What did Sisyphus do? A student's question that changed the way I think about teaching.

Sisyphus used Spark Notes.

Sisyphus by Titian 

In my second year of teaching Homer's epic poem, The Odyssey, a freshman asked me, "What did Sisyphus do to deserve his fate?"

I froze. Sixteen sets of eyes looked to me. I had never been the sage on the stage, yet I once knew the answer, but I had forgotten - confusing Sisyphus with Tityus and Tantalus. 
(Click the links for the answers.)

So like any good teacher, I redirected the question.

"Hey, what are you doing, Mihir? Put your hands up." 

Busted. His smartphone aglow on his lap. 
I pride myself on catching students on their phones in class.

Sheepishly, a grin came across his face...

"I was just reading on Wikipedia. I was curious what Sisyphus had done." 

"You don't know the answer" was the unspoken remark that everyone heard.

His hands were still held up. So I relented. 

"Well, what did Sisyphus do?" 

And he read us the definition and we moved on - enlightened. 

In the moment, I laughed at myself, yet I never forgot that question. 

Kids by nature are curious, but the way we play the game of school crushes that curiosity. We say...

Read the book.
Think for yourself. Come up with your own ideas. 
Don't use the internet. 

But why are we pushing our own boulder up the hill in teaching? 

We still pretend the internet does not exist in the English classroom. 

When we talk of integrity and say don't use the internet, we are not living in the reality of 2014. 

We are wired to Google it as teachers - yet we tell our students - you can't do the same. We know the word for that and teenagers are keen to it - hypocrisy. 

After I surf the web to answer a question, I am smarter from the experience. I've made connections with the text. 
I understand references, vocabulary, biography, and history.
I've learned (and here I am writing and sharing what I've learned, so I don't forget). 

We demonize online reading aids because they summarize the plot and analyze passages for students (and alas, not that well). We think that they ruin the reading experience - they are spoilers. 

Yet we forget that only in a second reading can we see the significant details of foreshadowing and symbolism and start to see thematic through-lines. 

We forget how busy our students are and they pressure they are under to do it all. 

But we play a game, a charade of control, and we want to see who's innately intelligent, anticipating what comes next in the novel.

So we tend test and quiz on plot - but we call it close reading. 

As teachers, we even read Spark Notes so that we make sure not to use passages or questions that can be answered by just reading Spark Notes, so we devolve into a world of double think and suspicion of our students, and downright anger that the internet exists. 

Let's end the gotcha quizzes that keep kids honest - the irony.

That's not teaching. That's testing and grading - in a game that has no integrity or true learning. 

I'm tired of pushing the boulder up the hill.

Then again...

Excerpt from Book 11 of The Odyssey

from MIT's downloadable Trans. by Samuel Butler

"After him I saw huge Orion in a meadow full of asphodel driving the ghosts of the wild beasts that he had killed upon the mountains, and he had a great bronze club in his hand, unbreakable for ever and ever.  

"And I saw Tityus son of Gaia stretched upon the plain and covering some nine acres of ground. Two vultures on either side of him were digging their beaks into his liver, and he kept on trying to beat them off with his hands, but could not; for he had violated Jove's mistress Leto as she was going through Panopeus on her way to Pytho.  

"I saw also the dreadful fate of Tantalus, who stood in a lake that reached his chin; he was dying to quench his thirst, but could never reach the water, for whenever the poor creature stooped to drink, it dried up and vanished, so that there was nothing but dry ground- parched by the spite of heaven. There were tall trees, moreover, that shed their fruit over his head- pears, pomegranates, apples, sweet figs and juicy olives,but whenever the poor creature stretched out his hand to take some, the wind tossed the branches back again to the clouds.  

"And I saw Sisyphus at his endless task raising his prodigious stone with both his hands. With hands and feet he' tried to roll it up to the top of the hill, but always, just before he could roll it over on to the other side, its weight would be too much for him, and the pitiless stone would come thundering down again on to the plain. Then he would begin trying to push it up hill again, and the sweat ran off him and the steam rose after him. 

Interesting name: Artist Franz von Stuck 1920 painting of Sisyphus

9 Words That Will Change Your Life; Daniel Pink Encore

I won't keep you in suspense, or make you watch the video below....

Here's the 9 words from Northwestern University Professor Charlie Yarnoff to Daniel Pink in "Writing the Essay" that changed his life - and it can change yours too: 

"Sometimes you have to write to figure it out." 

