Principles of Good Practice in Education
How does implementing Chickering and Gamson's seven principles for good practice in education improve your online course?
Dr. Crews, It is entirely a myth that online is easier. I teach in both environments, and I can tell you F2F is much easier.
Tom,
I like the fact that you include yourself in the journey. I tell students all the time, that learning goes both ways. I don't have all the answers, but I learn a lot and respect what students have to say, and what they are going through.
Dr. Crews,
I have not published it per se, but I do discuss the concepts in my class. Going forward, I will be posting it directly.
Michelle,
Glad you emphasized making connections and engagement. Putting these principles in place has helped me in F2F and online courses. Thanks again.
Implementation of these principles I feel will help an online instructor strive for excellence within their classroom. Excellence of course is not a destination, but an attempt to reach the destination. I truly feel that striving for excellence includes a willingness to keep learning and growing. I feel excellence includes an open-mind, humility, and accountability. Excellent instructors seem to know who and what they are and make sincere attempts to become what they know they can be within the classroom.
To me, excellence is:
• Not settling for simply meeting requirements, but striving to exceed them
• Effectively creating a sense of community within the classroom
• Making connections with the students through the discussions
• Engaging and motivating students in a way that makes them excited to learn and want to participate
• Being accountable
• Providing substantive and timely feedback
• Going above and beyond on a consistent basis
When we approach our classrooms with this state of mind it can absolutely have a positive effect on retention and student engagement.
Eleanor,
Right on! Open ended questions do help engage students and provide for an environment for sharing. This is a good thing. Thanks for sharing!
One of the aspects I most like about this method is encouragint active participation from my students. It helps to ask students open ended questions so that they can share ideas and generate their own learning discussions with each other. Online environments bring such diversity to the classroom in terms of location, age, cultures, life experiences. It means that we all can learn something from each other.
Barry,
The more we share our ideas with others, the more we think more carefully about what we're doing. Managing our time is important as well. Thanks for your input. Take care.
Encouraging people to discourse, encouraging people to interface is the first step in getting a conversation going or sharing ideas... Having the ability to bounce ideas off of one another and cooperating in individual or group projects encourages people to consider how synergy or creativity can be used to a helpful end... participating actively gives people a fell or accomplishment and having immediate feedback or creative criticism is often helpful and stilts creativity... where simple critique might stale things a bit... Managing time and staying on task is key... as well as meeting deadlines but doing shotty work with out living up to expectations shows little care for the material and shows the student's concern for the class and the topic.. but most importantly each person being given the opportunity to show off their work and being lauded for their abilities is the best inspiration for most... I my case it is the only way that I get students up and working as they grew up in the five poorest counties of the second poorest state in the union. and I often times hear that no one believes in them. I retort, I believe in you when I see you doing something other than feeling sorry for yourself.
It might seem harsh, but it works.
William,
Being polite is a part of being professional. When we communicate in this manner, the students are likely to see how we are modeling that communication and respond in a similar manner. It's a shame you don't have group projects any more. I would encourage peer reviews on assignments at least. Take a day off from email. You need down time too. Thanks for your input.
I use please and thanks allot in my comments to students in grading to encourage them (#1). I also sent friendly reminders in emails and Announcements to students to complete assignments or make their first post to the DB before Wednesday to avoid a penalty. I pray for my students and tell them I am for those that say they have family members in hospital, sick, or one has died.
We don't have group projects anymore, so students don't work together, but I do encourage them to comment on my comments and other student comments on the DB. I post optional questions on the DB to generate discussion among students like "what is the difference between evolution, intelligent design, and creationism." (#'s 2 & 3).
I give feeback to students assignments in 48 hrs or less and am required to do so in 72hrs or less. For emails, I check mine 2-3 times each day 7 days per week. I am required to respond wthin 48 hrs.
Rafael,
You are right. We all have different levels of self-efficacy, knowledge and abilities, but through the cooperation you mention, we can move all students toward the learning objectives. Thanks!
I like the principles of cooperation and responsibility within an online course. In particular, these two principles remind me that I cannot expect every online student to show the same amount of self efficacy within class. Cooperation between students and facilitator is a shared responsibility that I should encourage. I suppose that also contributes to online presence.
Chander,
The research continues based on Chickering and Gamson's seven principles. They are seen as sound instructional design and teaching principles. Thanks!
Chickering and Gamson's seven principles encourage contacts between students and instructors contributing to their motivation and involvement; provides for developing a collaborative learning environment; uses active learning techniques which include structured exercises, challenging and probing questions in discussion threads, and group projects; promotes learning based on prompt feedback; emphasizes time management skills; sets high expectations for institutions and teachers and recognizes diverse talents and learning styles.
Louise,
Sounds like you have a weekly plan and that you are responding in a timely manner. Keep it up.
One of the methods that I use to encourage contact between students and faculty is that I will comment on all discussion forums on Friday (their primary response is due Wednesday). Not only does this provide quick feedback, students may amend their post by Sunday. This also aids other students in the class with a "jumping off point" for their responses to the primary comment and/or the original student's summary (which is due by Sunday. Seeing my comments also reminds students of the need to respond to others.
Ann,
Contact, interaction and prompt feedback. Excellent things to strive to do with our students. Glad you also mentioned the principles from Chickering and Gamson. Nice job.
I think the most improvement in my classes for me as an instructor and the students have been the principle of contact between the students and faculty and prompt feedback. When I began teaching online there was not much feedback from me as the instructor in the discussions primarily. I just made sure that everyone participated. I learned quickly that feedback from me was very important to some of my students. One the major disappointments in the disucssions are the students than never read my post back to them which often has good information for them in the real world of a medical practice. The students that take advantage of this, love it. I encourage my students to look for my responses to them via email. Prompt feedback is something the students really desire. In our environment the earlier the student tests, the more time they have to review their errors. If they wait till the last minute they lose this ability to see the errors. The seven principles of Chickering and Gamson are really important and I have seen the benetfit of these work in my class as I have worked through becoming better at communicating with them.
