Adapted from Arthur W. Pickering and Zelda Gamson’s 1987 article “Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education”.
Encourage Student-Faculty Communication
Establish communication guidelines from the beginning of your online course. Specify what email account you will use for the course, especially if you choose not to use the eCourseware email function, and how frequently students can expect a response. Identify virtual office hours. NOTE: It is appropriate to indicate if virtual office hours are by appointment only.
Encourage Student-Student Communication
Build-in activities and assignments that encourage learners to collaborate, e.g. online peer-review, peer-help, or peer-editing; discussion forums; empowerment activities which allow students to share in teaching responsibilities; online meetings or seminars, and the like. For more ideas about encouraging student collaboration online, review Special Report: Student Collaboration in the Online Classroom presented by FacultyFocus—Robert Kelly Editor.
Encourage Active Learning
Incorporate content and activities that require learners to actively engage in the content and the course in thoughtful and targeted ways. Use a mixture of delivery methods like a short-form video (generally 5 to 7 minutes in duration), audio-enabled presentations or invite a guest speaker. Students especially love reading or hearing good stories; therefore, become a good storyteller. Sometimes letter grades or even meaningful feedback aren’t enough to keep students enthusiastic about a course or its content; therefore, offering intrinsic motivators like certificates or digital badges may compel a student to keep going when assignments are challenging. To learn more about freely available software and digital badging standards visit: OpenBadges.
Offer Timely Feedback
Expectations for regular, timely, and meaningful feedback should be clearly stated with appropriate instructor response times noted. This includes when students can expect answers to questions, email replies, grades on assignments, and the like. Meaningful feedback is specific, clear, and timely information about academic performance that motivates students to continue when course activities become challenging. It should be used as an assessment of learning mastery rather than a measurement of inadequacy. Sufficient observation of scholastic achievement ought to develop knowledge, skills, and abilities as well as include recommendations for improvement. Watch Setting Expectations with Adult Learners to learn more.
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