Prior to hearing this advice, my goal this summer was to write more - write about teaching, coaching, and living.

Not outlining or planning on where the writing would take me, but the important act is the process of writing.

Note: I refrain from using the term blog. Unfortunately blogging has such negative connotations. Just the sound of the word almost suggests an onomatopoeia...blog, blob, blah, blah, blah.

So when I heard this recent address by Daniel Pink on my drive home to Cleveland from Philly, I was reminded of a profound truth: do your thinking in writing - one that I have preached to freshmen and seniors alike.

Yet as a teacher, I feel more like that frustrated writer in the summer that talks a good game during the school year, but let's be honest, I don't write anymore - and haven't written much since grad school...

At the moment, I am in bed, ready to go to sleep, but I type away. Why?

Writers write.

When I heard this speech half way through my 400 mile journey home, I felt less like a heroic Odysseus but more like the prodigal son. Pink's advice to the class of 2014 hit a nerve with me. He talked of successful people and the process of writing an essay as metaphor for life:

Why? Because they lived to figure it out. At some point in their lives, they realized that carefully crafted plans, like meticulously outlined essays, often don’t hold up. And tweaking the topic sentences, or rearranging the subsections, isn’t enough. 

Sometimes the only way to discover who you are, or what life you should lead, is to do less planning and more living. To burst the double bubble of comfort and convention and just do stuff. Even if you don’t know precisely where it’s going to lead, because you don’t know precisely where it’s going to lead. 

Now this might sound risky. And you know what? It is. It’s really risky. But the greater risk is to choose false certainty over genuine ambiguity. The greater risk is to fear failure more than mediocrity. The greater risk is to pursue a path only because it’s the first path you decided to pursue. 

With miles of PA Turnpike ahead of me, I reflected on my life and the turns I have taken and the comfort and convention that I had left after eight years of teaching at a boarding school near home. After a year of transition at a day school, living in the city and commuting to the suburbs, I had plenty to think about on my drive.

When I was a 15 year old student on full financial aid at Andover, I returned home over the holidays and visited my old elementary school. In chatting with my former first grade teacher, she asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up? I shrugged that I might like to be a teacher at a boarding school because of the admiration I had for my teachers at Andover. I couldn't believe it even after I said it, but she was insistent that's what I would do someday. And I resisted this fate for four years after college. However, to be candid, and really honest with even myself, I have moments of doubt where I wonder if I pursued a path only because it's the first path... one that I knew well - the only path at 15 that I knew.

Around that time, when my dad's business collapsed and our house ended up in foreclosure for a time and a period where my parents made ends meet on food stamps, my mom, often at her wits end with stress, would say repeatedly to my two brothers and me:

"Be a doctor or a lawyer, but never be a businessman like your father." 

I never forgot that line. And I learned business equaled risk.

My first year in college, after a brief six week stint in Chemistry, and struggles with history paper deadlines, I concluded neither medicine nor law were in the cards. English courses inspired me and I read all that I could...thinking someday I will teach, but really... the dream was to write.
Novels. Screenplays. Short stories. Even poetry.

After losing my brother Conor when I was 26, I soon settled down to teach after living in Baltimore, NYC, and Miami.

Now at 40, I enter my thirteenth year of teaching. I am amazed how fast time moves and the years blur together. I am grateful for the purpose, connection, and meaning I've experienced as a teacher. Teaching has allowed me to serve others, and I feel I've made a difference.

But I recognize that teaching and coaching may be playing it safe, living in my comfort zone.

After college, I am thankful I lived in NYC and explored life for a few years after college, but in a way, I feel I have always been in school. As a teacher, there's relative job security, steady paycheck, and bonus: summer's off.

Don't get me wrong - I love what I do - but before bed, and during long drives, I confess that I still wonder what I want to be when I grow up.

What risks have I not taken?
What do I regret?
What do I regret not doing? 

These questions can haunt many of us, if not all of us.

I leave them unanswered because I am not the writer that I dreamed of being. Not yet at least.
I am not Daniel Pink - and for as much as I admire him, I envy him. I'd love to write in a garage like his all day. But part of me knows, I would miss teaching. Who says I can't do both?

In the end, I must say thank you, Daniel Pink - for sharing Professor Yarnoff's advice and more importantly inspiring me to write - and take risks - even if it's so little as publishing a blog that I am afraid to post, knowing full well that no one reads this but me - I have seen my stats ;)

Good night.

Here's to writing, and figuring it out. You never know.




