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Facilitating Online Collaboration - Carolina Online Teacher Program
This course is the third in the Carolina Online Teacher Program (COLT), a series of courses designed to prepare online instructors. You must complete this course before taking electives.
Course completed (taught April 1–April 21)
Communicating online is very different from the familiar experiences of face-to-face communication. The online environment creates both challenges and great opportunities. The focus of this course will be to develop strategies and practice skills required to facilitate good online communication, moderate online discussion, and promote better accomplishment of instructional goals.
Through asynchronous interaction, we will discuss issues online instructors face, and discuss and apply good facilitation/moderation practices. We will engage in role playing, work together on case studies, and participate in discussions in facilitating and moderating. We will learn how to create good discussion questions and apply techniques to keep discussions going and on track. We will look at communication needed at the start of a course and apply strategies for establishing presence and building strong learning communities. This course will also provide opportunities to apply strategies for providing feedback, encouragement, and handling problem situations.
This class was very beneficial not only to a prospective online teacher but for all teachers in general. I especially liked the opportunity to deal with difficult students and managing discussion forums in a "practice" environment.
-COURSE PARTICIPANT
Syllabus
You can view full the course syllabus here.
Prerequisites
Course objectives
The overall goal of this course is to provide the training and tools for effective online facilitation and moderation. This course is designed to help improve online course communication and instruction to improve the quality of learner education and course experience.
- Describe general guidelines for online communication
- Identify the roles and responsibilities of the online facilitator
- Identify your own strengths and needs areas as group communicators
- Describe the stages of interaction and appropriate activities for each stage
- Learn how to craft discussion questions
- Use effective responses, feedback, questioning, and encouraging techniques
- Learn basic intervention skills to keep discussions on track and positive
- Learn how and when to respond to problems in the online classroom
Audience
This course is appropriate for teachers of all subjects and grade levels who wish to teach online.
Standards Alignment
This course addresses the following North Carolina Professional Teaching Standards:
- Standard II: Teachers establish a respectful environment for a diverse population of students.
- a. Teachers provide an environment in which each child has a positive, nurturing relationship with caring adults.
- d. Teachers adapt their teaching for the benefit of students with special needs.
- Standard IV: Teachers facilitate learning for their students
- c. Teachers use a variety of instructional methods.
- d. Teachers integrate and utilize technology in their instruction.
- h. Teachers use a variety of methods to assess what each student has learned.
- Standard V: Teachers reflect on their practice
- c. Teachers function effectively in a complex, dynamic environment.
Time commitment
Participants will be expected to log in and participate five days per week, for a total of approximately four hours per week.
Materials required
None
