Post 2: Intentionality about Online

I am balanced between f2f and online teaching. I really want my online teaching to be more visible and personal, so I am making a short (3 minute) video to introduce each week. Weekly is really the best; short modules is really the best for online. I finally see that. Giving them freedom is not good, because the day to day sitting in class that gives them rhythm and structure is missing.  Little bits is bigger than huge bites (i.e., short, focused modules are better than longer thematic ones).

 

My online classes are quite different. One is mostly repeaters of a first year experience course, and as of last night ½ of them had not done the first easy assignment (short video intro). They failed the first time, so….many of them had 1.0 or lower (as in .0) gpas last semester. The second is an intuitionally based professional communication course at 3000 level, and the third is a similar course taught for the university system at the 2000 level. I designed the first, not the second; I feel like a hall monitor or restaurant hostess in the second one right now.

 

I keep short tabs on assignments and did post a video for the week last night. Whether they watch it, I’ll see. I’ll keep doing it and try to get some feedback at the end. But intentionality is everything, and I choose to be intentional about my presence in the course, as per Small Teaching Online (Flowers).

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