Full transcript on idonethis.com

Footnotes:

Pink's Poetry professor Dennis Brutus, who gave him an A- if he promised never to write poetry again. 

Sadly, Professor Sheila Schwartz had passed away in 2008.

And look what I just found: Charlie Yarnoff's brilliant Grading Criteria for a Reflective Essay: 

          An “A” paper:

•    Has a well-focused main idea that is developed throughout the essay.
•    Is logically organized so that readers follow the development of the main idea easily.
•    Clearly explains the underlying premise and key points.
•    Addresses major questions and counter-arguments that readers are likely to raise.
•    Has well-focused paragraphs with clear topic sentences.
•    Offers relevant quotes and paraphrases to support main points.  Accurate source citations are provided.
•    Has the relatively informal, personal style of a reflective essay.
•    Has an introduction that engages the audience and establishes the paper’s focus.
•    Has a conclusion that provokes readers to keep thinking about the main idea.
•    Has sentences that are concise, direct, appropriately varied in structure, and mechanically correct.

How Do We Teach Poetry? "Sell It!" Says Daniel Pink

When students (and most people) think of poetry, they tend to hear...

Teachers, let's face it: how we were taught poetry when we were in school influences our association with poetry.

As teachers, do we inspire poets and a life-long love of poetry?

Perhaps, if we are inspired, we hope that our passion can make a difference.

Borrowing from Middlebury Professor Jay Parini, I ask the question, "Does poetry matter?"

And inspired by Parini, I have argued "Why Poetry Matters".

But I realize that I tend to teach from my point of view, and I do not see (or hear) poetry through the eyes (and ears) of my students.

For a few years now, I share with my students a poem from one of my favorite poets...

Introduction to Poetry

BY BILLY COLLINS

I ask them to take a poem   

and hold it up to the light   

like a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem   

and watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem’s room   

and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski   

across the surface of a poem

waving at the author’s name on the shore.

But all they want to do

is tie the poem to a chair with rope   

and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose   

to find out what it really means.

After reading this poem, I'd be a hypocrite in class, and we would tie this poem to the chair and over analyze it.

Then I would play a favorite reading by Billy Collins with the expectation that students would like poetry and Billy Collins by hearing the poet's voice - yet that would often backfire. The laugh track would cue them to the irony, but they'd complain about the "boring" tone and not appreciate the nostalgia or the ironic humor.

Instead of enjoying poetry, students wonder if this will be on the test. 
Their attention wanders to thoughts of their math test next period, or their Spanish quiz that they may have failed last period.

In a bottom-line, test-driven culture, we can no longer manipulate students to jump through hoops, especially if it's not on the test. 

Poetry is difficult to test - yes, you can identify figurative language with multiple choice questions or write essays that paraphrase analysis found online... 

Plus how do we assess poems written by students? Do we give points for a simile? Do we require punctuation?

We have to move students and shift mindsets, including our own. Poetry matters if students show us how it matters to them.

As a teacher at a new school, I was the new guy in a new culture and once again I had to rethink how I taught (and motivated) students. I found extrinsic incentives do not inspire critical thinking that is required in reading and writing.

Addicted to TED talks, I discovered and meditated on the ideas of Daniel Pink:

A summary of Daniel Pink's DRIVE: When it comes to motivation, there’s a gap between what science knows and what business does. Our current business operating system–which is built around external, carrot-and-stick motivators–doesn’t work and often does harm. We need an upgrade. And the science shows the way. This new approach has three essential elements:

1. Autonomy – the desire to direct our own lives.

2. Mastery — the urge to get better and better at something that matters. 

3. Purpose — the yearning to do what we do in the service of something larger than ourselves.

For more, check out Daniel Pink's full TED talk.

Recently, I started reading and thinking about his most recent book - To Sell Is Human.

Now before we grow too cynical about teachers as salesperson, consider this argument by Pink:

Here’s the thing. I think that educators are in sales. Essentially what you are doing is making an exchange with your class. You’re saying, give me your attention. In exchange, I’ll give you something else. The cash register is not ringing. It’s not denominated in dollars or cents or euros, but it is a form of sales in a way. It is an exchange...Read More

Watch this:

As teachers, we don't like to think of ourselves being in sales.
But we are. When we hear the word "sales" we cringe with the connotations...

Yet everyday we sell our subjects to students at school; however, the game has changed with the internet. Our students have changed.

We no longer hold the keys to knowledge - lectures, content, lessons - all readily available at their fingertips.

