Searching for "online learning"
Study: Gamification Techniques Can Improve Online Teaching
https://campustechnology.com/articles/2021/04/12/study-gamification-techniques-can-improve-online-teaching.aspx
A new study out of MIT‘s Sloan School of Management explores the use of ideas and tools from the gaming community to improve online teaching and student learning outcomes.
four key elements for maximizing student engagement in online learning:
- Narrative — a specific storyline or overarching theme. For instance, study co-author Brian Stevens, senior lecturer at the University of Tennessee‘s Haslam College of Business, created a video game theme for his statistics class, incorporating “Boss Battles,” “Speed Runs” and wacky characters to spice up his lectures.
- Continuous flow of action in sight and sound, even before class starts. For example, Lo uses a countdown timer and upbeat music on his course page about 30 minutes before the start of a synchronous lecture, to build anticipation for class. He also switches tasks and/or scenes every 15 minutes to help maintain students’ attention and interest levels.
- Opportunities for two-way communication. To help turn students from viewers into participants, Lo uses a combination of the “Raise Hand” function in Zoom, polls, breakout sessions, surveys and the chat window.
- High production quality. Lo built a home studio with various input devices, professional lighting, a green screen and more to create richer, more engaging presentations for students.
The full study, “The World of EdCraft: Challenges and Opportunities in Synchronous Online Teaching,” is openly available online
serious gamers and gamification experts on that panel. More here on the initiative: https://tinyurl.com/IABOL2021
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more on gamification in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=gamification
https://lompocrecord.com/opinion/columnists/jennifer-brown-and-christopher-lynch-quality-online-education-for-higher-ed-requires-public-investment/article_512e95ce-fae0-5d0b-917c-3a2f9232ad74.html
Online coursework must not be considered an inferior or cheaper option. Getting online right requires a significant investment in course development guided by professional course designers who focus on achieving and assessing learning outcomes. Best practices show that developing a quality online course takes about 10 weeks to build with the faculty member working closely alongside an instructional/course designer, and research has shown that in-person instruction improves after working with instructional designers.
An online lecture requires more lecture preparation, continuous monitoring of student progress, increased use of assessment tools, extensive electronic interaction with the students and online office hoursAdditional instructor and teaching assistant support is also needed, as well as technical support.
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more on online education in this ISM blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=%22online+education%22
https://www.facebook.com/groups/onlinelearningcollective/permalink/746716582625709/
a discussion from the Higher Ed Learning Collective:
In my teaching career I worked at two colleges in Wisconsin. One public and one private. Both have Learning outcomes for each course, program/major outcomes for each major, and Institutional outcomes for the college (aka Employable skills, Career essentials, or Abilities).
Recently a friend of mine started teaching an online class at the University in a different state, and she kept asking them to give her learning outcomes for the course. After some back and forth emails it turned out that this other state university doesn’t have them.
It blew my mind
, how do they know what the scope and depth of teaching should be in that course? How do they get their accreditation?
I am curious to know if it is just in Wisconsin or selected states/countries that it is a common practice to have outcomes? Also how do you teach without them?
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We have LOs over here in MN.
My guess is that they’re buried deep in some filing cabinet in your friend’s university and most folks just ignore them.
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Usually the instructor is required to create the outcomes for the class, but they are usually based on meta-outcomes from the department. That’s how it has been at all institutions I have worked at. With that said, I have worked with colleagues, full professors with Ph.D.s that didn’t understand the principle of learning outcomes, and unless forced to put them in the syllabus, they either would not do it on their own or when having them, would not follow them. And forgot about triangulation of LO to activities and assessments.
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Accreditors look for program LOs but not at course level. (We learned this after a faculty member was fired for pushing back on LOs on the syllabus, and when the Uni said “SACS requirements”, SACS responded w/“um no, not really…”) Since then, we’ve collected data as part of our assessment plan & can say w/confidence that students don’t read them…
http://blog.stcloudstate.edu/oer/2021/01/18/learning-to-learn-online/
Learning to Learn Online was created by students to help ease the shift from a traditional classroom setting to an online environment. You will explore a total of six unique chapters that will help you successfully prepare for online learning.
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more on learning in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=learn+to+learn
https://www.edsurge.com/news/2020-12-16-now-is-the-time-to-redefine-learning-not-recreate-traditional-school-online
The vast majority of emergent virtual and hybrid learning models appear to be “stuck at substitution”—that is, they seek to recreate or translate the brick-and-mortar school experience into the cloud without stopping to ask which aspects of those models may not truly serve students in the time of COVID-19 or beyond.
When we say “stuck at substitution,” some readers may recognize the SAMR model of education technology integration. The SAMR framework describes four different levels of technology use, from Substitution to Augmentation, Modification and Redefinition (SAMR). At its most basic level, education technology can be used to simply substitute: to replace traditional methods of teaching and learning with ones that are digitally mediated, but are still based on the same basic structure and pedagogy.
edtech can be used for augmentation, to bring some other affordance or benefit to the teaching and learning experience—for example, when that worksheet becomes a shared Google Doc that allows for collaboration and increased critical thinking.
