“…expertise is learned from prolonged experience with good feedback on mistakes.” – Daniel Kahneman

Students are eager to receive meaningful feedback quickly. With hopes of improving their class performance, timely and substantive feedback is essential to helping students get on track before it is too late. Yet, knowing this doesn’t change why feedback and grading sometimes gets put off, despite our best intentions – it can appear daunting and time consuming.

8 ideas on how to take the sting out of providing feedback:

Self-checks

Not all feedback requires your intervention or even a grade. Can you set-up an activity where students can check their understanding and get immediate feedback? A simple solution is to create a short practice activity (e.g. multiple choice quiz, drag and drop interactive) which provides immediate results. The prompt feedback supports students to move on to more challenging work with confidence. In some systems, including Canvas, you can provide comments for wrong answers that clues them into where they could find the right answer.

Screencasts

As a student, I really enjoyed a course where the faculty member used screencasts to give feedback. I never had to schedule time during her office hours to feel like we were sitting down and having a conversation about my work. Her tone was approachable, I could rewatch the feedback to make sure I understood it, and it was so personal. It was also a nice break from reading text.

When I later heard her share at a faculty training event that she used this method because it was faster than providing text feedback, I was shocked – that had never occurred to me as a student! She has found that by using screencasts she doesn’t have to labor over editing her words to make sure what she is trying to convey doesn’t get interpreted the wrong way. She saves a lot of time by making them intentionally brief and informal, all while providing students an experience that feels relatable and relaxed.

You can check out this Faculty Focus article on Using Screencasts for Formative and Summative Assessment to learn more.

Campus Partners

Could you require students to see a campus partner, like a writing center, to review a first draft of an assignment? Of course, you will want to discuss your idea with these offices before designing your assignments. If they are willing, they can help you by catching a lot of simple errors in students’ work, so you can focus more of your grading on the content in a later iteration. Also, feedback from multiple people broadens the scope of perspectives a student receives, which deepens their learning.

Here at OSU, you might contact the Ecampus Student Success Counselors, OSU Library, Math Learning Center, Online Writing Lab, or other offices to chat about options for partnership.

Self-assessments

You might be surprised how honest students will be about their own work if they are given the opportunity to grade themselves. Providing a rubric and asking students to respond to each criteria can be a helpful way to encourage students to take a moment to step back, reflect on what they have done, and provide suggestions to themselves on how they could improve.

Group feedback

Providing group feedback quickly allows the ‘go getters’ to get started with at least some advice from you while you are finishing giving more specific grades and comments. While you want to use group feedback sparingly, because students need personalized feedback that relates to their specific work, it can help you to prevent a lot of individual email questions. If you are able to offer group feedback that notes class-wide trends more quickly than individual feedback, it shows that you are reviewing the work and paying attention to how students are doing.

Text expanders

Do you often find yourself writing the same types of comments for students over and over? Text expanders allow you to write a small string of text and it expands into a larger piece of text. Some ideas:

APA => Please review the APA in-text citation guidelines at Purdue OWL.
Rubric => See the rubric requirements regarding this section.
Great => This is great work – way to go!
Research => What research are you using as a basis for your claim? What evidence can you provide for this claim?
Replies => This discussion forum required two replies. Please make sure to post at least two replies in subsequent discussion forums to receive full credit.

If you are unsure where to start, check-out this instructor video You Type Too Much! Use a Text Expander To Save Time from Cengage Learning (duration 01:59).

Social pressure

Consider leveraging social pressure through assignments that are public, like e-portfolios or blogs. It’s amazing how much our work improves when we think it will be viewed by others. If students are presenting their work in a public forum, they may take more ownership over the quality, which reduces how much effort is required by you to grade. You will want to check with your instructional designer on how to do this while still adhering to FERPA.

Chocolate

I hate looking at finances, so when it is time to go over my budget, I put on relaxing music and treat myself to a favorite chocolate. If grading is painful, creating a positive ritual around it can make it easier to engage. Are there ways you can make your environment more inviting and focused?

If you are interested in exploring any of these ideas in more detail, contact your instructional designer to discuss what could work for your course and your teaching style. Remember, meaningful feedback will help your students focus on the learning, rather than just the grade.

