The readings that were assigned to us this week were very informational. We had the opportunity to learn about online courses and what the professors did in order to make the courses successful for the learner.
In the first reading, one of the main features I noticed that these courses had was a clear and detailed course schedule. This is essential in online courses because students are not attending an in-person class where the due dates are being discussed multiple times a week. During my university experience, I was in an online course that took place when the university was shut down due to COVID. This course had never been online before, and the professor was very open with us and stated that she would appreciate feedback throughout the course so she could make it better for us, because she wanted us to be successful. When the course begun she had a course schedule for us, but it was the same one she had used previously when the course was taught in person. After a few weeks of the course, many students were falling behind and saying they don’t know when assignments are due. As a class, we decided to mention this to her, and she immediately started to post weekly schedules to ensure everyone stayed on track. This small change that she made instantly made a positive impact on the course. This taught myself, as an educator, how important it is to be accepting of feedback when trying something new, and also that clear outlines and schedules are essential when teaching.
In Lisa Lane’s course, she discusses instant messaging with her students. I had never experienced this before until EDCI 339. In the past, in order to get in contact with my professors I would have to email them and sometimes it would take days to receive a response. In EDCI 339, I had a question that I could not find an answer to. I decided to try out the instant messaging feature on Mattermost and messaged my prof and I received an answer within minutes. I enjoy this feature as it saved me time and by receiving an answer from my prof I was certain that the information I was given was correct.
In the second article we read, “Openness and Education: A Beginners Guide”, there was a term that I have never heard before. This term was MOOCs, which means Massive Open Online Courses. This is something that I would be very interested in learning more about.
Overall, I found these readings beneficial and I learned teaching strategies that I will certainly use in the future. As stated in the ProQuest Ebook, we are in the very early stages of learning how to teach well online, and rapid innovation and experimentation is needed (Major, 2015). I believe, if we keep taking the necessary steps we will continue to move in a positive direction.
One question I will end with is, why has there been such a massive shift in the last few years towards online education?
References:
Major, C. H. (2015). Teaching Online – A Guide to Theory, Research, and Practice. Retrieved from http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/uvic/detail.action?docID=3318874 (pp. 88-105) Note: UVic login required.
Jordan, K. & Weller, M. (2017). Openness and Education: A beginners’ guide.Global OER Graduate Network.
Kayla's Blog 
Hi Kayla,
I really like how you organized your post this week. It is awesome you found examples in your own life that you could relate to the readings. That is great your professor was so open to receiving feedback and made the changes needed to enhance your learning. As a future educator I want to always be open to receiving feedback.
Mattermost is such an awesome tool! It would be awesome if all profs used it then we would get responses quicker. I find sometimes I do not get a response fast enough over email and also email is more professional. I feel like when I have a quick question that could even be answered with a yes or no, Mattermost is great because it is informal and easy to use on any device.
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Hi Kayla!
For some reason, it won’t let me log in to comment on your post. Did you create your blog using an opened.ca account? Hopefully this works, and you’ll be able to see it!
Like Hannah, I really like your blog and how it is organized. Very aesthetically pleasing! I think when we all made the shift to online learning, it was challenging for everyone. As a student, it was hard to shift from in-person classes to online only. I can only imagine what that was like for the professors! I think we are so lucky to have so many resources available to us. I mentioned in my post how I couldn’t imagine what life as a student would be like in a pandemic 20 years ago.
I like how you also mentioned Mattermost, and how you have enjoyed using it. I find it relatively easy to navigate, and it’s so convenient being able to message anyone in the class, including the instructor, and being able to get a prompt reply. This makes for simple collaboration, and helps when groups are trying to sort out times to meet or sharing our blog posts – just like we have been doing!
Thanks Kayla!
Emily
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Kayla,
I had very similar experiences with online courses. I think Brightspace is an excellent platform for online schooling- however where content goes varies from professor to professor. It’s truly overwhelming to look through all the different tabs and menus to try and find things and due dates/assignments/readings all get lost in the different places. For example, I spent a good hour trying to find my syllabus for one course, as mostly all my profs put it in the table of contents. Long behold, for the first time ever one of my profs put it under the overview tab which I had never even clicked before. This happened quite a few times with various different courses and content. Having some sort of consistency between courses would be awesome, but not exactly realistic.
During the same issue with the syllabus, I had emailed that prof asking about it but didn’t receive a reply for the next two days. However, when using platforms such as mattermost, the replies are almost instant which is awesome. I think mattermost is an excellent way to communicate with profs, as it has a more casual feel and is a lot more effective for those quick questions that may come about.
Thanks for your thoughts,
Kiana
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Hi Kayla,
Great post. I like how you incorporated your personal learning experiences. I agree with you of how convenient Mattermost is. Last semester, I took EDCI 338 and we also used Mattermost. It is quick and easy to connect with the professor and students. In my experiences, I was unable to connect to peers in classes not using Mattermost. This made online learning harder as I was unable to ask questions or share thoughts with asynchronous classes.
Thanks for sharing
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Hi Kayla,
Great post. You mentioned wanting to learn more about MOOCs. They have changed quite a bit since the article was written, but the core ideas are still the same. The most common MOOCs are like the ones here: https://www.edx.org/. Essentially, universities create online courses and open the enrolment to anyone that wants to take the course. In most cases, these courses are not “human-centred”, meaning they run on their own with little interaction between participants and/or the instructor. As mentioned in the readings, there are other MOOCS (called cMOOCs) in the readings that are more built around community. Those are less common, and are probably non-existent anymore. I taught one for USask in 2015 that was sort of a mix between both types.
You ask about why there has been a shift towards online education. Over the past year and a half, the answer is obvious. Outside of the COVID-19, I’d say the shift is primarily due to schools wanting access to more students. It can be beneficial for both students and the institution. For example, at USask the College of Nursing touts “learn where you live”, which allows students in Northern Saskatchewan to become nurses without having to leave their home communities. This idea is expanding across other programs too. Do you know of anything similar at UVic? Are there full degrees that can be completed remotely?
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Thank you for the resource and more information about MOOCs.
Wow, that is awesome that USask has that program. I am not sure if UVIC offers full degrees to be completed online, that is not something I have heard of. I know SFU offers some Masters programs to be fully completed online though. I wonder if we will be seeing more fully online programs like these in the future.
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