I am thankful my computer is nowhere near a window. If it was, it would have gone out long ago, and I would have a glass bill larger than my student loan debt from the number of times I tossed it.
It's not the "online" part- I love "online". I live online. Hell, I love technology in a multitude of forms. I would rather text than call, would rather IM than email, would MUCH rather deal with customer service online than have to wait on hold to talk to some rando customer service person.
But while I appreciate the McDonaldization of many areas of my life, education is not one of them. Never have I experienced frustration like I have when dealing with Blackboard, Connect, and the inability of a student to realize that I can Google too- and yes, you damn well did plagiarize!
I started out thinking it was the lack of connection. On campus, I see my students twice a week. I stand in front of the class, I look at each of them, I start being able to read them and adjust my lesson accordingly. I get to know them and they get to know me. We establish a relationship that has led to quite a few students taking multiple classes, to several reference requests, and even to a couple of friendships after the class was over. I've found that nearly impossible to do online. But I realized that personal connections aren't the problem. They're different online, more shallow, but not really the problem.
The problem lies more in the rigidity of the online experience, and the ease at which students circumvent the requirements in order to get away with doing as little as possible- possible on campus, ridiculously easy online.
For one thing, there's pretty much an institutional demand that every element of the class be set up at least a week before the students even get access to the class. And due to this requirement and the lack of time between semesters, by necessity a lot of the same material carries over from one semester to the next. This makes it a juicy target for cheating. If there was more flexibility built into Blackboard- such as giving a pool of questions on tests, of which the computer randomly picks twenty for the student to answer, this would be less of an issue. But if every question I choose is one that every student will answer, it's not too difficult to see how some students could use this as a means to cheat.
In addition, once the material is set, it's nearly impossible to change. This means that if an assignment I set up in module 10 has some problem that I don't discover until module 4, oh well. Not a typo or a broken link, I'm talking about totally misjudging the types of students I was going to have and writing questions they can't relate to at all. I'm a sociologist, teaching sociology- getting the material to relate to the students is pretty much job one. If you can't get them to relate to the material then you've lost them, often for the rest of the semester.
Since I don't have that power to adjust, my learning curve for online teaching has been huge, much bigger than the one for on campus classes. There are a few things I've learned that work, and a few that have been a complete disaster. Here's a taste of each:
What works
1. Assign journals instead of essays- Since I teach in the social sciences, learning is much more analytical and "fuzzy". I don't want students just learning the terminology, I want them to understand the concepts and be able to apply them. I also want a way to check their learning, and telling them to contact me if they don't understand something wasn't working. Give it a grade and they'll do it!
This also removes the pressure of APA formatting and me spending way too damn long on marking the grammar and spelling mistakes. I'm not an English teacher, I don't want to spend my time correcting your grammar or atrocious spelling (why is it that those who most need spell-check are the ones least likely to use it?). Essays are formal writing and demand certain criteria. Journals are informal writing, so as long as I can read it I'm fine.
I also make the journals private, so they don't have to feel like they're performing for their classmates and can be honest with me. I make them do 2 entries per week/module, one on the reading and one on a topic related to what we're studying at the time. I can tell from what they write whether or not they've actually read (and yes, that's in the rubric). This is where I usually get the "I don't understand..." entries, and I always answer them. At times, my comments are longer than their entries.
The second entry is more free-form, more like blogging. I've had everything from current events to a student complaining about how clueless their classmates are, and how frustrating it is to deal with people who won't consider another point of view. It's refreshing, and gives me a much better connection with the students then your standard discussion forum.
2. Make it clear that you hate suck-ups. Not in that language, of course, but whenever possible I reiterate that I WANT disagreement (respectful disagreement, natch). I want them to ask each other questions and confront the stereotypical views we all have. Think back to on campus classes- how many times did your classroom erupt into loud disagreement? How many of those times ended up being one of your best classes? I know for me, it's when we admit that we are different and are willing to stand up for what we believe in that I get the best conversations. This is incredibly hard to do in online classes, because unlike in social media, these people are getting graded and cannot be trolls without getting in trouble.
Students hate teachers that only want to hear their opinion handed back to them. Students don't learn in those classes, except to become parrots and mirrors for their teachers. If you are one of these who expect them to agree with you, check your ego or get a different job- it's not all about you.
3. Don't rely on rote learning. It's all too easy these days to find anything on the internet, especially if that's where their class is. Analysis, personal experience, opinion questions, etc. all make for a better learning experience- and a lesser chance of having to give that big red zero for plagiarism.
4. Put time limits on quizzes, but allow students to take the quiz an unlimited number of times. This is a great way for them to review without them realizing it. The quizzes are always multiple choice or true/false. And yes, that's just because it's a time saver for me. I get the writing in other areas, putting it on a quiz or a test just invites students to skip it and get a lower grade because they don't perform well under pressure.
4. Don't put time limits on tests, but warn the students that Blackboard will "error out" if they take too long, and then they'll have to start all over. Not a total lie, but much rarer now than it used to be. On the other hand, it removes the performance pressure that causes a significant number of students to do poorly on tests when they've done well in the rest of the class. They don't watch the clock, they just work. I've gone over the metrics on this and it works for me- depending on the subject it may not work for you. Yes, I'm aware that cheating is a possibility. Most colleges give professors the ability to give proctored tests, and there are individuals who I've required to go to a test center rather than taking it at home. In general, though, it hasn't been a big enough problem for me to make it standard.
