What are the foundations for a positive online education experience?
Over the past five years, I have worked to improve the effectiveness and student experience for an online health coach training program. This program first started as a live, in-person, course and switched online in 2010. The school experienced incredible growth, which created a challenge in providing an intimate and personal learning experience for students. In the live program, students developed strong connections with classmates and instructors. The community, is what separated the program from its competitors. To try and keep that sense of community and engagement alive, the school has worked to apply various technologies to the program. The school continues to explore what are the appropriate learning technologies that will make the learning experience more effective and community driven.
To help apply the best practices in instructional technology, I enrolled in the IST master’s program at Indiana University. My experience thus far at IU has been incredible. However, I can’t help but notice a true disconnect between my learning experience at IU and the one we provide our students. Each school has different resources, learners, and instructors, but both should be able to provide rich learning environments.
So, I ask the question, what are the foundations for a positive online education experience? In this blog post, I will show through personal experience and research that professional development, beliefs, and ease of use are some of the keys to a strong online learning experience.
Beliefs
The transition from live to online was challenging for staff. As I mentioned earlier, most, if not all staff, had only experience in the live setting. There was a strong belief among many that this program would not be effective online. When the technology continued to advance, transitions were not as smooth, and this was partially due to staff feeling less confident about its likelihood of success. In addition, the technology added (LMS, conference calling, skype, facebook) met only minimum needs to ensure communication among group. There were few technological implementations that were used to enhance learning. Those that were implemented, suffered a short life and were abandoned before they could be developed further.
Stanhope and Corn (2014) described how a technology facilitator (FT) can have a positive impact on teachers, specific to 1:1 initiatives. Though this was not a 1:1 initiative, the research can still be applied here. Their research examined whether having a TF would enhance the commitment to 1:1 initiatives. Their study argues that schools who had a TG on staff showed a bigger commitment to this initiative. The TF allowed for consistent training for teachers, including professional development (p.268). Schools who had a TF showed a bigger commitment to the initiative and teachers felt more positive about the initiative. Perhaps, had their been a similar position on staff, more technological implementations could have been applied that enhanced learning.
For example, in my personal experience at Indiana University, I have now done a few creative projects using website design and software like Moovly. See an example here:
This learning experience left me with not only a positive learning memory, but also feeling confident speaking on the topics related to IST. When thinking of the HCTP program, there could have been an assignment to create a marketing video of their practice. The instructors could offer a range of possibilities from iMovie to Moovly and more. Students could have posted this in their groups for feedback and possibly use this in their practice in the future.
Ease of Use
To move away from moodlerooms, the school decided to make a custom LMS for the program. Top notch developers and designers were brought in to design an LMS that met the exact needs of the program. This LMS lasted exactly 18 months before the decision was made to move off of it and into Canvas. The main reason was the custom LMS suffered too many issues and became very time consuming to use. Education and Student Services spent a lot of time focusing on resolving, what should be, small issues on a regular basis, when they should have been putting that energy into developing content further for an online environment.
I was reminded of this experience when reading research done by Adunate and Nussbaum (2013). They studied the adoption of various learning technologies in the classroom. Whiteboards had the lowest adoption due to its ease of use compared to digital cameras and a reference site. Many reported wanting to abandon it at the beginning and middle of its adoption. However, as those started to understand its function and benefits, adoption increased. The difference in this research and the example above, is the technology continued to not be functional. Eventually the frustration outweighed the benefits and it decided to move on to other platforms.
I mention this example and research because I think ease of use is important. If the technology applied is challenging to use, both the instructor and student will become distracted with the main purpose, learning. Utilizing more functional technology, both students and instructors can engage with less distractions.
Professional Development
When the health coach training program (HCTP) first converted to all online, the school decided to use Moodlerooms. The staff who worked to get this set up did not have substantial experience in online education. Their primary experience was working in the field of health coaching and supporting the school when it was live. They were trained by moodlerooms to get the system setup, but there was no one on staff who had a strong background in online education.
Fast forward to a year later, results were showing major enrollment, but also a significant increase in complaints. Many students expressed not feeling supported or part of a learning group. As an example, students would post in the discussion forums, but not get a response for days. Staff relied on their experience in the live program to dictate their instructional choices and methods of support. In this example, many staff froze when deciding what to do because there was simply too many to answer. Since their approach was not altered to meet the online platform, issues continued to escalate.
Professional development, whether it be a TF or regular traininings on best practices, could have helped ease the transition from live to online. As Ertmer and Ottenbreit-Leftwich note in their 2010 article, professional development can allow for instructors to learn and appreciate technology as a way to increase learning outcomes for students (p.272). In this example, professional development could have helped them determine how to better structure discussions, create more peer-review, or come up with new methods to address the lesson at hand.
At the beginning of the Ertmer and Ottenbreit-Leftwich (2010) article, they note how many professions (mechanics, doctors, etc) require substantial knowledge and implementation of technology specific to their field. Examples they gave were doctors using various technology tools such as 2-D, 3-D, and 4-D image scans to ensure the safety of a growing fetus (p.255). This practice is expected and if that knowledge were not there, a patient could worry about the doctor's abilities. Online education is on the rise and it is essential that instructors have the training and understanding of how to teach effective online courses.
I would push back and say, is it really how an instructor uses technology, or just how an instructor interacts with his/her students?
ReplyDeleteI like the outline, and I think this will be a good area to explore! I wonder, most of what you're talking about above is student-centered creation and production tasks, which doesn't necessarily relate to how instructors use technology, but how instructors provide a space for students to use technology themselves, in these creative student-centered ways. I would argue you could have a pretty "bad" instructor, and as long as they have good classroom management skills, and students have the space and support they need to engage in these types of activities, then you could potentially still have great learning happening. Just some thoughts that are hopefully helpful in thinking about while writing up this post!
ReplyDeleteMike Karlin (not "Biology Homework" - my old Blogspot blog)
Thank you! I am thinking of revising my question to: How can instructors use technology to effectively interact with students?
DeleteI feel like this could better address the feedback that you and Professor Leftwich gave me. I agree with your point that you could have a "bad" instructor, but still get a quality learning experience, as long as the tools are set up the right way.
What do you think?
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DeleteTo add more to your comment, I do feel teachers should have insight on various platforms in order to guide and support students. I wouldn't have thought to use Moovly had my instructor not suggested it. He gave me a range of ideas to present my final projects (website, movie, moovly, etc) that I didn't consider as an option.
DeleteHow do you define "effective" use of technology and effective interaction with students? What if instructors have different perceptions of effective instruction with technology for student learning?
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ReplyDelete