Communication during online teaching using advance relational skills appears to be effective.  Constructing theses types of emails can help students feel acknowledged, respected and valued.  I like the idea of creating an email template to create thoughtful supportive emails to our students.

I find it interesting to hear how there is current technology available that can help support the student with services and help with their involvement. Institutions can take between 3-5 years to adopt these programs.

It was interesting to learn that students online performed significantlly better than face to face studens.  It's also good to know that there are seven competencies that online students should have to be successful.

I have learned that there is a strong link between relationship and retention.  I also learned when physical charateristics are absent from teaching one must rely on purely relational skills to help online students.  For example: communicated back to students in a regular and timely mannner, and setting up one one one calls or virtual meetings.

It's important to promote high-level skills such as critical learning.  Provide the students with opportuntiy to problem solve and critical thinking.  For example: Encourage students to find relationships between pieces of information, and ask open-ended questions.  It is also important for instructors to plan synchronaous environment for real-time collaboration.

Active learning activities increase student satisfaction rates, increase participation, increase  students motivation to helps them to become interested with the process of aquiring content informaiton.  Active learning and technology should not be used as an emperiment, but aligned with the goals and learning objectives of the course.

Rubrics are also very important becuase it helps students to understand the necessary parameters to follow when completing assignments.

Active learning is what online teachers should be creating for students.  Yes, students are responsible for actively using the materials we provided for them online and participating in discussions. As Online instructors we are to keep providing them with comments and encouraging students as they complete their online program.

Add closed captions and transcripts to audio and videos.  There are software available to help support Instructors with close captioning called Media Access Generator (MAGpie) or Annotation edit.

I learned there are 3 types of assistive technology aviailable to students with disabilities. Assistive Technology software, equipment and hardware.  I will remember students with disabilites may not have access to asistive technology 24/7.

I learned about the laws that support students with disabilities and the responsiblities the higher education has to support the accessibiltiy for equal access to instuction.  As an online Instructor we must ensure students with disabilities can succeed.