5. Give students the ability to turn in late work penalty-free for an extra week. There are reasons students take online courses, and those reasons often interfere with getting work turned in on time. You do no one any favours by forcing deadlines on students that may also have kids, a job, and no support network to help them out.
What doesn't work:
1. Automated "learning"- an easy trap to fall into, especially if you're an adjunct balancing 6 classes at 3 different colleges to make ends meet (*note- if you are truly doing this, find another job. Teach a class or two at night or online, and find a day job that pays the bills. Adjuncting was never meant to be a sole source of income). Automated learning is when a professor sets up a class that runs without his or her input. 95% of the work is graded by Blackboard, the little that they grade is the discussion board- which they don't contribute to and don't actually read before grading. Students find out pretty quickly which professor is reading and which one isn't, and will use that fact to get away with some monumental amount of BS in their posts- to the point that even their classmates call them on it. You aren't teaching, you're collecting a paycheck, GTFO.2. Calculating times based on how long it takes you to do something. You've been told you need to assign work that takes at least nine hours a week for students to do. So you do the work, and it fits! Yeah! Drink!
No. You're the expert. You breeze through the reading, get the short answers done without cracking a book, and score perfect scores on the quiz in less than a minute. Do you really think that's how long your students will take? Find a comparable textbook, in a subject you are unfamiliar with, and read a full page of text while timing yourself. Multiply that time by the number of pages in the chapter. Then double it. If you are teaching nontraditional students, some of whom may have GEDs, allow more time. They are LEARNING. They don't know, it takes longer for them to absorb than it does for them to read.
Do the same with the rest of the work. Find someone else in your life to try an assignment, see how long it takes them. Then multiply that time by a half because I know you, and you helped that person with that assignment. Unless you're willing to go to every one of your students' houses every week to help them as well, give them more time.
3. Rely on Blackboard not to mess up. Yes, and always at the worst times. Chat no longer works on Chrome or Internet Explorer, errors out all the time on Edge, and even reliable Firefox has been screwing up. It's a problem that has been going on for months, but what have they done? Oh yeah, jack squat. Be prepared to find workarounds, to have to fix links that break in the middle of the module, and to have things become unavailable for no reason at any time.Maybe it's just me, but so much of how the program is set up is illogical. Why can't you see the prompt at the top of the discussion forum? Why can you only set up short answer assignments as tests? "Essay" and "assignment" are not synonyms, why is that the only non-test option? Why can't I copy a youtube url in the mashup section? Typing in the title ends up pulling thousands of results, rather than the one video I already know I need. Trying to make the search more specific often ends up with zero results, even if it's exactly what it said on Youtube. I can drag and drop here, why not there?
4. Assign research papers in an Intro class. These students are getting introduced to the subject area, they aren't experts. You are looking for work on par with the grad work you turned in, they have the knowledge (and often the skills) to write something that qualifies for high school freshman Language Arts. it takes a long time for them to write, almost as long for you to grade, and makes all of you miserable. No one wants that. Delay the inevitable burnout and find some other way (see above) to measure your students' learning.5. Ignore your class. Just like your students, it's easy for you to procrastinate and put off checking your class. Not only will the administration get mad at you, your indifference breeds indifference in your students. The more you engage, especially in the discussion board, the more it encourages your students to engage. Writing grading notes is a pain in the butt, and sometimes that's exactly the part of the body it feels like you're pulling comments from, but students need to feel that you are there and not ignoring them.
No matter what:
You will get students who don't do the work. Don't beat yourself up, contact them periodically, and document, document, document. You might be used to writing notes when you talk to a student in person, but sending emails self-document and you don't always think about writing notes on this. However, emails don't always tell the whole story. Writing separate, detailed, notes can help you remember the whole story, especially if they end up failing and you have to explain why.
You will get burned out, you will get bored, you will swear that this is the last semester you're going to teach. It happens, and the longer you teach the more likely it is. You get used to the length of the semester and anxious as you get to the end. Accept it, and accept that it is a temporary feeling. When I start feeling this way I find something else to take my mind off things- crochet, Netflix, the classical for studying channel on Pandora (I've somehow gotten it to play mostly classical remakes of alternative songs and movie soundtracks, great for jamming out to as I grade). And yes, there are times I just have to power through and just grade, grade, grade.
Three days before the end of the semester is the worst for me. It's when my grading inbox is the highest and my patience is the lowest. I can't put it off any more, and no amount of Supernatural or 2cellos is helping. So I give myself milestones. Grade three journals- with notes, no shortcuts- and I get to go put the laundry in the washing machine. Grading ten discussion entries gets me a few minutes of sliding up and down my hallway in my sock feet. Yes, I'm childish. Yes, it's physical activity. And yes, I don't much care what you think- it's fun and by this time my rear end is asleep. Whatever it takes you to get through it, you do it- as long as alcohol, drugs, or blood sacrifice isn't involved.
You will get requests for extra credit during the last week of class. And it will come from the students who haven't turned much in all semester and have JUST figured out they are failing. This is another reason not to ignore your class. Sending periodic reminders during the semester is a pain, but it's worth it. Either they turn the work in or they get sick of getting nagged and drop the class. Either way, it's better than trying to explain to them why you won't give them an extra credit assignment at the last minute that won't take them more than thirty minutes but will count for half their grade.
You will want to throw your computer out a window multiple times during the semester. Yeah, it's going to happen. Get a stress ball... or stock in a glass company,
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