When teaching online, it is important to understand that students will struggle with motivation, moreso than in person. Not havng that face to face communication, or a teacher to take the intiative can make a student nervous or lose interest fast. Not to mention ever present forgetfulness if the tasks aren't right in front of you. Life is already busy, not having scheduled time for school can push it to the backburner. But there are things we can do to assist students with motivation.
One method of promoting an online class is the ever present Discussion Board. A forum where students are given a prompt and told to discuss with one another. Some would say this is a poor substitute for in class discussion, but with the right prompt and encouragement to speak to other classmates, it can be a good soundboard (University, U.S.). In personal recommendation, Discussion Boards shouldn't just be for students to talk to one another, but to get real feedback from the teacher. Asking for help can be difficult, especially one on one. Having a group discussion where the teacher participates may lead to students being more willing to ask and answer questions.
Brown University insists on 'focusing student attention' as a way of motivation. What this means is engaging students in the work with a specific objective in order to increase engagement, and explaining what students should be looking out for. A proposed method of this is using 'anticipation guides'. Anticipation guides are notes a student takes before reviewing content, of 3-5 questions they believe they can answer after. Then when done, they will be able to answer their self made questions with the material they reviewed.
Another suggestion by Brown is giving targeted feedback on smaller assignments. Keep in mind, feedback and grading should not be the same. On smaller, foundational assignments, teachers can focus on helping students improve upon their work by Describing, Evalutating, and Suggesting (Brown). Describe what you as a reader see, evaluate how the work either meets or does not meet expectation and where, and suggest advice for improvement.
My personal favorite strategy is Feedback. As a student, being able to hear my teacher's thoughts about my work and where I need to focus my efforts on improving, really helps. I feel that without this kind of feedback, students often will stress and worry about everything, rather than what they really need to improve upon, because it can often be hard to self evaluate. Even with peer reviewing other students work, you can never be sure if another student is also struggling with these subjects, or perhaps they are trying to be polite about someone's work. Having expert evaluation is so valuable in knowing where to focus our efforts.
Sources Cited
The Harriet W. Sheridan Center for Teaching and Learning. (n.d.). Asynchronous Strategies for Inclusive Teaching. Asynchronous Strategies for Inclusive Teaching | Sheridan Center | Brown University. Retrieved February 16, 2023, from https://www.brown.edu/sheridan/asynchronous-strategies-inclusive-teaching#:~:text=Instructors%20and%20teaching%20assistants%20can%20contribute%20to%20students'%20sense%20of,a%20group%20virtual%20office%20hour.
University, U. S. (n.d.). Facilitate interaction and build learning community: Teach. Utah State University. Retrieved February 16, 2023, from https://www.usu.edu/teach/help-topics/online-teaching-orientation/facilitate-interaction-and-build-learning-community
Hi Aaliya, nice work! While researching, I also learned briefly about anticipation guides but did not look too far into it before writing my own post. Reading your description makes me want to resume my research!
ReplyDeleteI also think that instructor feedback is an important thing to have in an online community. While peer feedback is helpful, it is so important to have an idea of the expectations and expertise of your instructor. Teacher feedback is a substantial part of understanding the material in the course.