Re-designing an online course

I have been hard at work re-designing an online educational foundations course. It is an interesting process to rewrite a course after five years with the same approach. The re-design became more of an immediate need as in late December the Obama Administration signed into law the Every Student Succeeds Act, updating the No Child Left Behind Act. Suddenly, all textbooks dealing with the NCLB were suddenly out of date.

The re-design had been in the works, but it is a huge undertaking. At the same time, after five additional years of experiencing teaching the course, as instructor I find myself making new connections across concepts. It is a fascinating process, really. A teacher really learns the content when responsible for teaching it to others.

With online learners at the community college level, I am focusing upon also developing critical thinking skills. I find online learning instruction a challenge for many reasons. First, one has to find ways to encourage students to read the lectures and textbook, which, honestly, is no different from live classrooms. As a live classroom instructor for almost 30 years I have often seen the textbook, still wrapped in its cellophane cover, tossed into the trash can, never having been open. I usually claim these for future students, just in case someone really needs a textbook. My answer to working the content is, of course, to include quizzes that cover the content, but I also have students summarize content, provide answers to worksheet items, and reflect upon material in journal responses. That seems to be a useful strategy. It is a good approach, I think, as it moves students through Bloom's taxonomy upward through the glossary of content, into discussions with each other to clarify concepts, and then into one-to-one responses that focus on their reflecting about the concepts.

Online learners need to acquire self-assessment tools to help them with the ah-ha of learning. That is, they have to help themselves to find ways that identify for themselves that they have really learned the material.