Sheri Gon

It's important to make sure the students are able to use tools in the LMS as well as the social network platform. We can't assume all of the students are able to use these tools and we may need to have an orientation session at the beginning of the course to familiarize all of the students to use these tools effectively.

I can use a Community of Practice in the course I teach so the students can help each other learn about real life problems and how they can resolve them. Having groups work together brings diverse perspectives and they can see that there are more than one way to approach a problem.

I must remind my students that if they need accommodation for a learning or physical challenge, they should connect with campus support services. It is on my syllabus that students are responsible to reach out to student services. Once they have the student's report, student services can work with faculty to identify the accommodation appropriate for the student's needs. This can't happen until the student's needs are assessed by support services. I am happy to comply with direction from student services since it is designed to maximize student success.

When I taught my course asynchronously, I arranged a 30-minute synchronous meeting once a week. I found that going completely online last year during the first six months of the pandemic caused a lot of anxiety. It helped the students to engage with the course when our online sessions began with a light-hearted "question of the day." We learned more about each other with questions like, "what is your favorite frozen treat and why" or "if you could invite anyone to dinner, who would it be?" I learned so much more about my student's personalities and got them into a… >>>

It's not enough to possess the knowledge and experience to teach. Faculty must also be comfortable with their institution's CMS technology in order to take advantage of the tools available for e-learning. A lot happens in the front-end so delivery of instruction can take place successfully.