Teaching Strategies and Techniques

Some faculty go into online education under the impression that it will take less time than face-to-face teaching because lecturing is eliminated. But we know that online teaching takes as much, if not more, time than face-to-face teaching because of the added engagement with students

Social media is one of the hottest topics in education. Look at any teaching conference program, and you will find that a large percentage of the sessions are on how to incorporate social media into your teaching. This can lead instructors who do not use

Many of us in online education preach that instructors should be active in discussion, but not monopolize it, but we do not have any real research that says how instructor involvement affects student participation in discussion. Cheryl Murphy, associate professor of educational technology at the

Podcasts are an easy way to liven up an online course. Podcasts are nothing more than audio files, and have been found to enhance student learning, satisfaction, and feelings of connectedness in online courses. One use of podcasts is to deliver course content. Instead of

Coaches teach by modeling. They don’t just tell a player “your swing is wrong.” They show the player the proper technique. Similarly, an apprentice learns from a master primarily by copying what they see the master do.

Using Twitter, HootCourse, and Other Backchannels to Engage Online Students

The university population in the United States has grown increasingly diverse in the past 30 years, with international students making up between 10 percent and 20 percent of the enrollments at many universities. For the vast majority of international students, English is not their first

The benefits of group work are well known. Students develop critical thinking and enhanced reflection skills (Conrad & Donaldson, 2004). Group work promotes transformative learning while establishing a sense of community. There is a sense of positive interdependence when we are all in this together

Students in an online course can feel detached from the instructor and one another, so one of the most important things an online faculty member can do is send each student a welcome message. Welcoming students will kick off the learning relationship, and pay dividends

Online discussion has tremendous potential to engage students, develop written communication skills, and promote learning. Unfortunately, discussion boards often fall short, resulting in perfunctory posts and comments and surface treatment of the issues. If discussions, online or otherwise, are to endure and change thinking, they