1 Week to Go!

This week's topic of Facilitating Discussion and Student Collaboration brought up many things that I have not thought about before: Is it an instructor's job to assign groups? What if a group can't get along? Along with the introduction of more tools that an instructor could utilize to make group work more efficient for students.

I had a tough time participating in this topic, because I've never been an online instructor and because this is my first online class, as a student. The only opportunity I've had to work collaboratively, online, is a small project that we completed for this class. My experience was wonderful, we got together utilizing Elluminate, hammered out the details and did the work. It seemed like a rather easy process. Would it have been as easy if we had not been able to pick our group? What if I was assigned to a group that one of the people worked second shift and wasn't available to meet at a scheduled time? My limited experience with discussion boards and group wikis have shown that it is much more difficult to come to a consensus and final product, meeting asynchronously. I truly believe that we need that feeling of connecting to "real" people, even when participating in an online course. Synchronous meetings make me feel I have much more input into projects than simply posting something and hoping that others take time to read it.

For these reasons, I plan to incorporate as many live interaction possibilities as possible when I am the online instructor. There are many great tools available, so part of making things successful will be to investigate which are the most cost effective for my employer and allow the greatest number of students to utilize them.

From an instructor point of view, it is very important to encourage collaboration, in any form, by making yourself available to the students. Not only by posting comments or attending synchronous sessions, but sharing real-life experiences and situations that you have encountered in your online experiences.

The one thing I really like about this group of classmates is that people taking the course have a variety of occupations that cause different view points. It is much different then taking a class with other K-12 teachers. Although I still don't have the answers to many questions that I have, I have gained much "food for thought" and have been forced to consider situations that I never imagined.