Tina Stavredes

Hi Julia, yes, I have faculty use a spreadsheet to track all communications from learners as well as all proactive communications they have with learners. Most of the time, learners who fail are learners who at some point in the course disengaged, so it's important that faculty have done their due diligence in reaching out to the learner to re-engage them. Tina

Hi Lisa, you will find that learners had a lot of different expectations for the online course environment, so you may want to describe how you will engage with learners, the pace of the course and whether they need to complete units on a weekly basis or if they can do them any time during the course. I also recommend that you include something about plagiarism because it is so prevalent in the online environment. Tina

Hi Srabasti, these are great expectations to set. I recommend that you also discuss policies for learner time away from the course. I have had learners take vacation for two weeks and think they can pick up where they left off!! Tina

Hi Tammy, this is great information to include in your expectations. I think it's also important to discuss time away from the course and late assignments. I also include in my expectations how I will interact in the discussions and my turn around time for grading assignments and responding to emails. Lastly, I include a statement about plagiarism and the outcome if plagiarism is found. Tina

Good observations Mark. Kathy could potentially drop out, so encouragement will be very important in your feedback. Tina

Hi Mark, I agree that a phone call can help determine the root cause of the issue. I think sometimes we spend too much effort trying to communicate via email when a phone call could resolve the issue better. Tina

Hi Mark, I am very interested in exploratory learning. How to you align that to the online environment? Tina

Hi Mark, do you discuss any expectations for learners if they are away from the classroom for an extended period of time or if they post their assignments late? You may also want to consider discussing expectations for posting students own work and using appropriate citations if they take information from another source. At my institution with the easy access to information on the Internet, we are constantly dealing with plagiarism and learners sharing information across different sections and semesters of a course. Tina

Hi Tammy, do you set expectations regarding how you will engage in the course and your turn around time for answering questions/emails and grading assignments? This is one of the expectations that I have found to differ greatly amongst learners and can create a sense of unmet expectations if they are not addressed early. Tina

Hi Pamela, as you can see from my reply format, I specifically state who I am replying to. If you set this standard in your discussions, learners will know that the response is meant for them. Tina