I am on the online education train! I think online courses can be amazing, excellent learning experiences. I talked with my friend the other day who is in a different PhD program. She was saying that online classes are not for her. She loves the face to face classroom setting. I told her the first online course I took, I was yearning for at least some "voice-overed" PowerPoints. By the second course, I did not miss the voice at all. My instinct was to try to convince her how wonderful online courses are but I stopped. I thought, "to each his own". I am aware online courses are not for everyone. I tend to think, you don't know until you try it... There is an obvious adaptive process that takes places for a student trying an online course for the first or second time. All I know is I am excited about it and maybe I'm biased but it seems as though demand for online courses will continue to increase as long as we can maintain educational quality.
Last semester I did a review of the literature for my nursing education course. The literature I reviewed was focused on strategies for online nursing education/courses. It was a fantastic learning experience. Many of the studies used Chickering & Gamson's Seven Principles of Good Practice in Undergraduate Education as the framework. It was the first time I had been introduced to the principles. They really made sense in both the classroom and online environment. This class adds another useful layer of knowledge to the picture. Knowing good practice as identified by Chickering & Gamson in order to self-evaluate online courses is essential but the facilitator/moderator role is also essential to maintain quality education and to increase transfer of knowledge. I was surprised most of the literature I reviewed did not talk about the role of the facilitator.
Another intriguing thing I was introduced to last semester is Second Life, a virtual world where classes can meet synchronously. If you haven't seen it, check it out! http://secondlife.com/ It's pretty amazing! It might be a nice addition to an online course however then there is the synchronous element as well as the technology element to contend with.
Thanks to everyone is this class who have made this a wonderful learning experience so far. Thank you Heidi for leading the way!
Dana, I like your idea about trying a synchronous element. I thought I would actually try it in my mini-module...but time was a problem. If people have advance notice in the course syllabi it could work.
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Dana,
ReplyDeleteI looked at Second Life this looks great for adding role playing to a course. I quickly poked around but it looked like you could create your own virtual world and avatar. Although it would take a lot of time for me to learn this I bet our students could catch on and really be creative with this.
Thank you for sharing.......Mary S.
2nd Life is amazing! But it sure can suck up a WHOLE LOT of time without even realizing it! I use to think that this was the "next level" for online courses, but since it requires "same time" interaction, I'm not so sure. People sure do appreciate the fact that they can engage in a course at their convenience.
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