Keeping up on the CMS
I feel that my biggest challenge will be the technology support for my students. This will be my first online class that I teach, and since the program is different than the one I use at my present school, I hope I will be able to assist my students in a timely manner when they are confronted with a problem. I have already dealt with the technology group for gaining access to my class because they were having trouble for some reason in putting me into the system. I must say that the technical support has been very supportive; therefore, I feel pretty confident, I will be able to lead or guide my students in the right direction. I definetly need to look into the student orienation class for CMS.
I am glad to see your technology group has been helpful in the past. My advice to you is to make sure you give yourself time to learn the system and certainly take advantage of your helpful technology group. Good luck!
I'm almost finish with my first year of online teaching , and the CMS I use where I teach has been very supportive. However , we use a system outside of the virtual classroom that causes students to get a little frustrated . To help students with the technological issues , I make myself available to students anyway I can to ease the frustration. I try to make the process less stressful for students , especailly those students you might get frustrated with the process and withdraw from the course.
I really find that online experince no matter how well we teach or what whiz-bang materials we add if the technology is not first rate the learning really suffers.
That is a terrific tip Antoinette. Thanks for sharing.
You are correct. There is nothing more frustrating with the CMS continues to go down and there is nothing you can do about it!
My first online class is close to the end. The CMS is not too bad except the tool for live chat is not reliable. Therefore, before every live chat, I send students the ppt slides; and after the live chat, I email student a summary of the chat. So far my students had never complained the errors of the live chat tool.
You provided some great tips on how to deal with technology issues with live chat. Thanks!
Congratulations on teaching your first online class. I hope it was a positive experience for you.
That is so true, Francis! Students get frustrated very quickly and some of them will all too willingly quit. I do find it interesting, however, that they turn to me first (I'm not especially techie) when they have tech support at their beck and call! I end up sending them there in every case. Oh well!
