Promoting Interactivity in an Online Environment
Roles of Faculty are Changing Along with Delivery Modality
Jul 8, 2009
There are some components of online learning that cause concerns in the world of academia and ivy covered walls. Interactivity between the learners and accountability for the learning are two of those concerns. Accrediting bodies are starting to shift the emphasis from course completion to competency as technology enables more and more learning to shift from the classroom to cyberspace.
Faculty Roles in an Online Learning Environment
In online courses, faculty are facilitating the learning rather than lecturing and testing. In an online classroom, the learners are expected to take control of their own learning, to follow the instructions provided to them by the faculty and to participate in the class through interactive discussions. Accountability becomes key in this process, encouraging students to keep up with the workload or they will soon be left behind.
Active Participation is One Key to Success Online
Posting the questions in the discussion board is not enough. There must be an accountability process or there would be no point to posting the questions. Faculty can decide how much participation should be required and how much of the student’s final grade will be dependent on participation.
One way to do this is post two discussion questions each week, on different days, and require that the students respond to each question.Follow that requirement with another one that students respond to a minimum number of the other student’s comments on a minimum number of days each week. If they are only required to respond once, or on one day, the discussion will not flourish. The idea is to get them back in the discussion on multiple days to contribute additional comments, which will keep the discussion going.
Set Criteria for Discussion Responses
The responses to the questions should be substantive, consist of several sentences, if not a paragraph or two. The student comments also need to be substantive and credit for participation should not be given for responses like, “I agree with you.” Set minimum word or sentence length, or just tell the students that their responses are expected to be substantive.
The students will naturally move the discussion ahead by commenting on each other’s responses, adding their own personal experience, and even asking questions. Once they get used to this format, the discussions will become more interactive.
Both Faculty and Students Need the Connectivity
Promoting interactivity in an online environment will make the learning experience much richer for the faculty member as well as the student. Making sure that the student is accountable for the interactivity will help to ensure that the student is taking an active part in his or her education, therefore learning more.
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