IT within the company. You are required to give this presentation to all new employees at their induction. Your presentation should use animation to help engage the audience. You should use speaker's notes to describe what you will say when presenting each slide.
Create a single side poster showing users how to set up an email signature on their emails.
You are required to email the completed presentation and poster to your manager in order for them to upload it onto the company intranet. Your managers's email address is Luis@academy.com

SCENARIO:- Following on from the training materials you developed in the first assessment activity, you have now been asked to prepare some materials that explain the social impacts of IT and describe the negative implications of IT on social communications.

Task4 - IT in society (P6)(M2).

Explain the social impact of the use of IT. You may present your findings as a presentation, report or leaflet. You should consider the impact that it has on each of the following:-

Individuals.
Communities.
Society as a whole

Expand your report to describe the negative implications of IT on social communications. To achieve this, you will have to cover a variety of implications including:

Economic impact.
Legal (ownership,copyright, plagiarism)
Ethical
Inequality of access
Threats (cyber bullying, spam, phishing, denial of service)

(try to include examples where possible)

Task5 - Select, Set up and use a specialist communications channel (P5).

Your boss wants you to try out a new method of delivering the material and has asked you to choose and use a specialist communication channel. You are required to set up either a blog or a podcast to communicate the information you have provided in Task4. If you choose a blog, print a copy of your completed work.

Task6 - Justifying IT tools (M1).

Your boss has asked you to write a short report justifying the use of I tools used so far (Word, Powerpoint, Outlook, Blogs, Podcast, etc ). You must justify the tools used in terms of both safety and effectiveness. You may wish to cover topics such as securing personal data, data protection, firewalls and digital content when covering the safety aspect.

You will need to explain your reasons for your choice of communication tool. For example, the channel you chose might be better suited to the type of material you have produced (you will need to say why it is better suited over others), it may be more convenient for the users to access (again, you will need to say why it is more convenient) or it may be more secure to save or send the document in that way.

Task7 - Improving accessibility (D1).

Your boss now wants you to expand your report to explain how and why the use of specialist software improve accessibility to IT communications. You may wish to consider features of the software you use, such as Windows Accessibility Tools, or specialist software that can be bought.