Posts Tagged ‘discussion boards’
March 19 - Managing Controversy in the Online Classroom
By: Rob Kelly in Online Education
Controversy can erupt in any learning situation, and knowing how to manage it is an important skill for any instructor. Online instructors need to be aware of the following challenges when it comes to managing controversy:
March 7 - Three Ways to Change up Your Online Discussion Board Prompts
By: Rob Kelly in Asynchronous Learning and Trends, Online Education
Are you having trouble getting students to participate in online discussions? Consider using other types of prompts in addition to the typical open-ended question. Maria Ammar, assistant English professor at Frederick Community College, uses the following prompts in her English as a second language course and recommends them for other types of courses:
September 6 - Tips for Overcoming Online Discussion Board Challenges
By: Errol Craig Sull in Online Education
Discussion boards are often viewed as the heart of online courses, and for good reason: the students can interact with one another 24/7, sharing, debating, and offering ideas, insights, suggestions, and information that stimulate the learning process. Yet challenges do happen in discussion, and these can be formidable. Left alone, they can quickly limit the effectiveness of any discussion and create problems throughout the online course.
June 14 - Tips from the Pros: Reducing Instructor Workload in Discussion Forums
By: Rob Kelly in Online Education
Keith Restine, associate director of distance education, and Allison Peterson, senior instructional designer, both at Texas Woman’s University, offer the following tips for reducing instructor workload in discussion forums: You don’t have to be an active participant in every discussion. Let students know that although you will monitor all discussions, you may not be an
November 11 - Making Online Discussion Boards Work for Skills-Based Courses
By: Rob Kelly in Online Education
If you teach a skills-based course and wonder how online discussion can enhance the learning experience, consider Roger Gee’s approach to the use of online discussions in his introduction to accounting course.
April 29 - Discussion Board Assignments Designed to Foster Interaction and Collaboration
By: Stacey Curdie in Online Education
After some trial and error, I have hit upon a discussion set up that seems to promote the kind of depth and breadth of engagement with the course material and with each other that I would ideally like to elicit. Students are asked to read between two-to-four pieces of literature (poetry, short stories, essays) and to participate in two discussion boards per week – one group discussion and one pair discussion. For both, they must post an initial answer to a question I pose by Tuesday. Then, by Friday at noon, they must read at least what they’re groupmates have posted and post at least one reply/follow-up.
December 11 - Should You Let Students Lead Discussion Boards?
By: Joan Thormann, PhD. in Asynchronous Learning and Trends
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.
September 30 - Reaching Online Students with Learning Disabilities
By: Mary Bart in Online Education
Students with disabilities are drawn to online courses for many of the same reasons as everyone else, but it’s often the anonymity that makes learning online particularly attractive to someone who’s spent his or her life trying to mask a disability. For online instructors, this can present new issues. After all, it’s hard enough distinguishing
July 24 - Online Design: Reaching Students Eight Different Ways
By: Rob Kelly in Online Education
The online learning environment offers great potential for individualized learning. One way to achieve this is through adaptive hypermedia—using learner use patterns to adapt course presentation, navigation, and content to suit individual students’ needs and preferences.
July 23 - Eight Tips for Facilitating Effective Online Discussion Forums
By: Rebecca Owens in Asynchronous Learning and Trends
At the heart of every online course is the discussion forum. This is where ideas, information, and new material are shared, discussed, analyzed, built upon, etc. In many ways, the discussion forum mimics the classroom in a face-to-face environment. “Discussion is one of the most effective ways to make students aware of the range of
