July 1, 2004

July 2004 Online Classroom full issue PDF

Comparing Synchronous and Asynchronous Communication
Conventional wisdom about synchronous vs. asynchronous communication says that while they both have their places in the online classroom, adult learners prefer asynchronous communication for its flexibility and that asynchronous communication allows more time for reflective thinking. However, a paper presented at the 2004 meeting of the American Educational Research Association (AERA) contradicts these notions.

Tips from the Pros
Last-Minute Course Preparation Details

Finding the Right Assessment Strategies
Assessment strategies for online courses should match course objectives and the students’, instructor’s, and institution’s personalities — in that order, says Margaret Maxwell, assistant professor in special instructional programs and library media education at Western Kentucky University.

Personalizing the Online Classroom Using Tech-Smith’s Camtasia or Microsoft’s Windows Media Encoder
By Steven R. Mark, Ph.D.
Online instructors continuously strive (or should, anyway) to make their classes equivalent to the face-to-face versions by supplying the same content, providing the same activities, and using the same grading and evaluation rubrics. Until the last couple of years, adding video and audio to the mix was simply not practical. Computers were not fast enough, software was overly sophisticated, and teachers as well as students did not have the training to be able to bridge the technology gap. Since the advent of the $500 Pentium 4 computer and the explosion of accessories—including user-friendly software — considerably more opportunities exist for bringing the “human face” to the online classroom experience.

Student-Led Threaded Discussion: Few Constraints, Plenty of Learning
Rather than facilitating the threaded discussions in her online course, introduction to special education, Linda Lisowski, professor of special education at Elizabeth City State University in North Carolina, has the students take turns leading the discussions to get students to frame the discussion in ways that are most relevant to them.

Let Students Choose How to Collaborate
Group work can be a hassle for students, particularly in the online classroom, but the learning opportunities it provides makes it a popular technique among instructors. To understand how adult learners work in groups in online courses and to develop ways to make group work more enjoyable and productive, Kathleen Ingram, assistant professor in the University of South Alabama’s instructional design and development program, surveyed and interviewed students in her online graduate-level needs assessment course. She found that the groups took very different approaches based on their schedules and preferences.