By: Amy Munger

Fall term is in full swing, and right now students are at their best in terms of motivation and anticipation of a good term and academic year ahead. In a few weeks, however, the motivation that students started out with in September may change to disengagement as the term progresses. Some students, for example, have the misconception that online courses are easier than face-to-face courses. This misunderstanding can cause them to feel overwhelmed and disengaged when they realize that their online courses are just as rigorous as their face-to-face courses. Now is the time to get a jump on ways to spot disengaged students — and what to do about it — before they give up and drop that fabulous online course that you are working so hard on. Here are some key takeaways from a recent workshop on this topic that I attended through the Online Learning Consortium: Strategies for Increasing Interaction & Engagement Self-Paced Workshop

Signs that a student is disengaged:

Discussion posts are too short
The student rarely logs into the course
Little or no time spent participating in activities or interacting with other students
Missing or late assignments

Disengaged students may feel isolated and reluctant to reach out for help. Here’s what you can do:

Connect with students early and often at the beginning of the course.
In your communications with students or in your welcome video, convey to students a sense of community and that the course is a safe space for learning.
Encourage students to post their own introductory videos to help everyone get to know each other better.
Assign tasks that involve teamwork, which can encourage the development of student relationships that keep students engaged and are essential for learning.
Remind students of the many resources that they have through Ecampus, such as the Student Success Team, which include student services, exam proctoring, and success counseling.

What have you experienced in your own courses? What has helped keep students engaged, and what have you done when you have noticed disengagement?

Resources on this topic:

Engagement Matters: Student Perceptions on the Importance of Engagement Strategies in the Online Learning Environment (Martin & Bollinger, 2018)

Online Learning Consortium, Workshops

OSU Ecampus Student Success Team

The eLearning Dilemma: Engaged vs Unengaged Learners by Karla Guitierrez

Whether you are a new or seasoned online instructor, understanding how to establish and maintain instructor presence is a commonly shared challenge. What is known about online learners is they want to know their instructors are engaged and regularly interacting in the course. Students also express how important it is to know that their instructors care about them.

There is a natural distance inherent in online classrooms which necessitates purposeful actions and intentional structures to prevent isolation and to foster connection. There is great news… this distance can be overcome! Moreover, research has indicated that instructor presence has a relationship with perceived student satisfaction and success. Being there for your students can make a difference!

Being present goes a step further beyond students perceiving that their instructors are there. By definition, instructor presence is “the design, facilitation, and direction of cognitive and social process for the purpose of realizing personally meaningful and educationally worthwhile learning outcomes.” This may sound like a significant undertaking, but rest assured that you can craft your presence over time and that you have ample support from the Ecampus team. We can help bring your ideas to life!

Keep in mind that curating instructor presence will be an evolution. Learning environments and experiences are dynamic. In addition, the composition of students will change each term, so learner needs and wants will continually shift. Strategies used within a specific context may not work for another, and that is okay.

Let’s get started!

Try starting out small by exploring different ideas. Don’t be afraid to change directions if one approach doesn’t work. With all that said, what are some strategies for establishing and maintaining presence which can be leveraged today?

Establishing presence

Welcome announcements
Instructor introduction video
About your instructor page
Course overview video
Virtual office hours or individualized virtual sessions to connect with students
Personalized language to humanize the learning experience

Maintaining presence

Non-graded community building spaces to connect around complex learning activities
Announcements to send regular updates, reminders, and check-ins
- Tip! Announcements can also be leveraged to share and highlight valuable connections, expand upon those insights, and provide relevant resources for learners to explore.
Monitor learner progress
- Regular and timely feedback which is clear and actionable
- Outreach to learners who are struggling or engagement is lacking
Present content in diverse ways
- Module overview videos
- Audio recordings (e.g. podcast)
- Screencast demonstrations
Engage in course discussions
Solicit student feedback
- Tip! Consider adding a short anonymous survey in the middle of the course.

As ideas begin to percolate, please do share those with your Instructional Designer so that together you can explore different strategies and tools that will work best for you.

References

Budhai, S., & Williams, M. (2016). Teaching Presence in Online Courses: Practical Applications, Co-Facilitation, and Technology Integration. The Journal of Effective Teaching,16(3), 76-84.
Ekmekci, O. (2013). Being There: Establishing Instructor Presence in an Online Learning Environment. Higher Education Studies, 3(1), 29-38.
Jaggers, S., Edgecombe, N., & West-Stacey, G. (2013, April). Creating an Effective Online Instructor Presence. Retrieved from https://ccrc.tc.columbia.edu/media/k2/attachments/effective-online-instructor-presence.pdf
Ladyshewsky, R. K. (2013). Instructor Presence in Online Courses and Student Satisfaction. International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 7(1). doi:10.20429/ijsotl.2013.070113
Sandercock, I. (2014, October 14). The Importance of Instructor Presence in Online Courses. Retrieved from https://teachonline.asu.edu/2014/10/important-instructor-presence-online-course/
Smith, T. (2014, September 30). Managing Instructor Presence Online. Retrieved from http://teachonline.asu.edu/2012/08/managing-instructor-presence-online/#more-1069

Why Accessibility?

