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Month: September 2015

Published on Leave a comment on Engage Students Through Online Collaboration

by Janice Florent

photomontage with globe in foreground

In a recent eLearning Industry article, Dr. Amy Thornton, Director of the Center of Online Learning at Columbus State University, listed multiple strategies to engage students online. Dr. Thornton wrote that it is important to allow students to engage with content in different ways to ensure learning transfer. The engagement strategies suggested by Dr. Thornton are:

Keep it interactive

Interaction keeps students at their computer and engaged in the content. Not being able to see your students means that you have to keep them on their toes throughout the session. A few ways you can do this are:

  • Feedback - invite students to share their comments about the content.
  • Polling - asking polling questions can initiate discussion.
  • Brainstorming - invite students to assist with brainstorming on how a particular topic can be applied or used in the “real world.”
  • Scavenger Hunt - send students on a virtual scavenger hunt to find something and come back with their findings to share with the class.
  • Graphics - use graphics to create visuals. Students could be allowed to use electronic whiteboard tools to mark up the graphics or identify parts of an image.

Use triggers

Variety is the spice of life. Providing different types of learning experiences can help engage different types of learners. This can also keep your students on their toes because they don’t know what is going to happen next. A few ways to accomplish this are:

  • Multimedia - use video and/or music clips to add something for your visual and auditory learners.
  • Polling - give students a chance to think about the content that was covered and apply it.
  • Electronic Whiteboard - get students involved by asking them to write on the electronic whiteboard.

Group work

Allowing your students to work in smaller groups can give them more opportunity to interact with each other and be part of the discussion. Managing this in an online environment can be challenging, but with some planning can add a lot of value to your session. Here are a few ways to approach group work:

  • Discussion - assign a topic and have the groups discuss and report back to the class.
  • Brainstorming - allow the class to break into groups to brainstorm ideas.
  • Project - allow time for groups to work on a group project together.
  • Case Studies - allow your students to practice their problem-solving skills.
  • Role-play - similar to case study; give students a scenario they must work through where each group member must take on a role.
  • Use authentic materials - use real materials that give students an inside look, for example, online museum exhibits, scientific simulations, and scanned manuscripts.

Give students a task

Giving students some of the responsibility in facilitating synchronous class sessions will keep them engaged and help them create their own learning experience. A few ways to do this are:

  • Give students the opportunity to facilitate an activity.
  • Appoint a note taker for each session.
  • Have students do presentations.
  • Appoint a student to lead the discussion.

For more information read Dr. Thornton’s article “Online Collaboration Strategies to Engage Your Learners.”

Image credit: image by geralt from Pixabay

Published on Leave a comment on Conversation #32: Time Management

Download Conversation #32

Roben Torosyan

A conversation with Roben Torosyan on teaching, learning, and time management.

Are we allowed to swear on this podcast?

Roben Torosyan has held full-time appointments at Columbia University, Pace University, New School University, Fairfield University, and since 2012 as director of teaching and learning at Bridgewater State University (Mass.). There Roben leads a team of 11 faculty receiving course releases to help improve learning by improving teaching institution-wide. He helped introduce a validated student rating system and core curriculum learning outcomes at Fairfield University. He worked to make writing a signature across seven different schools of New School University. He has facilitated 83 workshops or presentations, 42 of them invited, at conferences and institutions ranging from Harvard and Columbia to Suffolk University and Howard Community College. He brings expertise in reciprocal reflection on teaching, trust, conflict, facilitation, and time management. He has taught courses in philosophy, education, psychology and leadership — twelve as new course designs entirely. His work includes chapters on The Daily Show and philosophy and articles in New Directions in Teaching & Learning, To Improve the Academy, and The Teaching Professor. (CV and selected works)

Links for this episode:

Published on Leave a comment on DB Assignments: Alternatives to Q & A Format

by Janice Florent

A discussion forum is an excellent tool for student engagement. However you don’t always have to use the question and answer format to engage students in a discussion forum. Chris Laney, professor of history and geography at Berkshire Community College, was having trouble engaging students in discussion forums in his online class and decided to rethink his use of this tool. Professor Laney thinks of the discussion forum as a place to foster interaction between the students through a variety of means rather than just asking them questions. He uses role-playing, debates, and WebQuest to foster interaction between his students.

Role-play

One example of how Professor Laney used role-play is a discussion forum activity that asks students to do some research on a person living in an urban Roman city in the first century CE. Each student creates a character and writes a diary entry or letter recording what he or she did in the course of a day or a series of days. To do this well, students need to research a few things about the professions and classes that would have existed. The students end up talking back and forth in character and at no point does Professor Laney actually ask a question.

Debate

One example of how Professor Laney uses debates is he had students debate whether democracy in the Middle East would result in better or worse relations with nations in the region. It’s a pretty straightforward assignment; however, when having students debate it’s important to set clear ground rules to keep things cordial and to avoid simplistic arguments.

WebQuest

In weeks when a major assignment is due, Professor Laney gives students a less intense discussion forum assignment. Rather than carrying on a discussion over the usual two-week period, he has students do a simple WebQuest and post their findings without having to respond to each other. For example, he may ask students to post an image, video, or music clip from the Romantic Period of art in the 19th century and write a brief description about why it’s considered an example of Romanticism.

Grading

To keep the discussion forum assignments manageable, Professor Laney asks students to post their messages in a single thread. In a class of 25 people there may be 75 messages in a week, but having all the messages in a single thread makes it relatively easy to grade. When a discussion forum activity is over, Professor Laney can click on an individual student’s name and at a glance assign a grade.

For more information, read the Faculty Focus article “Discussion Board Assignments: Alternatives to the Question-and-Answer Format.”

Published on Leave a comment on Weather or Not…Are you Ready?

by Janice Florent

Course delivery is vulnerable to unplanned events. Potential interruptions to class activities include but are not limited to natural disasters, widespread illness, acts of violence, planned or unexpected construction-related closures, severe weather conditions, and medical emergencies.

Whatever the event, an instructional continuity plan will help you to be ready to continue teaching with minimal interruption. Consistency in the learning experience can continue with the use of the tools in your instructional continuity plan. The pace of the course, the material covered, and learning process can all continue undiminished.

As we begin this academic year, consider developing an instructional continuity plan for your courses.

For those who missed our workshop and for those who want to learn more about instructional continuity you will find a link to the PowerPoint presentation above. Also, please visit our Instructional Continuity web page, where you will find planning guides, resources, and a recording of the workshop presentation.

Published on Leave a comment on Why Hello, Firefox Hello!

by Karen Nichols

A few interested instructors and I are experimenting with various video conferencing apps and software now like Google + Hangouts, Microsoft Skype, Apple Facetime and the fairly new Firefox Hello.  Firefox Hello has a very useful feature right off the bat.  It doesn't require you to install software nor set up an account with log in and password.  One person enters, gets a link, then sends it to the other person with whom s/he wishes to video chat.  You are required to use Mozilla Firefox as your browser, but it doesn't matter if you're used to skyping and your friend or colleague is used to Facetime.  You don't have to install then sign up for each other's videoconferencing service.

Screen-sharing is also an option with Firefox Hello.  You can share photos, discuss travel plans, collaborate on a project and myriad other activities.

Firefox Hello also boasts WebRTC-grade encryption to ensure your privacy.

I love the fact that a student and I wouldn't have to exchange personal information like phone numbers for Facetime, nor set up yet another account for another app, but I don't see a way to video conference with more than one person at a time and for a class, that can be a drawback.

Nonetheless, I'm happy to share with you this snappy little video from Mozilla Firefox about Firefox Hello and you can decide for yourself if this is a service that can meet your needs.