Teaching Online Requires Active Participation
I have had the opportunity over the past two terms to interact with online courses from the instructional stand point and the content/course development stand point. What I have discovered in this process is that online teaching, though often described as an isolating experience by numerous faculty, in fact requires active participation on the part of all involved in the course. This participation goes beyond the instructor and the students who are enrolled, but also involves those who are responsible for design.
In order for the course to be successful (and by success I mean there is a collaborative learning experience created for all involved) there needs to be collaboration when creating the course from the ground up. I just finished reading a report written by the CVU (Canadian Virtual University), entitled "Online University Education in Canada: Challenges and Opportunities." The full report is available as a pdf here.
Though I would have loved to see a similar study done for colleges, the report provides useful statistics and information on how Canada is lagging behind other countries in our post-secondary online education offerings. The reason we are falling behind is a complex combination of many factors such as a lack of innovation and a lack of accessibility. What I particularly enjoyed was a diagram that they provided illustrating "Quality and Ease of Use Factors" seen below:
In order for the course to be successful (and by success I mean there is a collaborative learning experience created for all involved) there needs to be collaboration when creating the course from the ground up. I just finished reading a report written by the CVU (Canadian Virtual University), entitled "Online University Education in Canada: Challenges and Opportunities." The full report is available as a pdf here.
Though I would have loved to see a similar study done for colleges, the report provides useful statistics and information on how Canada is lagging behind other countries in our post-secondary online education offerings. The reason we are falling behind is a complex combination of many factors such as a lack of innovation and a lack of accessibility. What I particularly enjoyed was a diagram that they provided illustrating "Quality and Ease of Use Factors" seen below: