While it might seem like a different lifetime, it was not so long ago that our world was turned upside down by the emergence of
Echo360, the global leader in campus-wide active and distance learning solutions, is announcing a product release that provides analytics for student activity before, during and after class. Data-rich summaries provide instructors intelligent insight on each student’s participation, flags topics of difficulty and measures student engagement in and out of class. Ultimately, this data will guide instructor-led course adjustments and improve academic outcomes as teaching pedagogies changes to respond to student cues in real time.
In a follow-up to the online seminar “Creatively Engaging Online Students: Models and Activities,” Curt Bonk, professor of instructional systems technology at Indiana University, offered the following response from a participant who asked, “What is your favorite method to increase interactivity in an online class?”
Several years ago, a colleague suggested that having students lead discussions in the online classroom would be a good idea. I agreed and searched the literature for research on this topic but found nothing. No one at that point had been looking at having students moderate, or they hadn’t written about it. I still thought it was a good idea and decided to pursue this line of research by having my students moderate and follow up with an end-of-course student questionnaire.
Faculty need to consider learning objectives, learning styles, accessibility, cost, and available technical support when designing distance learning courses, says Laurie Hillstock, manager of distance learning at Clemson University.
Hillstock works with faculty to develop satellite, CD-ROM, and Web-based courses using a design model that is roughly 80 percent asynchronous and 20 synchronous. Within this model, instructors can…