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U N I V E R S I T Y O F P I T T S B U R G H |
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A newsletter devoted to the support of teaching and learning at the University of Pittsburgh |
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U N I V E R S I T Y O F P I T T S B U R G H |
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A newsletter devoted to the support of teaching and learning at the University of Pittsburgh |
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Putting a Course Online to Teach at a DistanceBy Anna Halechko, Psychology
Even after many years of teaching both traditional and distance courses in Abnormal Psychology, when I considered putting the entire course in CourseWeb for delivery via PittOnline, I was concerned that I would face an overwhelming demand on my time to prepare the course, let alone teach it. Many faculty share this concern about the workload in developing and teaching an online course, and it’s important for them to know that support and resources are available to make the process smooth and manageable. It was very helpful to work with a CIDDE instructional designer. Regular contacts helped me to stay on task and, as we bounced ideas back and forth, she shared materials and activities for teaching online. Most students today are technologically sophisticated and comfortable with online materials and format, but it is important to provide structure and assist students in pacing themselves through the course. It was helpful to see what others are doing, and the instructional designer shared many ideas that I would not have been aware of otherwise. Her suggestions were a tremendous help, and I even received some ideas I can use in other courses. Another factor that made it easier than expected to develop an online course is that the publishers of many textbooks now provide excellent materials and learning activities that can be changed and personalized by the instructor. These resources are easily adapted to Pitt’s online course management system, CourseWeb, and the instructional designer pointed me to the appropriate CIDDE instructional technology staff when it was necessary to address a technical issue. A major structural addition to my distance course is a focus on weekly online asynchronous threaded discussions. These give students a regular avenue for interacting with one another and with me. The instructional designer pointed out the importance of planning a sequence of discussion assignments, using initial ones to establish a collaborative atmosphere for the course. She provided useful examples of discussion prompts and evaluation criteria. In fact, her suggestions for making grading criteria as explicit as possible motivated me to incorporate new grading rubrics in my traditional face-to-face courses.
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A newsletter devoted to the support of teaching and learning at the University of Pittsburgh |
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