As teachers, what is our role now? 

Motivators, coaches, facilitators, guides, curators, etc.


According to Daniel Pink it's the New ABC's of attunement, buoyancy, and clarity, he writes:

1. PULL UP A CHAIR. (ATTUNEMENT) 

If you’re preparing a lesson plan, an empty chair can remind you to see things from your students’ perspective. Attuning yourself to others – exiting your own perspective and entering theirs – is essential to moving others. One smart, easy, and effective way to get inside people’s heads is to climb into their chairs.

2. SEND YOURSELF A REJECTION LETTER. (BUOYANCY) 

More important, by articulating the reasons for turning you down, the letter might reveal soft spots in what you’re presenting, which you can then work to strengthen.

3. FIND THE ONE PERCENT. (CLARITY) 

Instead, think about the essence of what you’re exploring – the one percent that gives life to the other ninety-nine. Understanding that one percent, and being able to explain it to others, is the hallmark of strong minds... read more.

So now when I think of teaching a poetry lesson, I put myself in a student's chair...
and I think what does she or he like to do when asked a question: Google search. 

Why not foster intellectual curiosity? 

The fun in learning is the inquiry, discovery, and sharing what you find interesting. 

This past year, I had my freshmen explore the internet, research, write poems, and share what they learned about poetry and poems. 
Attunement and Autonomy.

In the future, I will have them write peer comments on their work - and then self-assess their learning, yet they must be more critical than complimentary in their self-assessment. Explain the thought process behind the final product. They know where their own holes are - and how much time they worked on it. As friends, peers are often too kind to point them out. Through self-assessment, students criticize areas of weakness in order to make them a future strength.  
Buoyancy and Mastery. 

If students find their own examples and write their own poems, there is clarity to poetry. 
If they share their discoveries and poems with others, especially outside their class, there's writing for a greater purpose than a grade - remember the purpose of writing is for an audience. I believe students are more concerned with impressing their peers than impressing me as the teacher. Leverage positive peer pressure to produce poetry.
Clarity and Purpose.



Selling a Sonnet Assignment; Make Poetry Personal: 

1. Define and explain: Sonnet
2. Find a sonnet that you wish to give to an individual, perhaps a friend or family member.
3. Write a sonnet - explain why you are giving your individual this sonnet.
4. Record your sonnet. (Try iMovie or vocaroo.com or other online voice recorders). 
5. Visit your classmates blogs and comment on their posts. 
6. Post what you learned about sonnets to your blog - reflect on the learning process of finding, sharing, and writing about sonnets. 

Questions:

What is a sonnet?
Why share a sonnet?
Who writes sonnets?
Why write a sonnet?
How do you read a sonnet?
What did you learn through this assignment?

The more open-ended the better in my opinion to encourage creativity, but being vague with assignments can create anxiety - how do I get an A? Thus...

How you get an A:
Show us what you learned. 
Hit the established deadlines. 
On a scale of 1 to 10, consider where your work stands in relation to the work of  your peers.
Self-assess: what grade do you believe you earned? Make a case. 


Depending on the grade level of students,  I would give students a couple days or a week to complete this assignment. I like to use some classroom time, but not the full period. I like to give mini-lessons (on other fronts:  grammar, vocab, reading other poems, etc.) and allow time for blogging and creative writing to evolve and even percolate on the back burner so students can produce work they are proud of, while reminding them:

“Poems are never finished - just abandoned.” ― Paul Valéry  

Same can be said for blog posts...

As teachers, we need to shift our focus to 21st century skills. We need to understand how different our students are as digital natives. As a 40 year old teacher, I'm a digital immigrant that must assimilate in order to relate to my students. The internet and smartphones exist. How do we embrace this fact? 

How do we as teachers motivate and inspire our students in this new world? 

Whether it be poetry or coding, let them show us what they've learned as we foster intellectual curiosity in our teaching. 

Hacking Education: A Mindset that Embraces Change

This past spring trimester, Phillips Academy's Head of School John Palfrey taught a compelling course called "Hacking Andover; an Experiment in Education in the Digital Age."

It connects in many ways with my first course at Global Online Academy.

Having graduated from Andover in 1992, I continue to be inspired by this special school.
I wish I could have taken this course!

Assignments included a playlist on Youtube:



Students also published content to a variety of social media outlets: Wordpress page, Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.

Plus they had a field trip to MIT.

