Making progress...slowly

This past week I began to make progress toward my personal learning plan goals....slowly.  Although it felt like I really wasn't getting anywhere, once I began to list things for inclusion in this writing, I realized I really did make some (although not much) progress. 

One thing I’ve learned this week through course work and personal exploration of publications, is that the federal government is beginning to look more closely at whether an online course is truly distance education, or better meets the criteria for a correspondence course.  From what I read in an online article (Link below), the key factor in allowing the designation of correspondence/online is the amount and type of faculty-student interaction.  While Western Governor’s University is the institution of focus right now, competency-based online programs are becoming more popular.  Therefore, this will be a topic to watch as the results of the investigation might affect all online education.

This week, in an effort to achieve my identified goals, I completed some online tutorials on creating a survey tool using Google Forms.  I viewed a tutorial provided by my professor, and this tutorial was found on the online site, Tech Republic.  This was a very clear and easy to read article, and through this article I learned the term “skip logic.”  This was a new term, and it is used when a survey asks If/Then type questions.  Apparently Google Forms cannot do this when you are creating survey tool, but then I also realized that the article’s screen shots look nothing like the Google Forms tool I used.  I then realized that the article was from 2012, which in computer application time is essential decades ago. In fact, I began building my tool during the weekend, and when I began finalizing it the day before I submitted, I was offered to upgrade to an even newer version of the tool.  Nevertheless, despite the age of the article, I did learn some things that were useful, such as when skip logic might be helpful, and to have better clarity on the descriptions of the types of questions available in the survey.  Another strategy to help me learn the tool better was that, as I built a sample tool, I clicked on the “help” icon frequently, reading the instructions for each section and function.  Although I did explore the tool through creating a sample tool, I do think it is a pretty self-explanatory and easy application.  I submitted my sample tool to some classmates for critique and to use the survey to make sure it worked like I wanted, and then created my actual needs assessment.  It was pretty exciting to see results start coming in within a few minutes of emailing the link!  This was much easier than I anticipated, so when my students agreed to use of social media in the classroom as a means of communication, I decided to also query them on preferences through use of another survey tool.  The faculty survey results will help me craft a professional development seminar, and the student survey results will help me meet their learning needs. 

Another learning opportunity I experienced this week was attending a webinar provided by the University System of Georgia (USG).  This seminar was a panel format entitled Successful Practices in Teaching Adult Learners Online.  There was a variety of educators from three different universities, and all have vast experience teaching online.  Some of the points made were as follows:

• · Online learning needs to be affordable, and resources to support learning need to explicit.  Students should not have to waste valuable learning time digging for resources the instructor should provide for course assignments.
• ·         Online learning must be flexible, the job of the instructor is to understand what students really need.  One panel member accomplishes this by providing students an access to a course section prior to beginning the course.  This section includes a survey of the students, and gives them practice navigating the online platform.  Another point made is that truly online programs need to have more entry points rather than requiring students to enroll only at the beginning of defined semesters.
• ·         Online instructors need to assume a role of student advocate, both within individual courses and the institution.  University resources are often not helpful to online learners, especially when they can only be accessed through the home campus.
• ·         Online learning needs to begin consideration of meeting the needs of a learner who can accelerate learning.  This may include consideration of looking to build a competency based classroom that can meet the needs of the learner who can successfully accelerate and meet the course outcomes.

This was a great format to learn, I was able to participate at my desk, even asking questions through the chat feature.  The USG offers webinars frequently, and the list of upcoming topics can be found at http://www.usg.edu/faculty_affairs/workshops/category/academic_year_2015_2016 

Articles read:

Fain, P. (2015). The faculty role online, scrutinized. Inside Higher Ed.  Retrieved January 26, 2016 from https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/01/15/education-departments-inspector-generals-high-stakes-audit-western-governors-u.