Redefinition means thinking beyond existing paradigms and schedules that are built for an on-campus experience. It is the opportunity to imagine entirely new ways of teaching and learning—for example, attendance policies that emphasize engagement versus seat time, blended learning models that leverage technology for anywhere, anytime learning, and instructional design that allows increased student choice and participation.
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more on online learning in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=online+learning
Higher Ed Learning Collective
https://www.facebook.com/groups/onlinelearningcollective/permalink/711959409434760/
I am thinking about doing clicker-type questions as well as groupwork with instant response as the core of my online synchronous class. With this in mind, I am considering either Top Hat (which the students have used as clickers, but what I am not sure about is how well it works for groupwork) versus Learning Catalytics (which has a mode that I know works well and forces students to do the questions themselves first … which I have a love/hate relationship with – and has some question types that might be interesting but I am not as certain about the interface). I’d like to hear your thoughts.
Thanks!
FWIW: the class is general chemistry.
https://cognitiontoday.com/pros-and-cons-of-online-education-and-learning/
- Access to variety
- More autonomy, flexibility, & control
- Native digital habits
- Extended brain
- Easier Relatability
- Easier self-expression
- Distribution of learning resources
- Competition for quality
Cons/Disadvantages of learning online
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Gateway to procrastination
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Online disinhibition & psychological distance
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Merging of formal & informal environments
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Opportunities for technological & human errors
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High cost of transition
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Weak boundaries & monotony
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Lack of social connections & collaboration
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Lack of buffer activities and time gaps
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Cyberbullying & threats
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_Alpha
Meet Generation Alpha. Here’s How Their Lives Will Be Different Than Previous Generations
Baby Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, Gen Z, & Gen Alpha: What Generation Am I?
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more on online ed in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=online+education
https://www.facebook.com/groups/onlinelearningcollective/permalink/705490370081664/
Question for the brilliant hive-mind: I am looking for an in-depth, thought-provoking and non-didactic essay on learning to share with my students. Doesn’t have to be long, doesn’t have to be academic, per se. What are some of your favorites?
KEEGAN: The Opposite of Loneliness
Home
Survey: Distance learning creates more work with less rigor
https://www.educationdive.com/news/survey-distance-learning-creates-more-work-with-less-rigor/588097/
- The sudden transition from in-person learning to remote instruction resulted in more work but with less academic rigor, according to a Cognia survey of more than 74,000 students, teachers and parents conducted between late April and late June. Among students, the report found 80% saying they had more work in the distance learning setting.
The report includes suggestions on tackling problems arising from distance learning, including increasing academic rigor by expanding professional development opportunities, redesigning instruction, and introducing digital learning and content tools.
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more on online education in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=online+education
Call for Chapters: Transforming Teachers’ Online Pedagogical Reasoning for Teaching K-12 Students in Virtual Learning Environments
Proposals Submission Deadline: November 16, 2020
Full Chapters Due: February 21, 2021
Submission Date: February 21, 2021
Introduction
How can students learn safely amid the challenges of the global pandemic? Currently, it is not safe to have them crowded in a classroom engaged in face-to-face learning. The challenge has forced K-12 teachers to think differently about teaching. Unexpectedly, and with little warning, they have been confronted with redesigning their curriculum and instruction from face-to-face to online virtual classrooms to protect students from the COVID-19 virus. The critical questions include: Has this shift assured that students will learn the identified essential content and skills for the 21st century? Will they develop the skills identified through the 4C’s: communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity (Thoughtful Learning Organization, 2016)? The rapid shift of K-12 education to being online left educators and parents lacking in confidence that students will receive an appropriate education through the virtual environments proposed for keeping students safe. The speed with which this transition was made prevented educators from developing the necessary knowledge and skills needed to create engaging learning in the unfamiliar virtual environment. Superficial observations of the online features and organizations for virtual environments suggest these environments lack key elements for guiding students in engaging in the skills such as those identified by the 4 C’s. A more serious question is: Are the bold claims true that students cannot learn online in virtual environments? Some say that teachers lack the knowledge of how to think about online teaching in a virtual environment. This begs the question, are today’s teachers simply applying their classroom strategies as they have done in their face-to-face classrooms, only now in front of a web camera?
Objective
The primary objective of this book is to gather and present actual best practices and pedagogical reasoning for designing online strategies that work for K-12 virtual learning. The chapters will provide ways to think about teaching in virtual environments that can be used to guide instructional strategy choices and ultimate decisions. The ideas and frameworks will present effective online pedagogical reasoning for the redesign and implementation of K-12 virtual classrooms.