While distance learning has grown tremendously over the last few years, it is still a somewhat new means of instruction.
And teaching online requires diverse skills and expectations than teaching in a very classroom. Many faculty members are hesitant to master these skills. But simply putting a few notes along with materials from a classroom does not make for a very effective online experience.
What are the 3 most important skills you will want to be a truly outstanding on-line teacher?
1) You must communicate frequently using the students.
Frequent communication does NOT mean that you must be online every hour of any day. But it does mean you will want to be in contact with college students frequently. How frequently? At least another day. Rather than teaching in 2-4 hour blocks in a single day, like you would having many college classes, spend 15-45 minutes a day answering emails and monitoring your web course. At the end with the week, the time spent teaching online should be just like the amount of time spent teaching in a very classroom.
2) Be organized & be clear
Let students know right from the start exactly what is expected ones. And set the ground rules with the course. Let students know how often you may be online, so they don’t expect an immediate response no matter the time of day. Explain to students how they are graded, how quickly they will probably receive feedback, how they should submit assignments, how they should contact you, etc. The more students know in advance, the less time you’ll spend giving an answer to problems.
3) Engage the students in the learning
Lecturing and testing are standard in most campus classes (not they right now there necessarily promote effective learning, however that’s another story! ). Teaching online supplies the opportunity to reach students in most different ways – projects, chats, comparing ideas, sharing knowledge having other students. Use as a variety of ways as possible to participate students, and promote active learning. Without the confines of time which have been present in a campus training course, and with the ability to express and discuss ideas online, not making good using these opportunities leads to lost “learning moments”.
There is no better way to discover ways to teach online than to discover online – so, before you may teach online, take an on-line course yourself.
You’ll understand what it can be like to learn from the distance, without an instructor standing facing you. You’ll understand what it can be like to have to wait for answers to your questions. And you’ll find out about how the technology can Allow you to teach.
You certainly DO NOT need to be a technical expert to show online. But you should be:
• comfortable with the Net
• familiar with sending along with receiving email
• ready to spend an afternoon setting up your course for the first time
• aware that becoming an effective online teacher takes some time (often several courses)
• excited about learning a new skill that will help!
Some will say there isn't substitute for seeing the student’s looks. Others will realize that many students will flourish since they have more time to prepare thoughtful answers, and won’t be fearful of speaking up facing a large group.
Teaching online can be quite exciting, and very rewarding, so long as you are prepared!