11 Tips for Setting the Tone in Your Online Course
The cliché that you only get one chance to make a first impression is especially true when you teach online. Each item you post—email, discussion message, announcement, etc.—must be created with much...
View ArticleTaking a Learner-Centered Approach in Online Courses
One of the biggest changes in recent years has been the adoption of student-centered instruction. Here are a few tips for taking this approach to teaching in your online courses: Be a constant presence...
View ArticleKeep Your Classes on Track During the Holidays
This time of year is always one of the most difficult times for students to focus on their studies. In the online classroom it can be an especially challenging to keep students engaged, serious, and...
View ArticleSeven Tips for Creating a Positive Online Learning Experience
Here are a few tips to ensure your students have a positive online learning experience. Personal introductions. By using the personal introductions of students, an instructor can get to know his/her...
View ArticleInstructor or Professor, It’s Not Your Title but What You Do That’s Important
In a recent conversation, an online teaching colleague complained that her school had wrongly listed her as “adjunct instructor,” rather than “adjunct professor,” in its faculty roster. “That term...
View ArticleOnline Teaching Tips: Sweat the Small Stuff
When we teach online courses there are many fundamental issues that concern us: knowledge of our subjects, teaching strategies, engagement of students, school policies, deadlines, grading and returning...
View ArticleOnline Teaching Tips for Leveraging Students’ Insights and Experiences
Teaching any online class is time-consuming and can be a juggling act. The instructor must keep students engaged and motivated, adhere to a variety of deadlines, quickly answer all student emails and...
View ArticlePreparing Your Online Students for the Tough Weeks Ahead
Our courses are rolled out to online students with assignments scheduled for each week. Some of these assignments are relatively easy, meaning there will be weeks that are “light” in terms of scheduled...
View ArticleHow to Create Effective Activities for Online Teaching
We’ve all used them, first as students and now as online instructors: activities in a class meant to highlight, spotlight, underline, enhance, or explain some aspect of the subject we are teaching. Too...
View ArticleCreating Effective Responses to Student Discussion Postings
An integral part of nearly all online classes is the threaded discussion—it is where students interact on a nearly daily basis, posting their thoughts and information on main discussion topics, your...
View ArticleThe Underbelly of Online Teaching
No matter how much we embrace and enjoy online teaching, the human frailties of mistakes, disappointment, anger, frustration, and oversights will come calling each time we teach a class. And when any...
View ArticleTeach Like It’s 1990: Online Teaching Fundamentals Are Always in Style
The list of technological add-ons to enhance our teaching efforts seems to be endless and growing. Yet as these add-ons continue to grow in use, a problem has also begun to surface: the online...
View ArticlePersonality Matters When Teaching Online
Online instructors are hired because they are judged as having the right combination of education, teaching experience, content expertise, and professional accomplishments. But once an instructor is in...
View ArticleThe Online Educator’s Complete Guide to Grading Assignments, Part 1
Students know that in any online course assignments will be required, and students expect the online educator to read the assignments and give feedback that can help them improve their understanding of...
View ArticleThe Online Educator’s Complete Guide to Grading Assignments, Part 2
On Tuesday, I provided general suggestions on course-based grading expectations practices. Here I share some ideas for grading specific assignments. Use a bank of comments that are precise, detailed,...
View ArticleThe How, Why, and When of Posting Resources in the Online Classroom
Resources—that amalgam of nearly anything and everything related to the subjects we teach and offered to our students as “extras”—give students a broader, deeper, and enhanced understanding of what...
View ArticleTips for Overcoming Online Discussion Board Challenges
Discussion boards are often viewed as the heart of online courses, and for good reason: the students can interact with one another 24/7, sharing, debating, and offering ideas, insights, suggestions,...
View ArticleThe Most Overlooked Items That Can Help Keep Online Students Engaged
Student engagement is a popular topic and the overwhelming majority of the information on this topic is concentrated on the big issues of keeping students engaged, such as the importance of faculty...
View ArticleCreating the Perfect PowerPoint for Online Teaching
While other forms of visual presentations have cropped up—such as Prezi and Empressr—PowerPoint remains the presentation software of choice. Yet many folks develop PowerPoint presentations without...
View ArticleOvercoming Eight Common Obstacles of Teaching Online
Anyone who teaches online has run into problems within their courses. Some of these problems can be complicated and if not correctly resolved can do major damage to the online instructor’s reputation...
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