For those that are wondering, it is cloudy with a chance of rain on the central Florida gulf coast. Truly! You could look it up.
The e-learning 2008 conference sponsered by the Instructional Technology Council (ITC) is off to a great start. Following a Saturday night keynote address on busting the myths of e-learning (and we do hold strongly to some of the myths!), Sunday saw a number of concurrent sessions presenting great ideas. I already have several pages of notes.
One session was how to reach the digital natives, aka the Millenial generation (those born 1982 and later). There are some interesting demographics and shared experiences in this group that really set them apart from those of us who are older. We really need to consider how to use Web 2.0 tools (as one slide I saw yesterday pointed out ... some folks may not even realize there was a Web 1.0 ... or a Web 1.5) to reach this generation. Examples are YouTube, blogs, wikis, RSS, the list grows longer each day. One common characteristic of this generation is that life is spent in continuous, partial attention. Hmm ....
Attended a great session on Online Instructor Competencies. The presenter challenged us to think about HOW learning occurs. This may be a more fruitful starting point than the course compentencies -- though we do eventually get to those. We need to look at the following 5 areas from the student perspective:
1. subject
2. type of relations (with the instructor and other students)
3. control of time, place, and PACE of learning
4. type of assessment
5. media used.
The presenter talked about the importance of the instructor reaching out to students ON THE DAY THEY REGISTER ... even before the first day of class. We'll be having more discussions about this among distance learning faculty (I know some already do just this).
Here's a link to the slides from that presentation: http://bowene.edublogs.org/2008/02/12/elearning-2008/presentation-slides-2/
Let me know via the "comments" below if this link isn't working correctly. Hard to tell on the computer I'm on.
A couple of the general sessions on Sunday covered Learning from Our Worst Practices and a debate on the topic Classroom Observation is an Administrator's Right (specific to the online environment). I'll share more on these two topics at a later time.
On to Monday's sessions!
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4 comments:
Daryl, The link works correctly.
You mentioned "One common characteristic of this generation is that life is spent in continuous, partial attention." (with respect to digital natives and distance learning).
Does it follow that if 1) A distance learning course is challenging, and tools are provided to meet these challenges, and 2) Course expectations are set high, and clearly communicated,
then the course will receive (demand) more attention from these students? And a greater amount of learning is possible?
Interested in others’ opinions.
John Darnow
I like the idea of contacting students before the class begins. I tried that this semester with the distance students. I hope that I have better retention of students than the college average.
Another instructor sent me an email saying "I wholeheartedly agree with reaching out ASAP. I would like to learn more about what is being said about the PACE of learning."
When considering pace, there are a number of factors that come into play:
1. do you want your course to be entirely self-paced? Or are the students better served by having some (or a lot of) structure to keep them moving?
2. what do you do with the student who has a valid excuse that takes them away from the course for a couple of weeks?
3. Some programs have found success with condensed courses of 10, 8, even 4 weeks -- would our students excel at that pace?
4. still others offer the ultimate in student-determined pace -- open entry/open exit
But that loops us back to the questions in #1 ...
Thoughts?
A few first thoughts….
What do you do with the student who has a valid excuse that takes them away from the course for a couple of weeks? Life happens and academic work may not always be on the top of a student’s priority list. If the excuse is valid, I usually defer to and work within schools’ policies for these situations.
Would our students excel at that pace? New undergraduate students need more structure than higher level students and graduate students. As I continue to teach for a variety of institutions around the world, I am learning that a partial answer lies in the culture and standards of the organization. The culture and standards indirectly and directly set student expectations. I have taught accelerated 10-week courses in rigorous graduate programs and I have taught standard 15-week courses in horrifically lax undergraduate programs. At both ends of this program spectrum, most students who accepted the schools’ expectations lived up to those expectations.
My PACE? I continuously wrestle with building classes with adequate breadth and depth, and that strike a balance between struggle and inspiration. I asked about PACE because I sense the need to keep the daily and weekly fire stoked, but to do it without burning out before we hit the 15-week mark.
Currently, for a CMC 3-credit course, I build fairly fast-paced course that demand a solid 3-5 hours of reading, exploring and project work per week. To go along with this pace, I provide nearly limitless Monday-Friday support, including Elluminate office hours, IM, email, Bb Announcements and Bb discussions. However, I see that some students are not putting in the time or asking for help. Now, I find myself wondering, is 3-5 hours per week too much to ask for 3 college credits? What were they expecting? Is it me?
Thanks,
Robert
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