Lisa Hershey

While I believe in this concept of holistic assessment, our program requires practice of standardized test taking (multiple choice) in preparation for the credentialing exam which is all multiple choice.  I do like the idea of reviewing multiple choice tests and posing different statements, changing words in a question then asking students what the new "outcome" would be.

A concept I want to work on is the student not only learning individually but providing useful knowledge to classmates, instructors and those outside of this class. This can be facilitated in a variety of ways including project based assignments and wikis / blogs.  I am also interested in pursuing the students having access to the whole course content from the beginning.

Applying the term "inclusion" means providing learning opportunities and assessment forms to meet many different learning styles.  This is an important change I need to make so that all learners can be successful in my courses.

One thing I learned is to design my instruction so that students "drive" the learning process thus increasing the student's autonomy.  This makes a lot of sense to me.

This modue offered numerous specific examples which are very helpful.  I will be able to refer back to these examples and strategies.  It is key to communicate in email feelings, a helpful attitude, etc.  This is no different than how we should communicate with colleagues or those we manage.  I think it is important that we model this type of communication for our students and encourage their emails to be professional and positive as well.

I plan to use video conferencing early on in the course so we can put faces to names.  I also hope to use video conferencing during office hours.  I believe this is an important component of the online environment.  

I appreciated the 7 Competencies required for online learners and plan to promote these in my online courses.  I believe that a high quality instructor in F2F environment can convert to a high quality online experience for students.  It will require work but building relationships always does.  I also appreciate the fact stated that some programs and material need to be hybrid to incorporate the hands on learning aspect.  It is up to institutions and Advisory Boards to ensure we are offering the best mode of education for the program.

These posts have been very insightful.  Clearly, we, as online instructors, have our work cut out for us!  I agree with the statements made that students will remember long after class how an instructor made them feel.  This is a good take away.  I also agree with the person who discussed how students, regardless of class, always seem to fall into three categories; high achievers, middle of the road students and those who are clearly going to need extra support / guidance.  All three groups need to feel equally valued and appreciated.  Through building relationships, we can improve retention and… >>>

I want to consider content chunking as I prepare my recorded lectures; planning to keep them to 15 minutes by using this technique.

I plan to utilize the four personality questions as an ice breaker activitiy with students.  I think it will provide valuable insights.  I also like the idea of having one project where students can choose different methods to achieve the same learning objective.