Need Some Fresh Ideas for Teaching Virtually?

 By Donna Westfall-Rudd and Jama S. Coartney -- 

 

One option might be to take a more student-centered learning approach to your online courses. While teaching in-person has advantages when it comes to making connections, you can still create a classroom atmosphere with engagement and interaction, by focusing on the needs, interests, and inquiries of your students.

In a recent publication, Teaching in the University, Rachel Mack offers guidance on exactly how to go about making these additions to the curriculum in the chapter entitled, “4. Teaching Practices for Student-Centered Learning Online.”  Recently published as an open textbook, this resource offers suggestions on how to engage students in an online environment.  It also offers tips and things to consider when working with students to increase the opportunity for them to build relationships with others in the course and feel engaged with the course content.



For example, one action you can take is to tell students at the beginning of a course what technology platform(s) you will be using and to provide them with resources, such as existing tutorials to ensure that they know how to use these platforms. An advantage of offering an online course is the ability to easily integrate web-based resources into instructional activities.


Options to Access the Textbook:


If you would like more information about Open Education Resources (OER), this press release about the textbook provides background about the process for creating and OER.



Photo by @Windows on Unsplash.com



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