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Observing Online Instruction: View of Instructors and Students

The tremendous growth of online learning has been spurred by improved student access, the increased rate of degree completion, and the growth of varied and/or professional education¹ (Seaman and Allen, 2008). For long-term success in online education , institutions must establish an overall program composed of recruitment, training, scheduling, and mentoring. They also need a system for evaluating and observing faculty to ensure that course standards are maintained and courses are taught within institutional policies.

Michael T. Eskey PhD September 14, 2010

Five Techniques for Dealing with Problem Students and Other Classroom Challenges

James is a first-year student who is enjoying the freedoms of being out from underneath his parents’ rules. He’s an average student academically, but is often a distraction in class. He perpetually texting or surfing the web, and gentle reminders from the professor to pay attention fail to keep him on task for long. His behavior is having a negative effect on other students in the class and the professor is reaching his breaking point. The final straw came when the professor noticed James was wearing headphones while taking an exam.

Mary Bart September 13, 2010

Modular Assignments: Learning Episodes for Diverse Students

On our campus, we have growing numbers of nontraditional students. The demands on their time out of class are numerous—work, family, and military obligations. It is my job to meet them where they can learn and benefit.

Rolland Fraser September 10, 2010

Improving Online Learning, part 2

Editor’s Note: In Tuesday’s post, the author explained how he used streaming media to enhance the delivery of his online course content. In this post, he discusses the impact on student learning, and answers the question … Was it worth the extra work?

Jerry Kapus PhD September 9, 2010

Integrating Social Media into Online Education

Many people take it on faith that online education must be run through a learning management system (LMS) like Blackboard, Angel, etc. Those systems were originally designed to allow faculty to move their courses online without having to learn HTML coding. They provided all of the tools needed to deliver an online course in one package.

John Orlando, PhD September 8, 2010

Improving Online Learning, part 1

Instructors have a myriad of technological tools available to enhance online instruction, such as blogs, wikis, and streaming audio and video. I have been particularly interested in streaming audio and video to deliver course content in a dynamic mode that captures the energy of the traditional classroom presentation while taking advantage of the Web’s functionality to combine text, audio, and images. However, given the significant time it takes to design and create a presentation for streaming over the Web, I have wondered whether the time commitment is justified by the learning benefit for students. Do bells and whistles enhance learning online?

Jerry Kapus PhD September 7, 2010

The Teaching Professor Conference Issues Call for Papers for 2011

Magna Publications, the leading provider of professional development resources for the higher education community, today issued a Call for Proposals for the 2011 Teaching Professor Conference to be held May 20-22 in Atlanta.

Mary Bart September 4, 2010

Eight Things Campus Leaders Can Do to Support Academic Departments

As a department head, I initiate or respond to seemingly endless phone calls, emails, and letters to and from almost every corner of the campus, the community, state agencies, etc. Our department’s office coordinator is swamped by similar interactions. Our faculty members, while working mostly with students, also interact with many others each day. We must all be well-versed in the “who does what” and “how things get done” on our campus and beyond.

Doyle D. Carter, EdD September 3, 2010

Five Steps to Improving Program-Level Assessment Practices

Student learning outcomes assessment can be defined in a lot of different ways, but Lisa R. Shibley, PhD., assistant vice president for Institutional Assessment and Planning at Millersville University, has a favorite definition. It’s from Assessment Clear and Simple: A Practical Guide for Institutions, Departments, and General Education by Barbara E. Walvoord and states that student learning outcomes assessment is “the systematic collection of information about student learning, using time, knowledge, expertise, and resources available in order to inform decisions about how to improve learning.”

Mary Bart September 1, 2010

To Improve Students’ Problem Solving Skills Add Group Work to the Equation

Problem solving is “what you do when you don’t know what to do.”

What a simple, straightforward definition for something often defined in much more complex ways. But problem solving doesn’t always mean the same thing. It might be the solution to a specific problem, like those that appear on math quizzes, or it might be a collection of possibilities that respond to a complex open-ended problem. But however it’s defined, problem solving is one of those skills all teachers aspire to have their students develop.

Maryellen Weimer, PhD August 31, 2010

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