Online course design - what would YOU want to know?

[Bart Pursel]

Hello everyone. I'm working with Larry Ragan and other colleagues at PSU to design a fac dev course on
"authoring an online" course. We're in the initial brainstorming stages, and we're trying to elicit feedback from folks with experience in this area. Specifically:

What are the top 3 questions you have been asked by faculty interested in designing/developing an online
course?

Any input very much appreciated!

[Bart Pursel]

Thank you everyone for the responses! I put together a brief summary over on the Schreyer Institute blog:
http://www.personal.psu.edu/bkp10/blogs/site/

[Shannon Kennan]

Thanks all... Bart wrote to say he appreciates the input & will post a compiled list from your responses as well as another venue in which he is collecting feedback.

[Michelle Kline]

There are many questions that I receive when I ask if anyone would be interested in authoring a course but almost all ask at least one of these:
1. As an author am I totally in charge of the content or must I submit to some reviewer? Can I ignore the reviewer's comments? Can I select my own review team?

2. If I author the course, does it belong to me and will I be able to copyright this material and use it in my resident or hybrid courses? Will I be able to publish this as a text under my own name?

3. Do I get paid more to author than to teach a course that is already developed?

I have found that while some faculty consider it an honor to be selected as an author, many believe that it does not hold value in the P&T process.

I hope this helps.

[Julie Laubach]

Hi Bart,
Here they are

1) how do I get my materials to you... is there a way I can do my writing online instead of sending you word docs.
2) how do I record my voice I want to do Power Points with audio
3) advice on how to conduct real time discussions and a close third is the best way to have team activities submitted through ANGEL

[Jeff Andersen]

I teach online courses and have assisted (encouraged, cheer leaded) faculty to use our technology (Moodle) for their courses. Here would be their statements to me:
1. I just do not have the time to do that. A new prep..by the way how much time does it take?
2. How do you get interactions with the students? How do you know they are in the course?
3. How do you keep up with all that you have to do with the technology?

There are others but these are common.

Jeff

[Sue Cromwell]

Questions that I have asked:

1. What is the time commitment regarding development of the course? By time I mean the transfer of learning from teaching face to face and designing the on line experience for the students to be extremely positive. How much time will it take to learn all of the design options available, especially the initial course development?
2. What are the resources available to assist in the design/development of a course, especially when this is the first time through?
3. How does the design/development process work, for me it was helpful to actually develop a "project plan" with some milestones and target dates to shoot for. This was helpful in determining when to begin the development process and when to launch the course?

[Jeanne Vilberg]

Hi Bart,

Here are a few...

1. How do I know students are not cheating on assignments?
2. Why do I need learning objectives?
3. Why can't I just post my lectures online?

[Daph Crane]

Hi Bart,

The questions asked depends on the amount of experience the faculty member has. For a faculty member who has lots of experience, but is new to online, the questions fall into three main categories:

1. Roles and responsibilities.
What is your role? What do you expect from me? Do I really need to work with an instructional designer? Who will create the multimedia? Who will put my content into the LMS?

2. TIme required for development and delivery
How much time should I expect to commit to this project? How long will it take for the multimedia to be developed?

We generally address these time relates questions when we create the timeline prior to the start of the course.

Time required to facilitate
This will depend on the nature of the course.
We attempt to design to limit the number of questions about expectations, assignments, etc. Where appropriate we automate feedback on practice exercises. We let the students know the expected response rate to email, discussion postings, and assignments. We discuss this throughout the design and development process.

3. Types of multimedia and technologies that can be used, or how to use.
For example, I want to have an interactive image, how do I do this? I hear a lot about blogs and think I would like to use one. How to they work? How does the LMS work?

I hope this helps.
daph

[Karen Pollack]

Hi Bart,

Here are a few that I have been asked:

1. What will the process look like (roles and responsibilities)? In our enviornment, the author is typically working with an instructional designer -- but they still have questions about how they will work with the designer, in what format they will be expected to submit content, etc.

2. What kinds of technology will I/can I use?

3. How will I be compensated? In our environment we do typically compensate course authors. We have a few different models for compensation, but all are fairly generous.

Best,
Karen

[Angela Velez]

Hello, Bart. I also teach a course in online teaching at my university. We have very few online courses right now, and hybrid/online teaching is the newest thing going on. Faculty mostly ask me, 1) How do I know how much work to assign and what types of assignments work best? 2) How do I develop community with my students if I don't see them? 3) How do I manage my time since it seems like online teaching is a 24/7 endeavor?