Many times in the online environment students can feel overwhelmed and alone since they are not in a physical class. This can cause frustration on the part of the student. It is important for the online instructor to guide the students and communicate timely and effectively. Teaching through feedback is also important in an online course.
John,
True, you never know what you might encounter but that is true with a f2f course also. You may not know all of the answers, you just need to know how to find the answers.
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
An online facilitator needs to wear as many shoes as necessary to provide a rich learning environment for the students. In an online environment, there are many different cultural backgrounds, life experiences, and situations in general. As an online facilitator, you should never forget that and knowing it should serve as a moral compass for you. Wearing different shoes comes with the territory in the online environment because you never know what situation you may encounter during a class session or through the semester.
jcl
cynthia,
You are right! It is probably more. We do have much to do but the important thing is to be able to lead students to the answer; we don't have to know it all!
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
Dr. Wilkinson,
Only 4? : - ) We will have to continue to try different styles to keep up with the technology and also the needs of the students. Multiple roles is needed in any teaching environment.
Thanks,
Cynthia
Nancy,
What a great post! Not only do we change our roles regularly, we change are roles depending on the needs of each student. The secret is determining the appropriate role for the appropriate students for the appropriate situation.
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
As an online facilitator, we must change our roles regularly. We need to guide students through the course, we need to foster positive engagement throughout the course. We need occasionally to intervene and mediate in situations. We also serve as technical adviser on occasion. Each student requires us to act in each of these roles, but the percentage of assistance varies from student to student. Some students need us daily and others less frequently.
Nancy
Raeven,
You are right! You hope you can guide students to the information that will connect them to the content. For each student you take a different role. It can be trying but it shows the importance of student centered learning.
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
Being a facilitator is more than simply teaching. In this role we must be an instructor, social director, program manager and technical assistant. This can be trying, but will also result in our students being more successful (I hope).
Kelly,
You are correct. Teaching is a combination of many different tasks and skills. You have to also know what resources you have within your institution. You don't have to know everything, just seem like you do! :)
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
Hello All,
The wearing of different shoes In our actual lives helps us complete task better, giving us an advantage to do more and accomplish tasks more efficient, faster, stronger and in addition a multitude of attributes to work more effectively. With online teaching the analogy is in reference to changeling roles or facilitating in completing tasks or direction, throughout the course, as a guide, communicator, technical advisor. Each of these roles comes with a set of task that then can be overlapping and broken down to many other subcategories.
Thank you.
Kelly
William,
You are right. You do have to monitor the discussion and keep students on track. (Just like a f2f course). You also must set expectations for behavior as well as monitor that behavior.
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
Bill,
You make a great point! I agree the "not knowing what to do next" can be one of the greatest barriers. It is our responsibility through communication and course design to prevent this from happening.
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
Jim,
True, motivation is an interesting subject to discuss. Students need to want to learn and you have to be able to engage and grow the want to a need to learn. It is such a challenging situation.
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
Marie,
I like that you used the term "aid" in student learning. It is our job to facilitate learning and help them learn to find the answers to their questions with our guidance.
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
Keisha,
You are right! You are the institutional connection. Also, if you have helped them in any way, you become their "go to" person. You are right, you don't have to have the answers, you just have to know where to direct them. They do need to find some of this information themselves. . . with your guidance.
Dr. Kelly Wilkinson
To prevent the students form going off on tangents and provide a direction for the ones that are confused on the subject. Facilitator’s also should engage the students with thought provoking questions to help promote research and interest.
The struggle for many students in an online environment can be the frustration of "not knowing what to do next". The facilitator is instrumental in course success. He/she has to be the academic stability of the program, the mediator at times, and the person responsible to move the course in a positive direction for all students. At times, he/she may even be a technical adviser. A learner usually looks towards the facilitator to solve all problems relating to the course. many things can not be changed but it is up to the instructor to deal with several issues in online learning
Another role is to be able to motivate students. Sometimes this motivation is in the form of communication pointing out obvious errors.
You have to be very tactfull when using this type of communication and you must be careful not to embariss the student.
As a facilitator we have a responsibility to use what we can to aid in student learning. Many of our students are adult learners who have not been to school in a while. We may or may not know who is in that situation. The adult learners may need extra help in navigating through the course. Our "shoes" would depend on what we are trying to accomplish with our class keeping in mind the different levels of comfort the students have with the technology and the learning environment. With some we may have to be the social director to encourage that collaboration among peers as an example because this is a new way of learning for some.