A student's final argument that echoes Ken Robinson's thoughts on divergent thinking as well as how and why to assimilate technology into the classroom:




This course also reminds me of a video of my history teacher from Andover, Victor Henningsen.
I watch it from time to time, most recently this winter during a snow day, to remind me of my purpose as a teacher.

With school closed again today, it's been a time of reflection. For teachers: http://t.co/dtUxx6H5D0 #empathy #collegiality #conversation
— Kevin James O'Brien (@KOB14) February 6, 2014

Curating, Highlighting, Outlining, or Plagiarizing an Article?

For the first lesson in my GOA course, I just read a brilliant article by Jim Henry and Jeff Meadows, but the traditional essay layout with block text and countless citations made it a bit of slog to read online.

Plus it's the World Cup, and I'm watching my three and half year old son...which can feel like this at times...

Thus, with all due respect and credit, I'm applying the Henry and Meadow's principles below:

1. The online world is a medium unto itself.
2. In the online world, content is a verb.
3. Technology is a vehicle, not a destination.
4. Great online courses are defined by teaching, not technology.
5. Sense of community and social presence are essential to online excellence.
6. Excellence requires multiple areas of expertise.
7. A great web interface will not save a poor course; but a poor web interface will destroy a potentially great course.
8. Excellence comes from ongoing assessment and refinement.
9. Sometimes the little extras go a long way.

(If I had time, all citations could be footnotes or linked via hypertext.)

Highlights outlined from:

"An absolutely riveting online course: Nine principles for excellence in web-based teaching"  

by Jim Henry & Jeff Meadows

Principle 1: The online world is a medium unto itself.

#88621616 / gettyimages.com

The search for excellence begins with this principle: The online world is a medium unto itself.

It is not just another learning environment, like a separate classroom down the hall; it is a categorically different learning environment. 

Without classmates and instructors physically present, Online students: 

1. review material, 
2. read instructions and 
3. participate in activities

There isn’t someone standing nearby to offer comment and clarification.

Communication is often asynchronous and commonly in written form.

In the classroom, if an instructor is losing the class because a lecture is dragging, 

he or she can change gears or topics, pick up the pace or suggest a quick break. 

Online: Most material needs to be developed and integrated ahead of time before the course is even offered.

As well, the online instructor needs to provide distinct pathways through the material, providing a clear route to those students who either have previous knowledge of the content, or who are picking it up quickly. 

At the same time there needs to be another pathway that provides more detailed background material for those students who either want or need more information about a particular concept.

Because of the different dynamics, material that works well in a traditional environment does not necessarily work in the online environment - needs to be retooled, converted or redesigned for online use. 

Even supplementary materials such as PowerPoint™ slides, course notes and handouts usually need to be adapted, with explanatory content added.

Lengthy lectures don’t tend to work online. Once uploaded, the lecture is no longer a “live” presentation with the potential for interaction – questions, further discussion, spontaneous comments, the involvement of classmates, smiles and groans around the room. Rather, the material tends to be more static, reduced to a frame of content; a talking head. Because of this insight, much shorter clips were created, using brief excerpts of important points along with the addition of visual material such as PowerPoint™ slides. The result was much more effective (as indicated by the feedback provided by students).

The retooling and redesigning of course materials often takes significant time - the preparation of their material to be the most time-consuming part of the process. 

The online world is a medium unto itself and if instruction is to be effective, material for online courses needs to be developed with the unique strengths and dynamics of the web in mind 

Principle 2: In the online world, content is a verb.

#174147228 / gettyimages.com

Content alone is not sufficient to result in or to guarantee excellence.

As suggested in principle one, there is much more to online teaching than uploading content. 

Online instruction involves much more than posting a series of readings 

or a standard curriculum to a website. 

Rather than merely presenting learners with content, online instruction needs to 

purposefully and strategically engage learners in activities and interaction. 

• content tended to be mastered by doing more than by reading or listening. 
• content was not simply deposited for review. 
• students were actively involved in it and thereby mastered it.

Essential Question: 

“Do we confuse providing content with creating a learning environment or delivering a course?” 

Beyond Content: 

• interaction, 
• dialogue, and 
• coaching.

The roles for both students and teachers are changing in the online world.

The instructor role: provider of content => designer of student learning experiences 

a facilitator who structures a learning environment where students actually contribute to course content.

[Student curation = crowdsourcing content]

the facilitation of both social and cognitive processes

[Leverage positive peer pressure to engage students = produce thoughtful content to impress peers]

information acquisition < student centered tasks and assignments

Principle 3: Technology is a vehicle, not a destination.

