Facilitating a Distance Education Course

1. Facilitating a Distance Education Course Some Practical Advise and Sources of Further Help Winter 2011

2. Updating your curricula is critical. But unless you update your approach to facilitating classes at the same time, you’re jeopardizing your overall success. It’s a bit like writing your materials in a foreign language, but forgetting to provide a translation. Source: Carole Robinson, Ed.D. and Joan Van Duzer, M.S. Ed.

3. A few words about OOL’s model of course development and the literature about teaching online At OOL we use the team approach to creating DE courses. This differs from the other models that range from the “Lone Wolf” approach where the individual SME/Instructor tries to do everything him/herself Lone Wolf some limited expert assistance Team Development

5. The Truth about Online Courses • Delivery As much – sometimes more - work than FTF • Teaching/facilitating Is a different kind of interaction with students/among students

6. Facilitation Online Vs. Teaching F2F

7. Here Is What Another Group Noted Recently: • Coach “go team go” • Guided independence • Facilitator being a Learner • A different way of communicating • “Getting things done” at a distance • Prompting engagement • Making a difficult job a bit easier - remove barriers • Being available and accessible

8. Skills of the Facilitator • Engaging the learner in the learning process particularly in the beginning • Appropriate questioning, “listening” and feedback skills • Ability to provide direction and support • Skills in managing online discussions • Ability to build online teams (occasionally) • Motivational skills

9. What Are Some of the Challenges? • Keeping track of individual students’ progress • Catering to different learning preferences / needs • Learning to become an effective guide • Dealing with silence / getting students active • Dealing with technical issues • Managing expectations • Finding the balance of communication methods • Empowering students to be self-directed

10. Areas of Concern • Pedagogical (Cognitive & Teaching) Presence: Guiding student learning with a focus on concepts, principles, and skills. • Social Presence: Creating a welcoming online community in which learning is promoted. • Managerial & Administrative: Handling organizational, procedural, and administrative tasks. • Technical: Assisting participants to become comfortable with the technologies used to deliver the course.

11. Pedagogical • Remain flexible about activities you planned • Maintain a non-authoritarian style dealing with the class and the individual; • Be objective about comments on individual contributions • Combine ideas from separate conversations into a summary; ask questions based on that summary • Play devils advocate in a questioning manner; site research or sources for that position • Don’t present final answers unless you are prepared to have the conversation stopped • Ask particular participants for comments and allow time to do so; promote reflection

13. Social • Be regularly visible in the Discussions as well as the News/Updates widget • Use first names of participants when replying • Praise and model the behaviour you want in discussions • Don’t ignore bad behaviours, deal with them • Use humour but be certain it is clear and don’t use sarcasm at all; it rarely is interpreted correctly • Be yourself; assuming that is a good thing. Be enthusiastic about the content and your interest

14. Managerial • Be responsive in an efficient manner when possible • Don’t dominate discussions • Manage your TA’s time and practice as you would your own • Change headings that are out of sync with valid digressions; remind posters to start new topics • Redirect inappropriate discussion digressions • End discussions that have been exhausted

15. Administrative • Learn to cut and paste • Keep a note pad and record the changes you want to make next offering • Stick to the time limits you set in the Outline for responding; or advise the class if you need to vary it • Establish virtual “Office Hours” online if you have not already

16. Administrative • Establish your own personal weekly schedule • Provide grades on time or explain why not and when • Solicit feedback from students; talk with your DLS about good questions to ask. • TA’s often have a good sense of what’s going on in the course. • Talk with other faculty members - in your department or not.

17. Technical • Assisting participants to become comfortable with new technologies used to deliver the course • Unless you know the answer at once; don’t try to answer technical questions yourself….. at all. Send the learners to the Help Desk • When assessing how well the course is going, ask for advise on what new technologies might solve a problem for next offering; ask students, DLS’s and the Tech team; they are usually up to date.

18. Resources that may be helpful • These links and more are available at www.w11instructorsresources.wordpress.com/

19. These are 1-2 minute video clips of tips and ideas by experienced Online facilitators Larry Regan Penn State World Campus tips http://www.youtube.com/user/facultydevelopment Australian Flexible Learning Network http://www.flexiblelearning.net.au/flx/go/home/resourcecentre/products/quickguides 51 Competencies for Online Instruction http://www.thejeo.com/Ted%20Smith%20Final.pdf Journal of Interactive Online Learning http://www.ncolr.org/jiol/issues/showissue.cfm?volID=8&IssueID=27 Curt Bonk videos http://www.indiana.edu/~icy/media/de_series.html Sample Vignette: Social Presence http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=iv&annotation_id=annotation_570273&v=P_Fbo63Gi_k