The following is a response to a prompt after analyzing survey results….it seeks to respond to negative feedback about an online learning course.

Teacher Quality
Feedback: “I did not have much interaction with the teacher.”
Suggestion: Heightening the level of interactivity is key to the success of an online course. As such, the online instruction needs to set straight the role s/he will play as instructor. Those roles–which if exercised properly can provide the kind of feedback response students need and are informed by research–include any or all of the following:

• Providing positive feedback on student input by highlight the comments made that are relevant rather than individual students.
• Encouraging contributions from individual students.
• Being sensitive to students’ needs
• Praising and modeling positive discussant behavior.

Feedback: “The only thing the teacher did, as far as I know, is grade my assignment” and “Only was in contact with teacher when she graded the assignments.” as well as “Online teacher was invisibile and inaccessible.”

Suggestion(s): Clarifying your role as an effective facilitator is critical, as much as interactivity! One way of doing that early on is to take time to set the agenda. This involves declaring the discussion objectives, setting a timeline for achievement of those, providing strong leadership and direction. For example, it was clear that students–or at least, this one in particular–did feel that s/he saw a decisive end to discussions or assignments. In other words, students did not know where they were in the flow of the discussion, whether they had achieved objectives or not because those discussions were not decisively ended.

Achieving closure on topics is important. Frey and Wojnar point out that it is essential to “summarize for reinforcement and closure” so as to better combine discussion threads. With this kind of action taken, the student would have had a better idea of the value the facilitator provided rather than having to infer it from lack of action or the few actions taken.

The Online Teacher Utilizes Effective Teaching Techniques.
Feedback: “Every assignment was the same.”

Suggestion(s): Varying activities is critical. Assignments can be varied in ways that allow students to respond to conflicting opinions. One approach for that is the kinds of questions the facilitator can ask. Using full-spectrum questionning (Adapted from Precision Questioning, Dennis Mathies (1991)), questions can be asked that address urgency, context, relevance and/or importance of the response (“so what?”), clarify meaning or conceptual vocabulary, explore assumptions/sources and/or rationale. Other question types include cause-n-effect and appropriateness of action.

In addition to employing full-spectrum questionning to enrich the discussions, it is also possible to rely on a variety of e-Learning activities. I was overjoyed to encounter Ryan Watkins 75 e-Learning Activities: Making online learning interactive.

This book on e-learning activities covers various activities that can be used to ensure students will not be filing a similar complaint as the one above. The book is divided into sections, including the following:

1. Tips for Effective e-Learning Design and Delivery – while I found this section a bit superfluous, some of the tips were valuable, even as reminders. I won’t say I knew all of them but my sense is that if you’ve participated in online courses as a learner and facilitator, you’re aware of these. Still, it’s nice to have them “written down.”
2. Introductions and Icebreakers – This is where the book gets good and I have to admit, I’m going to use some of these for my next few online courses. There are so many possibilities for livening up an online course in the intro section.
3. e-Learning Study Skills – This includes an e-Learning Readiness self-assessment and pre-reading questions worth studying in more detail.
4. Collaboration and Team-Building – For a long course, this would be well worthwhile, and includes tips like setting discussion ground rules and playing roles in a group.
5. Elaborating on Course Content – This is one of the bigger sections and I about fell out of my chair as I reviewed these. Just lots of stuff here.
6. Increasing Interactivity – Again, more great stuff like structured controversies, town hall meetings, guest speaker press conference and online jigsaw learning.

As you might guess, there are many approaches that can be employed that eliminate the “assignment weariness” for students faced with having constant discussions.

And, one must also mention that if using Moodle, you can take advantage of Hot Potatoes (free for Windows/Mac users) to create a rich variety of task-based activities.

Feedback: “The only time I accessed someone was when dealing with the difficulties with the technical aspects of the course.”

Suggestion(s): Again, the challenge for this online learning course from the student was lack of contact with the facilitator. It’s critical that technical issues and/or questions about assignments be handle quickly so that the student does not feel isolated. One way to achieve fast handling is to create a technical support forum, a virtual helpdesk where participants can post their questions.

It is important to allow others–fellow students–the opportunity to respond to “trouble-tickets” so that students begin to build that reliance, that community of learners in the face of adversity. Over time, increased peer support in technical areas transfer over to other discussions, enabling students to share in the role of facilitating their own needs. This is an important point to consider since we are dealing with adult learners, and/or with students, learners that must learn to adapt to online learning environments.

In considering that learners may have different needs, it’s to be expected that students would want to more activities where the instructor is the center-point of discussion. Yet, like the Socratic Seminar my fifteen year old daughter participates in high school English class, a socratic seminar approach helps spread the responsibility of moderation to others.

While I found it difficult to identify/differentiate between some of the comments made by students and those made by adults, there did seem to be a desire to ensure that learning was relevant to what adults had to do (e.g. matched up to standards). This is different from K-12 learners who sought feedback from a moderator who exhibited social responsibilities for keeping conversations going, as well as made them comfortable with the system.

How could we better differentiate the survey data to reflect adult vs K-12 learner comments and feedback?

References
Kiernan, M., Thomas, P., & Woodroffe, M. (unk). Signposts in the sand: Key issues for e-moderators. Email: mk222@tutor.open.ac.uk; p.g.thomas@open.ac.uk; m.r.woodroffe@open.ac.uk

Chapter 3, Key Facilitator Roles. PDF document available offline.

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Everything posted on Miguel Guhlin’s blogs/wikis are his personal opinion and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer(s) or its clients. Read Full Disclosure