For students to be successful in the online learning environment, it is important be prepared. The instructor should be familiar with the learning system, how they plan to deliver instruction in an engaging way, and the students they will be teaching. It is important fo the instructor to begin with an orientation to help students start off on the right foot.
Structure and support are main keys to success for the teacher and the student. I plan on implementing this by having clear instructions posted, tasks, assignments, and discussions posted in an organized manner, and an online presence so the students know i am here for them.
Adapting the current curriculum to online will be a challenge in some areas and easily adapted in others. We currently use an adequate Course Management System (CMS) that students are familiar with. The CMS allows me to access student information, monitor progress, and communication academic progress to both student and parent. The CMS is already set up by modules with the assignments and due dates, etc.
The challenges I can foresee to moving online will be changing the delivery format and communicating differently. Another challenge will be establishing online discussions, assessments, and I am sure there is so much more that I will delve into.
Online teaching has many components. The role of the facilitator or online instructor is complex. Instructors must have a good understanding of their role in the online course.
I have learned you should utilize different techniques to keep the student engaged and motivated in the online course.
When facilitating a class, it needs to be engaging, meet course objectives, highly interactive, and with meaningful activities and not just busywork.
Well structured platform, clear instruction and open orientation, optimize feedback, provide supports and quick and continual feedback to students. As I went through this, I remembered some of the online courses taken in the past...the good ones and the bad.
That with e-learning you can post assignments and grade asiignments. As an instructor, I need to be timely in my response to grading students work.
I learned it is important to have structure, to ensure constant communication and provide frequent feedback. Also to provide orientation to all new students on the CMS and LMS
It reinforced to me the importance of laying things out clearly and concisely and having some type of guidance process for students who are unsure of what to do.
It shared the need for a clear path for students to work their way through and offered suggestions on how to frame the content according to what students need.
Consistency and communication are the two main things I will choose to focus on during my initial implementations.
Prior planning prevents poor performace. In the past I didn't allow students to post publically to discussion boards because I was unsure how to moderate and implement consequences that would be supported by administration. I think it is something to re-think now that all learning is online for the likely the rest of the school year.
What i have learned is the importance of the following:
Comprehending course structure
Comprehending the couurse delivery platform
Comprehending the support infrastructure
Comprehending the course content and the course delivery format.
Understanding the impotance of these things will ensure the success in online course delivery.
I found it interesting to see all the different tasks and support that will be on us as instructors.
I found it interesting to see all the different tasks and support that will be on us as instructors.
Similar to face-to-face instruction, e-Learning can be delivered with CMS and technical support, instructor creativity, and knowlege of resources locations.
online teaching takes a lot more structuring for a teacher that is not too acclamated with computers ;great way of delivering distance instructions. Very helpful if you are planning to start an online teaching mode,
The structure of the CMS does include technical support which is an area for improvement. I affirmed some ideas of providing audio as a structural support as well as transcribed; create simplistic complexity that allows learners to think and increase their knowledge. Other additions or adjustements that need to happend is a tutorial content on the CMS and providing a list of "need to dos" at the beginning of the course as part as the welcome rather than jumping into the learning on the content.
Using a CMS requires us to have a full understanding of the platform and know the organization of the CMS and how to use all the tools that are available in the CMS. We should ensure, as we normally would, that we use structure and set clear dates and expectations. We also need to be sensitive to the frustrations our students may face and be knowledgable enough to help and have IT numbers handy when we cannot solve the problem. I also feel it is alright to let our students know we have to find an answer. We are human and may need help sometimes as well. I have found that when I let them know I will find out the answer, they respond well.
I didnt realize how much prep went into preparing an online course.
Learning how the CMS works as well as the expectations of the programs will help to ensure the students' expectations are met for the course. I plan to learn the platform as thoroughly as possible.
