Time Saving Tips for Online Teachers

Time Saving Tips to Make Online Teaching easier

As you continue to teach online you develop time saving tips. It does get easier. I average between seven and ten hours a week per class in teaching, but I have been doing this a long time – since 1997. Developing a course takes much longer. You cannot simply dump your face-to-face class into an online course site and expect success. 

I do think you need to set some boundaries. You can burn out if you try to be available all the time.  It is a happy medium. If you don’t log into the class every day your students will wonder where you are and you may be presented with a lot of work to do all at once. However, if you answer every student’s post immediately you will become exhausted.

Remember when you consider your time that in online teaching you can teach “anywhere.” You do not have to be at home. If you do consulting or traveling then you can either take your laptops with you or find a cyber café.  Last week I was away from home, and the place I was staying had WiFi. I brought my iPad2 and I was able to function but it was frustrating at time because I am used to my PC. 

It does get easier each time you teach an online course. In the beginning the first time you teach online can be overwhelming, but be assured it will get better as you become more proficient. The design of the online course makes all the difference, and you will find that if you, yourself, design the course, then you will spend a lot of time planning the class structure. 

In many schools teachers are compensated on a per-student basis. This means the more students they teach the more money they make.  Unfortunately, this sometimes encourages teachers to take more than they can handle.  Also sometimes administrators see online classes as a way to add more students. I believe online classes should be capped at 20.

Specific tips on time saving:

If you are not available by phone after a certain time at night let the students know this. You may want to encourage students new to the technology, especially if they are in the class with experienced technology users, that it will be easier as they go along. You may need a phone conference with a few.  Be at your computer and encourage them to be at their computer also.

Make friends with the IT support people. 

 

Set limits on your time. As in life there is a “happy medium.”  If you try to respond to every post within 6 hours you will exhaust yourself. However, if you only log on once or twice a week then you will have a lot to read and respond to and students may wonder if you are reading their messages.  

Set up a comfortable place to do your computer work. Be comfortable. That’s the big advantage. Remember you do not have to dress up, drive your car, find a parking place, and walk to the office. Enjoy that freedom. 

Make up a printable list of all class assignments with due dates and tell your students where it is. Print it yourself so you can keep track of it.

You will occasionally find a student who “over posts,” replying to every posting. Many times the other students in the class will handle this. An e-mail from you also helps. I would never make a comment to the student in the discussion board itself. 

I do find it helpful, especially for undergrad students, to have specific days assignments are due. In my case, it is Tuesday and Friday. I remind the students: “Every Tuesday and Friday you know you have an assignment. If you wake up and it’s Tuesday or Friday then you know there is an assignment due.” In graduate courses I have assignments due at the end of the week, but I do require original posts earlier than replies. 

 A good question: “What happens if we get sick or something happens in our life that means we will be away for a while?” There may be times when we can’t log on. Maybe we had a horrible thing happen in our lives: sickness, death of one close to us, an emergency at work. I think if we can manage to let the students know they will understand. I have left with my husband a list of contact people in case anything happens to me. 

Use copy and paste and other functions of your Word Processor when appropriate. I know an English teacher was tired of seeing the same errors over and over again in student work so she took the time to make up Word macros for common errors like comma slice. She would then just have to press, for example, ALT-C and the information on common slice would appear. You can also use the Track Changes feature to make corrections in a different color inside student assignments. 

Let the students know IN THE BEGINNING OF THE CLASS that this is NOT an independent study course, and that they will have deadlines to meet. If you expect discussion then let them know that also. I do give a short quiz on the Syllabus, worth a few points. If students expect “fun and games” then I want them to drop the course during the drop/add period.  I allow students to retake the quiz until they get the questions correct because I want them to know the requirements. 

Remember it DOES get easier as you continue to teach IF you make improvements and seek student input!

Constructing an Online Course Using Blackboard

Question Tips Best ideas for course construction?        Build class around objectives        Use the tools provided by Blackboard        Provide objectives at unit and week levels along with information resources        Use color appropriately to give students a clue to different topics        Use a calendar with links to the assignments        Use a textbook with a CD-ROM        View courses developed by other instructors        Many students find the weekly format easiest to keep track of assignments Best ideas for course organization?        Arrange in seminar format        Use course outcomes and units        Establish weekly topics        Set up by topics or in seminar format        Break down the students by area of interest and/or student locale        Give external links to APA guide, CDC, Healthy People 2010        Create folders to arrange and group content into manageable units Best ideas about Blackboard?        Blackboard is easy to use and access        Blackboard has ease of navigation        The course instructor should be familiar with Blackboard        There may need to be a course for students who are unfamiliar with the technology        Many options to create a variety of lesson types        Use video access capability in developing courses        Ease of use in color coding in posts and discussions Best tip about planning for collaboration?        Share and develop e-Portfolios and work together on projects        Design good discussion questions        Define what you expect and then design so that students can achieve the desired objective        Work on case studies or vignettes        Have group activities include nurses in the community as collaborators with students        Have group activities flow around content areas        Use small group work, but design with care and do not start immediately when the class begins unless you have had the students in a previous class.        Have each student post a case study for all students and instructor to write responses

Establishing Community and Avoiding Conflict in Online Classes

Establishing Community:

a.   Set up a cyber café and encourage postings

b.   Instructors can model community.

c.    Younger students may already be used to online communities like “MySpace” and “FaceBook.” You may make it clear that you require formal writing.

d.   Provide a good orientation to what is expected.

e.    Allow some flexibility.

f.       Give students a sense of control. Allow them to not post but read in one or two forums.

g.   Have students share details about their lives if appropriate.

h.    Teaching by vignettes or Case Studies encourages participation.

i.        Begin each posting addressing the student personally, in order to personalize the interaction and create a more personal connection.