Online education provides access to all types of students and from all across the world. Each student is unique and has unique educational needs. To better attend to our student’s needs, we can develop course materials from the beginning to be more accessible for everyone.

What can I do?

Provide the equivalent alternative to multimedia

When creating or selecting multimedia for a course, an equivalent option should be provided for students that cannot access the multimedia. As an example, if you are creating lectures you should create a word for word transcript that can be posted or better yet, be used to create closed captions.

Provide “alternative” description for images

For students who use screen readers, adding an “ALT-TAG” on all images used in the course helps them to “see” images or skip over unnecessary decorative images efficiently. The ALT-Text should describe the educational value of that image. What they are they supposed to gain from that image and why is it essential to the course material?

Make all file types accessible

When creating or selecting documents to use in your class, you’ll want to make sure that all files are accessible to students. Using built-in accessibility feature in Word, PowerPoint and PDF documents will help to develop an accessible structure for that document.

Creating meaningful link names

All students will benefit from having a link that describes where they are going to link out to. Students who use screen readers will be especially grateful if they have a link that says “Oregon State University Library resources” instead of “click here” or simply the URL.

Use contrasting colors

Blind person frustrated because the computer says to push the red button but has no other ways of conveying which button to push. — Credit: Zero Project Conference

Dark text on light backgrounds or light text on dark backgrounds will help all students read your important information easier than, perhaps, orange text on a red background. Doing this also limits the trouble that students who are color blind to see the difference between the background and text. Remember to not use color as the only form of meaning. If you have red and green text showing students what to and not to include in a paper, make sure there are headings that also state that information. Want to know what colors and backgrounds work? Check out WebAIM’s Color Contrast Checker.

If you have any tips or questions, please leave them in the comment area below.

Becoming a Student Again

With excitement and a bit of apprehension I logged in to my first ever online class. Sure, I’ve taught online classes for years, but this was my first time as a student in an online class that I had paid to take and where grades were given.

I reviewed the “Start Here” module and familiarized myself with the structure of the class before I opened the first lecture from my new instructor. The instructor’s voice came through my speakers and as she began to speak I noted the length of the lecture: 44 minutes. “What?!? I don’t have time for this,” I thought as I slammed my laptop shut. It suddenly and powerfully occurred to me that I did not have control over this classroom and my expectations as a student might be vastly different from my instructor’s.

Eventually, I settled in to the rhythm of the class and my instructor’s expectations. As it turns out, that 44 minute lecture was an outlier (the rest were closer to 15 minutes), and I figured out a way to incorporate the lectures into my schedule (I watched them while on the spin bike).

The Needs of the Online Student

As a working parent, trying to balance family, work, and school obligations, I am the target customer for online education, and I certainly felt the “squeeze” of all these obligations competing for my time. Like many of my students, my days are jam-packed and most of the time, I am scheduled to the minute. Uncertainties can throw my well-planned schedule into turmoil… “Wow, that reading took longer than I expected. No, I can’t participate in a live webinar or meet for a group project at 3pm. I have to pick up kids from school. Darn, this link is broken and the instructor hasn’t responded to my questions about it…now I’ve lost my window for working on this project. My dog died today, and while I had to go to work and had to make dinner, I just don’t have it in me to watch a class lecture and take a quiz. I’m too sad…can I have an extension?”

Meeting Our Students Where They Are

I ended up taking several classes from several instructors over the course of a year. Being a student in these classes exposed me to a number of different teaching styles and techniques and strategies, and I was able to experience these things from a student point of view. Based on my experience, here are 4 strategies for instructors that your students might find helpful:

Provide time estimates for weekly activities. Estimated read times and watch times for learning materials are very helpful for a busy student trying to plan the week.
Chunk the material. As an online student, I rarely had long chunks of time to work on my classes, but I could squeeze in smaller chunks of time here and there. And while students can start and stop a task as needed in the online classroom, it’s rewarding to actually finish a task in one sitting.
Make it easy to find class resources. In the online classroom there are many wonderful learning materials we can easily incorporate (e.g., links to blogs, videos, calculators); but when these resources are scattered throughout 10 learning modules, they can be difficult for the student to find. Provide a works cited page (with hyperlinks) or a glossary of key terms to help students locate material, especially when studying for exams.
Anticipate Questions. This might be tough the first time you teach a course, but over time we often see the same questions arising from our students. We can reduce the delay in response time, by anticipating these questions and providing answers and support ahead of time. This could be a Q&A sheet for complex assignments or a guided worksheet with comments from the instructor to help students get through well-known tricky spots.

