4a+-+Online+Course+Observations


 * 4. Observations of interaction between master teacher and students, and students and students [[image:student_calls_teacher_on_phone.JPG align="right" caption="photo credit http://offthemark.com"]] **
 * **How can an online teacher establish a vibrant online community in their courses? Provide examples from your practicum course. **

Creating a community of learners in an online course environment is more than just gathering a group of students together in an online forum and hoping a community forms. Creating community is critical, and takes time, and once that community is formed, all those involved will benefit from a supportive and positive learning environment, one that is efficient in nature. There are several ways an online instructor can help create such a community. First, before having students dive into content, an online teacher should (a) help his or her students get to know one another and the learning platform; second, the instructor should (b) convey a desire to help students be successful in the course; third, the instructor should strive to (c) provide appropriate and timely feedback to students on their work; and finally, he or she should (d) maintain a presence in the discussions and activities. These are obviously only a few of the ways in which an instructor can create a caring online community of learners, strategies mentioned in several readings and articles related to online learning and teaching.

The instructor in my practicum course has done a great job of establishing a supportive, close-knit online community of learners. (a) To help students get to know one another, and therefore not just be a face on the screen, she had students complete an "About Me" survey as their first assignment of the course. Students were asked about their likes, favorite things, hobbies, and goals for the course - and then were asked to read over each others' surveys and make comments. (b) The instructor's honest desire to see her students be successful shines through in her private messages to students, in which she praises the work they have done and encourages them in their efforts. For those students who seem to be struggling or are behind in work, the instructor sends motivating emails, giving suggestions for how students can meet success and offering her help whenever needed. <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif; font-size: 80%; vertical-align: super;">(c) <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">The instructor's level of feedback is also instrumental in maintaining the community created by the students; she answers students' questions in a timely manner, provides mid-term progress reports, and writes personal feedback messages on all their submitted assignments, in which she highlights what they've done well and mentions areas in which they could improve in future assignments. <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif; font-size: 80%; vertical-align: super;">(d) <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Finally, the instructor maintains a presence in the discussions students have - commenting occasionally and redirecting where necessary, but does so in a way that she is not dominating the conversation nor putting the focus on herself.


 * **<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Interactivity is not inherent. It must be designed. What are the instructor's strengths in creating an interactive climate in the online course? What are the instructor's strengths in designing interactive activities? **

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">To create an interactive environment, the instructor in my practicum course has taken care to ensure that the questions she asks students are thought-provoking and open-ended, rather than those that require a simple yes/no response. For example, in the unit on Japan, after watching an interview of survivors of the bombing of Hiroshima, students were asked this discussion question: "Think about what happened physically and psychologically to many of those who suffered through the atomic bombing. How did this make you feel? What if this were you and your family?" Questions such as these, carefully worded and open-ended, encourage critical thinking and active participation, all of which lead to deeper understanding for students.The same is true for the activities created for this course. They are, by default, designed to be interactive. For example, some of the activities are group projects, while others, though they are done individually, include a requirement that students observe and comment on at least two other students' assignments/activities.


 * **<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">List aspects of the instructor's interaction that contribute most to student learning. **

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">The instructor in my practicum course excelled in two areas which contributed most to student learning - encouraging students' deeper interactions and encouraging a range of viewpoints.

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">First, the instructor continuously encouraged students to continue their interactions with their peers and their engagement with the materials/content as the course progressed. She did this through her positing of deeper-level questions in the discussion board and through her commenting to students in their Private Discussion area. For example, one student in the course was completing the required amount of work, but her comments to her peers lacked depth and evidence of higher-level thinking. In this student's progress report, sent through the Private Discussion Area, the instructor wrote: "//Hi --, I just want to take a moment to discuss your work with you. I think that you are doing a great job getting assignments completed in a timely fashion. I would like to see you go more in depth with your responses and develop your ideas more. Many times your answers are very brief, and sometimes not in complete sentences. Also, proofread, because often there are typos in your posts//." In this example, the instructor has provided a positive comment about how the student is doing ("...a great job getting assignments completed in a timely fashion") as well as suggestions as to what the student can do to improve her performance and, ultimately, her own learning ("...go more in depth with your responses and develop your ideas more.").

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">The other area the instructor excelled in, which contributed most to student learning, was with encouraging a range of viewpoints on the variety of topics studied during the course. Not only did the instructor acknowledge that not everyone would have the same viewpoint on an issue, but she also encouraged students to seek out a classmate whose ideas were convergent to their own and discuss the issue. For example, in the week that students were discussing the topic of The Immigrant Experience, the instructor posted these directions for one of the discussion topics: "Find a classmate's posting, read their thoughts, and respond with a thoughtful and complete comment of your own, that DISAGREES with something they said." By allowing all students to share their thoughts, no matter their viewpoint, the instructor is encouraging multiple points of view which, upon reading them, facilitates students' considering the opposing point of view, thus encouraging a deepening of student learning.