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The array of technological advancements continues to unfold at an ever-quickening pace. 

Important to emphasize that an increase in technology does not necessarily mean an increase in learning, and can in fact, lead to an increase in problems: technology blues and wailing students

In a description of her evolution as a course developer, Mandernach (2006) candidly described her progression from utilizing basic technology to eventually integrating all the bells and whistles into her courses. Originally her approach was to integrate previously successful best practices but had evolved into a “smorgasbord of jazzy supplements with little thought placed on their value, role and importance within an education context” (p. 7). Mandernach also discovered that despite the outward, tech-savvy appearance of her course, the pedagogical effectiveness had actually decreased. Not only did student learning not keep pace with her technological advances, but student complaints and difficulties increased and the instructor spent considerable time troubleshooting. Mandernach’s course has now shifted to an evolving balance of basics and bells.

Others have come to similar conclusions. In their review of exemplary online courses, Hopper and Harmon (2000) reported that these courses included a judicious selection of technologies. The developers were conservative and prudent in their application of technology and the courses were sometimes even austere. Online educators must be ever critical of the technology relied upon to engage students in learning. It is only through constant evaluation and examination of the tools that we use that we will continue to make sound pedagogical decisions for their implementation. We must also be aware of the ever changing dynamic of our audience. With more and more students being attracted to online courses we cannot simply rely upon what has worked in the past. As with teaching in a face-to-face environment, we need to constantly gauge our audience and discern what tools and strategies are going to be effective at the time.

Principle 4: Great online courses are defined by teaching, not technology.

Excellence in web-based courses is founded on excellence in teaching.

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The instructors in Hopper and Harmon’s (2000) exemplary online courses: 

• were competent, highly skilled and diligent. 
• had a good sense of humour, 
• excited about their content areas, 
• had high, clearly articulated expectations. 
• cared about their students, 
• were confident, fair and 
• were masters of effective feedback. 

The courses were “not defined by technology but by teaching.”

Specific aspects reported to contribute to enhanced learning and student satisfaction also include: 

• quick turnaround time by instructor on email and assignments 
• frequent and engaged contact and individual feedback 
• having goals and objectives that are clearly stated 
• and detailed enough to clarify: 

“what the student should be able to do,
the conditions under which the student should produce the desired behaviour
and how well the student must be able to perform it” (Ellis & Hafner, 2003, p. 643)

• great communication skills 
• regular use of student names 
• and the capacity to be real and genuine 

The use of technology, like all aspects of a course (including assignments, activities and approaches to assessment) should align with and stem from course objectives.

The learning outcomes are developed first, and then the course is designed and delivered by determining what pedagogical tools will best facilitate student attainment of each goal. 

In fact, a good rule of thumb is to “keep the course objectives in mind, and omit any material that does not support them.”

This certainly applies to technology. Regardless of how stellar the content or how wondrous the technology, if they are to be excellent, online courses must also involve excellent online teaching.

Principle 5: Sense of community and social presence are essential to online excellence.

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Since web-based courses do not have face-to-face contact and the wide array of non-verbal cues that such contact brings, they have the potential to become static and impersonal.

Creating a sense of community is one of the main objectives in any class and is also an essential part of the online learning environment.

Establishing a sense of community often signals movement to a deeper learning experience. 

It is through sustained communication that participants construct meaning and come to a more complete understanding of the content. Indeed it is through such interaction and through attending to the processes of learning and teaching (as opposed to attending only to content) that a deeper rather than a surface approach to learning is encouraged. 

Without this connection to the instructor and the other students, the course is little more than a series of exercises to be completed.

One significant way to promote a sense of community is to develop social presence a concept that has received much attention in the literature. 

In the community of inquiry model  social presence is considered – along with teaching presence and cognitive presence – as an essential element in the educational experience. 

A simple and useful description of social presence is that it refers to the degree to which someone is perceived as a real person in mediated communication.

Students cannot be left on their own and be expected to wade through massive amounts of content. 

They need...

• connection, 
• contact and 
• a sense of realness and immediacy. 

In short, they need a sense of community.

It is also important to emphasize that community will not happen on its own. 

Teachers need to work to develop community in their online courses. 

Without effort and social presence, any sense of community tends to wither.

Social presence and a sense of community are influenced by many things, including:

• collaborative learning activities 
• enhanced communication 
• use of humour 
• small group activities 

Once a sense of community has been established, it is very important to continue to foster it and encourage the members of that community to participate and support one another.

