The Learning Design Sequence is illustrates as follows.

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WHAT STUDENTS DO
As per the learning design sequence, students engage in the following activities:

• Choose or are assigned a role.
  Students may choose or be assigned to a team to play one role (this is optional, however most learners report that team-work, although time intensive, is educationally valuable). Students then read the role description and research the role and the camp in which the role is situated (that is, Convict Camp or Officers Mess) in order to obtain an understanding of the role’s strategic goals (including both public and private agendas).
• Publish a public role description and familiarise themselves with the other roles.
  The publishing of a role description could be optional in a cut-down version but most students comment that this assessment task really gets them into the role firmly. *
  Read other learner’s public role descriptions (if the above task is not done by the students then the teacher/designer will need to ensure that public role descriptions are available to all).
• Make contact via email with other roles that may be useful to furthering the role’s strategic goals and read, research and understand the "kick-off" scenario.
• Publish a petition or resolution: Convicts as a group negotiate to publish a petition to the Governor* and officers negotiate to publish a resolution*. The moderator releases "kick-start" scenarios depending on the direction of the discussion. If any students are in the Governor’s role, they publish a decision or arbitrate further.*
• Conduct a collective online debrief. The moderator declares the role-play finished and then facilitates the online debrief. Students submit an individually written reflection. *

* Assessment task

SIGNIFICANCE OF ORDER

The activities are designed to be completed in the sequence described above (that is, as illustrated in the Learning Design Sequence).

CRITICAL ACTIVITIES
A cut down version could have one learner per role rather than a team for each role and could omit learner publication of public role profiles. It is tempting to say that a cut-down version could omit publication of a final agreed resolution because that task likewise takes time. But omitting an agreed endpoint to be reached would be merely providing the role-play as a social experience. In some contexts this may be valid but the learning would likely be only surface learning with regard to the specific historical content and the generic negotiation skills listed in the learning objectives.

ACCESSIBLE RESOURCES
All resources are online. In addition to the role description and scenarios which are online at the role-play site, the main resource is at: Firstfleet.uow.edu.au

This includes a searchable database about convicts and their crimes plus maps, rations for the first two years, excerpts from journals of the time, and some short analytical articles about issues.

RESOURCES IN CONTEXT
Real historical information is difficult to track down in class time and the website brings it all to learner’s fingertips in one accessible place.

The First Fleet website is optional as a resource although the role-play is richer for having the historical information readily available.

SUPPORTS SUPPLIED
Support is provided in the form of moderator/s, team members, other learners.

SIGNIFICANCE OF SUPPORT STRATEGIES
The support strategies ARE the learning design in the same way that the assessment IS the learning design. The learning design is about communication and interaction and the support structures provide that interaction.

SUPPORT STRATEGY ADAPTATIONS
The teacher as moderator is central to the role-play in order to encourage learners to interact with other learners, to help them to stay in role, to decide when to insert "kick-start" scenarios, to arbitrate on unacceptable etiquette, to decide when the role-play is finished and to debrief learners. Use of more moderators could be considered, one per camp, depending on the class size.

Learners playing one role in teams is not essential but it can be more motivating and educationally effective.