 * **<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">What is the primary type of student interaction in your practicum course? **

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">The primary type of student interaction in my practicum course is student-to-student interaction. It isn't unusual to find that one student's posting in the discussion board for the week has four or five comments from other students, or that a dialogue develops between two students as they go back and forth, commenting on each others' postings and replies. At times, it was difficult for me to add my own comments to their discussion threads, as I didn't want to "break" the momentum they had going with each other.


 * **<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">What is the level and type of student participation in the course? **

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Most student participation in this practicum course takes place in the discussion boards. Though the major assignment for each week's unit of study involves an assignment in which students must review and comment on other's work, it is in the discussion boards where most of their interaction takes place. As mentioned above, it is not unusual to see a student's original posting receive several comments from his or her peers.

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">What makes it difficult to determine the level of student participation in this course is the fact that there are only eight (8) students enrolled. Therefore, when one or two students are "absent" or delayed in making their postings, it is very glaring, and can give the impression that there is not much interaction going on. At times, the students who are posting will try to pick up the slack by making more comments than is required; however, this is not always the case, and so some discussion boards might have a scarcity of postings, while other weeks' boards have a plethora.


 * **<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">When you teach in the classroom, how do you facilitate interaction between students? Do you have whole class discussions or do you break the class into small groups? **

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Determining how I want students to interact with one another depends upon the activity they are involved in. Sometimes, small group discussions are appropriate (for example, when my freshmen students were asked to share their //first impression// of what the concept of the American Dream might be), and sometimes, whole class discussions are appropriate (for example, when those same students were //reviewing// the concept of the American Dream). I often find that when I am introducing new material, or giving lessons in the beginning stages of a unit, that students are more focused in smaller groups, where they can share their thoughts with only a select few; later, after students have had a chance to share their ideas and use other students as a "sounding board," they are more apt to share their thoughts with the larger class.

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">More often than not, I will use a combination of these methods. First, students will work/discuss together in small groups, maybe of 3-4 students; then, depending on the assignment, two groups will join together (so, then 6-8 students) or I will pull all the groups back together to conduct a whole class discussion. Altering these teaching strategies helps manage the class while ensuring that all students get a chance to voice their opinions or ideas, even when they are in a class of 28-30 students.


 * **<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">When you teach in the classroom, how do you deliver the content to the students? Do you use PowerPoint complete with audio and animation, black and white overheads, a chalkboard or video? **

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">I use all of these delivery methods in my f2f classroom. My delivery methods have changed as the available technology in my classroom has changed. When I first started teaching, I relied heavily on the overhead projector and transparencies projected onto the blackboard or blank wall of the classroom. When we got our computer/TV connections, I turned to using PowerPoint presentations, sometimes with all the bells and whistles of audio and animation, sometimes with just the plain old Jane slide shows. Recently I incorporated the use of a Prezi and a Glogster into one of my lessons for my freshman mythology unit. I have always utilized videos, or snippets of videos, in my teaching as well. Next year I am told that my classroom will have a SmartBoard, so I imagine my lesson delivery will start to include using the SmartBoard as well. While the changes in modes of delivery have, at times, been stressful (with trying to keep up and develop my own proficiency), they have also allowed me to hone my technology skills and apply them to the courses here with VHS.


 * **<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">When you teach in the classroom, what sorts of interactive things do you use in the course? Do you have students move their desks around to setup the classroom the way they want it? **

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">In my f2f course, I try to incorporate a lot of interactive lessons and try to get the kids up and moving around - no high schooler wants to sit quietly in an uncomfortable desk for 6 or 7 classes of 45 minutes each and not interact with his or her peers! When students are working in pairs together, I have them move their desks together, either side-by-side or facing each other - whichever is going to facilitate more interaction between them. When they are in small groups of 3-4, I make sure that they are sitting so that they can see each other (so no lining up their desks side-by-side). If we are involved in a large group activity, I will have students create a horseshoe with their desks in an attempt to maximize their interaction with each other. When students complete rough drafts of their writing, if I don't have students pair up to edit each others' papers, I will have them pass their papers to a peer, to be peer-reviewed in a more quiet setting.


 * **<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Select artifacts that represent great examples of interaction between teacher-students and students-students from your practicum course. **

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Artifacts of the online course can be found at this page of the wiki.


 * **<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Write reflective statements for each artifact, elaborating on why it was selected and its meaning and value in the portfolio. **

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Reflective statements for each artifact of the online course can be found at this page of the wiki.

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