My idea was to provide plain language information as one component of my web site. When I surveyed Oregon staff in May of 1997, half or 50% expressed interest in learning how to develop easy-to-read nutrition materials via the Web. My idea was to develop modules that had certain characteristics: 1) they would be short - ideally it would take less than 10 minutes to complete them (keeping in mind that staff were challenged by time pressures); 2) they would contain key messages thus ensuring that the modules were kept short; 3) they would not be "tech heavy" or contain so many "bells and whistles" that users could not access them; and 4) they would not be costly (Guess what? There was no money to produce them).

In the summer of 1997 I drafted two modules and engaged nine people to review them - eight were from Oregon, one was from the Federal level in Washington, D.C.: 1) two nutritionists from the state health department; 2) one nutritionist from the Oregon Food Bank; 3) four Extension staff; 4) one nutritionist from the United State government's Food and Nutrition Information Clearinghouse, National Agricultural Library; and 5) one local literacy program coordinator.

Here is a sample module. (See: http://osu.orst.edu/dept/ehe/nutrition.htm) As you can see it is simple, it focuses on key messages - this one on writing style. It contains concrete examples that nutrition educators would recognize and it links to examples of nutrition education materials that apply the strategies mentioned in the module. As reinforcement the module ends with ways users can apply strategies.

The review of the two modules I developed was conducted via email in the fall of 1997. The two modules were somewhat different in content and length. The one titled "The Changing Face of Literacy" provided information about literacy - what it is, the extent of the problem in the U.S. and Oregon.. The module titled "Just Say It!" was very short and focused on one skill - writing more simply using word substitutions.

What did I ask of the field-testers? First: how long did it take them to complete each module? For the "Changing Face of Literacy" module this ranged from five to ten minutes, the average: 8 minutes. Field testers responded that the "Just Say It!" module took three to fifteen minutes to review, the average: seven minutes. (there was one person that said it took fifteen minutes so I felt that this was an outlier). I felt that I had achieved one goal - keep the modules short.