Principle 6: Excellence requires multiple areas of expertise.

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Those new to designing and delivering online courses tend to quickly gain an appreciation for the magnitude of the process. As well as the obvious requirement of excellent instruction, there are also other areas of expertise involved. 

In support of the instructor is the technical expert who may handle things such as HTML coding, getting the material uploaded and helping with the sorts of questions that invariably arise: 

• Why does the assignment link say ‘404 Page not found?’ 
• Why do the online readings say the links have expired? 
• Why don’t the menu bars work on my Mac? 

As well, there is much input required on matters of course design: what tools, resources, activities and forms of assessment best help students meet the course objectives? How are they best integrated into the course?

The expertise involved in developing excellent online courses is not optional; 

it is essential. 

And we either gain those areas of expertise ourselves or we look for help and support. 

Otherwise, significant aspects of the courses we develop will be weak, and possibly even mediocre.

With the software and course management programs available today it is really quite simple to get content online. But as mentioned above, an excellent course requires much more than making content available to students. 

This is why some universities and colleges promote the team approach to online course development. Developing and offering online courses simply requires more skills than are usually found in a single person not to mention that in post-secondary education instructors tend to be subject matter experts and not necessarily experts in learning theory and educational processes.

Some teams are quite simple and involve two or three areas of expertise: 

1. an instructor, 
2. instructional designer 
3. and an internet/technical specialist. 

In some larger institutions as many as eight experts are involved. These include:

1. content expert, 
2. instructional designer, 
3. editor, 
4. team manager, 
5. graphics and media designer, 
6. webmaster, 
7. library consultant 
8. and external reviewer. 

In some cases, however, this array of experts is simply not available and faculty members must serve in multiple roles.

Regardless of whether the expertise comes from a team or from an adaptive and ever-learning “lone ranger” the simple truth remains: 

Excellence in online education requires multiple areas of expertise. 

A content expert is necessary but not even close to sufficient.

Principle 7: A great web interface will not save a poor course; but a poor web interface will destroy a potentially great course.

In the online world students essentially go to class alone and there is no one there when they arrive. 

They are not able to turn to a classmate on the first day and say: 

     “Is there a text for this class?” 

They can’t raise a hand and ask the instructor: 

     “What are the assignments?” or 

     “Will we get a syllabus today?” or

     “Are we required to attend?” 

In an online course, students need to be able to find everything they need to be successful learners and how to do so easily. 

Even in well-organized courses it is not uncommon to find out, part way through the course, that one or more students have not found some of the essential information. 

They weren’t just quiet or shy; they were lost.

One thing in particular they need to find is a well-developed and articulate study guide. 

The guide is the student’s link to things such as content, assignments, group activities, and is the tool that leads the students through the course. Because students often feel somewhat disoriented at the beginning of classes, they tend to search for and depend on a central document, or syllabus, to explain the entire geography of the course; how to proceed and where everything is.

The instructor needs to anticipate where students will go wrong or get lost in the course and either modify the course design to minimize these areas or address these questions with tips, Frequently Asked Question (FAQ) areas or other means. They must also request constant feedback from students on the course content itself and draw attention to areas of anticipated confusion or problems. It is not enough to simply inform students of these areas, the instructor must request that students respond once they have found the required information or activity in question.

Principle 8: Excellence comes from ongoing assessment and refinement.

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Obviously there is some distance between a course that works and one that is absolutely riveting.

Two additional factors that develop the former into the latter are evaluation and refinement: 

1. the regular and systematic review of all aspects of the course 
2. and the subsequent changes and updates added as a result. 

Evaluation is essential and should cover at least two important areas: course effectiveness and course efficiency. 

Were the learning outcomes attained (effectiveness) and did the pedagogical tools used in the courses facilitate the attainment of those outcomes (efficiency)? 

This approach helps achieve the constructive alignment between 

the learning objectives and 

the method of delivery and assessment. 

Diagnostic feedback that helps: 

“the student to improve learning,
the teacher to improve the instructional process,
and the institution to improve its curriculum, support services, and infrastructure.” 

There are many ways in which feedback can be collected from within the course: 

1. discussion forums, 
2. feedback assignments, 
3. daily or weekly reflections, 
4. journaling assignments and, of course, 
5. formal course evaluations. 