 Conflict in an online class:

a.   Phrases like “let’s take a step back” or “I’m glad to see that a sensitive issue has been raised” may start to diffuse the situation.

b.   Remind students of the issues involved, which do not have to involve personalities.

c.    If students interject political or religious beliefs into the discussion remind them that this is not the purpose of the exercise.

d.   You can delete postings with personal attacks. Make it clear in the rubric that this is going to happen.

e.    Ask open-ended questions to get students to clarify their opinions.

f.       Resource on conflict management: http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newLDR_81.htm

http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/effective-classroom-management/conditions-associated-with-classroom-conflict/

Netiquette rules: http://www.albion.com/netiquette/corerules.html  

g.   Make the rules clear to students at the start of class. Students can establish their own “class charter” on the ground rules.

h.    Sometimes conflict is good. Students should learn how to manage conflict in online classes because they will more and more be expected to work online in groups in business.

Issues and Concerns of Teachers New to Online

Concerns: 

• Many teachers are distressed about not being able to see and students and have them see you. Web technology will soon make it possible for the students to see you and you to see them, but if you do that then the asynchronous nature of online is lost. I have found that the personality of the students and the instructor does come through in online postings.
• Student confusion at login can be a problem. Some institutions offer a course in the software. That is a barrier unless it is optional or unless it is an introductory course that carries credit.
• Sometimes students need a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) to see if others have asked the same thing. I do often, especially at the undergrad level, and give a Quiz on the Syllabus the first week of class. It is for credit (not a lot of credit, but credit) and students can take it many times in the first 10 days of class. My aim is to be sure they know the material.
• I sometimes require students to sign and return to me a “Letter of Agreement” that has item such as “I have purchased the text book” “I understand the grading” “I have a backup computer plan.” They do get credit for this.
• Not all students own a computer. They may be using the computers in the institution’s computer lab or at a library. Be judicious in the use of multimedia that demands many computer resources.

• Students should know what is expected. Here is what one community college sends to students http://www.muskegoncc.edu/pages/2246.asp (Muskegon Community College)
• Discussions are important. http://www.westga.edu/~distance/ojdla/spring51/edelstein51.pdf   Students learned more and were happier with the outcome if there were discussions.
• ·     The  instructor needs to be logging in and responding to the discussions.
• ·            Teachers must be trained to become good online instructors. Some college professors may find it very difficult to make the transition to online. I subscribe to the Podagogy blog and I thought this posting was interesting http://blog.podagogy.com/?p=421
• ·          It is the teacher's responsibility to make sure the students know what you expect. If faculty are grading once a week, then let the students know so they don’t worry when their work is not immediately graded. You can use the “track changes” feature of Word to make comments inside the student papers.
• .
• ·          Threaded discussions help the students stay connected, but the students need to be told what is expected of them. Students also need grades as feedback.

Organizing Content in Blackboard and in Moodle 

  It is important for a Course Management System (CMS) to provide facilities for organizing class material. Scrolling through pages and pages of text is too discouraging for students. In earlier Course Management Systems (CMS) the class was organized by adding icons on the main page. However, this became cumbersome because it cluttered the screen and required students to click on an icon, which then may contain other icons, which in turn may have had other icons. It was just too cumbersome and students often got lost and missed information. Blackboard and Moodle have surmounted this obstacle in different ways.

Blackboard uses the sidebar, main area approach and Moodle uses a screen split in three parts with the content in the middle.

IN THE OPENING SCREEN
Typically, In Blackboard there is a side bar on the left as you face the screen.

It is customizable and the teacher can add or remove buttons. By clicking on the button students can navigate the content of the course. This saves the main screen for whatever option the teacher selects.

In most cases this is the class announcements, which can include a graphic. Announcements may contain a course link, which allows students to click and be taken directly to the material.

In contrast, Moodle does not have a side bar. It splits the screen in three columns. The main column is for the course content. The two side columns can be customized with Blocks such as calendar, messages, recent activity and people, which shows those who are in the class at the present moment.

Both systems have advantages and disadvantages. I like that I can rearrange, add and change the side bar buttons in Blackboard. I like the readily available calendar in Moodle, and being able to see who is online (the Participants block) and the recent activity. I don’t like the way that Moodle keeps all the course information in the middle of the screen with no really quick access. I don’t like that that Blackboard only allows one item in the space facing the sidebar. I would like to also have a calendar. Some faculty make the calendar the option for the opening screen in Blackboard and then have the announcements be a button on the side bar.