Surviving Teaching Your Online Courses

Teaching courses online is not the same as face-to-face teaching. Although we have extensive experience in the traditional classroom, we need to rethink how to achieve many of these same positive outcomes and interactions in a virtual environment. This article provides 7 strategies to help each instructor get off to a good start.

Strategy 1 It’s personal. Just as classroom instruction is unique to your teaching style, so is online teaching. Do not feel obligated to teach online, like everyone else, because no one has the right to the TRUTH in this area. We are at an exciting period of continuous development. Therefore, find small and large ways to express your teaching style in the virtual environment.

Strategy 2 Develop a learning community. Invite students to post their favorite photos or slogans to create a composite class picture. This strategy greatly contributes to creating an online community feeling. Remember that in this setting, teachers and students will not see each other unless they use real-time video cameras. Having a photo to reference reduces the anonymity and strengthens the sense of reality of the virtual community.

Strategy 3 Communicate. How many ways do you communicate in an online course? Much more than what we usually enjoy. Plan at least three strategies a week with your students: blogging, virtual office hours, discussion forum, email, audio commentary, video commentary, online chat session, instant messenger, phone, or voice over internet protocol (VOIP) ( SKYPE, Gizmo, etc.), notes comments, etc.

Strategy 4 Ranking Opportunities. When posting grades, teachers have an unparalleled opportunity to improve communication and feedback with students. Rarely enter only a single digital note. Be sure to include specific comments and encouragement about student work.

Strategy 5 Support and encouragement. One of the problems we have to solve as online instructors is the high dropout rate. Take every opportunity to establish communication with students and encourage them to continue their work and to be responsible for their progress. Consider ways to develop a supportive and supportive learner community, from teacher to student and student to student.

Strategy 6 Continuous Improvement. Online courses require constant improvement – each semester, as students progress through a few sessions, they come back to the content and adapt it to their feedback, problems and questions. For example, make corrections, reorganize, refresh content, or add more dynamic media and interactivity to engage learning in meaningful learning and understanding of content.

Strategy 7 Learning throughout life. Walk the conversation. As teachers, we model lifelong learning, we will encourage our students to do the same. In addition, we will better understand their needs and discover new ways to solve them. The teacher who continues to grow transmits an essential message every day to her students.