Assessing these types of interactions and commentary through the use of qualitative criterion-based methods is essential in ensuring that the course is meeting the desired learning outcomes and helps facilitate constructive alignment (Biggs, 1999). 

By attending to the issues raised by students the course becomes much more organic and better able to adapt to meet the specific needs of a group of students. Assessment is particularly important in an online environment because 

“educational technology expands more rapidly than anything else that we have encountered and can morph into educational forms that we have not encountered”                                                                                            (Moskai, et al 2006, p. 29).

Principle 9: Sometimes the little extras go a long way.

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There are a few things that some online instructors/developers provide that can go a long way with students. 

One is to provide exemplars of the course assignments. Students don’t tend to have the same opportunity to clarify assignments, and quell that pre-assignment anxiety as onsite students. 

Discussion forums, specific to the assignments can be set up, and these help, but exemplars provide much more specific direction. 

At the very least, detailed rubrics that outline the methods for evaluation will help to reduce the anxiety that students have.

As well, brief guides and tutorials placed throughout the course and designed to help students with the skill necessary in order to make the most of an assignment or activity can go a long way to reducing student stress and increasing the quality of the work they produce as well. 

Unless the students in an online course can manage their time and provide some degree of self-motivation, they tend not to do well in a virtual course environment. There is a wealth of articles and resources that can be supplied in order to help students find a rhythm that works for them. 

Brief personal email messages are also appreciated by students. Those who begin courses with very limited discussion forum activity often respond very positively to short queries about their activity level and “friendly” reminders of the course expectations. 

Also, setting calendar reminders to help keep students on track can also go a long way to easing stress.

Another little extra is the inclusion of brief audio clips. There is something particularly connecting and compelling about hearing a voice. This seems to be especially so when the audio segment is directed specifically to the students as opposed to being a recorded lecture segment. 

“Hello everyone. I’ve just finished reading all of this week’s posts and I must say I’m delighted at the level of thoughtfulness you’ve provided and at the support you’ve given to each other…”

The integration of audio helps create social presence by reflecting the emotions and establishing the friendliness of the instructor to the students. These verbal segments can vary in complexity from edited podcasts, complete with musical introductions and RSS feeds, to simple audio clips that are recorded on a computer and uploaded as an attachment.

The integration of related video material also provides another little extra, especially for those students who tend to be auditory or visual in nature. Many online courses are extremely text heavy and instructors need to understand that this is often intimidating for students. Many instructors attempt to reduce confusion in the absence of verbal discussion and clarification by providing more resources and background reading material for each topic. This may only serve to exacerbate the problem.

Of course, the inclusion of additional resources in websites and online courses requires an understanding of the issues of fair use and copyright (Pitler, 2006). Many resources are protected and cannot legally be used without permission from the copyright holder. 

Fortunately for educators many other resources are available via a Creative Commons license. Creative Commons is a relatively new way of addressing issues of copyright, where creators of content may declare their work as having “some rights reserved” rather than “all rights reserved”. As such, many resources are becoming available to share and reuse legally. Creative Commons is recommended as a powerful new tool for educational activities (Pitler, 2006). See the Appendix for links to further information.

Adding little extras to courses can include things such as exemplars, rubrics, guides, tutorials, personal email messages, calendar reminders, audio clips and video segments. These additions, and others like them, often go a long way in contributing to student satisfaction and learning.

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Conclusion 

[A poetic revised layout of the conclusion, using enjambment and white space for emphasis]

It is not sufficient to be 

                               a content expert

Nor is it sufficient to be

                              “tech-savvy”

It is not even sufficient to be 

                               an excellent traditional classroom teacher 

Because the online world is 

                               a categorically different environment 

                                                              a particular blend of skills 

and knowledge is necessary 

                              if success is to be found 

                                                              in this domain

a medium unto itself 

                              delivery of content requires 

           action

used wisely 

                a sense of community 

                                                 is essential

many areas of expertise are needed 

                 an effective web interface 

                                                 must be provided

ongoing assessment 

             and refinement 

little extras often go 

             a long 

                                                 way

while technology is the vehicle 

              driven by good pedagogy 

Knowledge and understanding of such principles 

              can help us find success 

                                 in the exciting world 

                                                 of online education

and can help us move from 

              the mere uploading of content 

to creating absolutely riveting online courses



QUESTION from our class OLE 1 at GOA:

"What was one of the 9 principles from the article ‘An Absolutely Riveting...’ that resonated with you: either it was surprising or it affirmed something you already suspected about online teaching. Why?"

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