The flexibility of the online classroom gives busy students around the world access to educational opportunities that have not been available in the past. These students are working hard in every aspect of their lives and with a little support from us, their online instructors, we can help them make the most of the time they have in order to learn and grow.

-Nikki Brown, Instructor, College of Business

Active Learning Online – Part 2

The first post about active learning looked at how to include active learning in an online course. You heard about how a history professor used an interactive timeline. Each student added images, facts, and descriptions to the timeline, and the result was a visually-rich historical review. Students had fun while learning about facts and events. This is an example of collaboration and active learning at its best. The second example focused on interactive textbooks as an alternative to printed books. The Top Hat product combined words, images, video, and engaging activities to improve learning and make it more active.

In today’s post we look at two new active learning ideas: mind mapping and annotated reading. Although these two technologies are different from each other, they offer similar benefits. Mind mapping requires the student to visually depict a concept, process, or system. Students label relevant parts or steps, show how these are connected, and identify key relationships. Annotated reading, on the other hand, allows students to enter short comments to passages of text, which encourages peer-to-peer interaction and sharing. While reading, students identify confusing sections, ask (or answer) questions, and interact with others. Both methods actively engage students in the learning process and support them to apply and analyze course concepts.

A Picture is Worth…

You know the famous quip about pictures, so let’s consider how using a visually-based tool for active-learning can support online learners. Wikipedia defines mind mapping as “a diagram used to visually organize information.” Similar tools are concept maps and information maps.

Why are images important for learning? Mind maps help students understand concepts, ideas, and relationships. According to Wikipedia, a meta-study found that “concept mapping is more effective than ‘reading text passages, attending lectures, and participating in class discussions.'” One reason is because mind maps mimic how our brain works. They help us see the “big picture” and make important connections. Not only are mind maps visually appealing, they are also fun to create! Students can work alone or in teams. This mind map about tennis is colorful and stimulating.

If you want to try mind mapping yourself, here’s a free tool called MindMup. There are many others available, some free and others with modest fees. The Ecampus team created an active learning resources mind map, made with MindMeister. Take a look. There are a lot of great ideas listed. Try a few!

Close Encounters

Most classes assign reading to students. Yet reading is a solo activity, so it offers a lower level of active learning. But there are ways to raise reading’s active learning value, with or without technology.

Using a technique called close reading, students get more active learning benefits. Close reading is a unique way to read, usually done with short sections of text. With careful focus, close reading helps students reach a deeper understanding of the author’s ideas, meaning and message.

If you want to add technology, you can make reading even more active! Using an app called Perusall, reading becomes a collaborative activity. Perusall lets students add comments to the reading and see what others are saying. Students can post questions or respond. Instructors set guidelines for the number of entries and discover which content is most confusing. Originally built for the face-to-face classroom, Perusall is also an effective tool for online learning. Perusall is like social networking in the textbook. It helps students engage with materials and be more prepared to apply the concepts and principles to later assignments. Perusall can be used with or without the close reading technique.

Want to Try?

Let us know if you have questions or want to try an idea. We are here to help! If you are already working with an Ecampus instructional designer, contact them to ask about these active learning technologies. Or send an email to me, susan.fein@oregonstate.edu, and I’ll be happy to point you in the right direction.

References

Chickering, Arthur W., and Zelda F. Gamson. (1987). “Seven Principles for Good Practice.” AAHE Bulletin 39: 3-7. ED 282 491. 6 pp. MF-01; PC-01.
Lang, J. (2016). Small Teaching. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Liu, Y., Zhao, G., Ma, G., and Bo, Y. (2014). “The Effect of Mind Mapping on Teaching and Learning: A Meta-Analysis.” Standard Journal of Education and Essay, 2(1)
Nist, S., & Holschuh, J. (2000). Active learning: strategies for college success. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. 202-218.
Serafini, F. (2013). “Close Readings and Children’s Literature.” Reading Teacher, 67(4), 299-301.
Simpson, M., & Nist, S. (1990). “Textbook annotation: An effective and efficient study strategy for college students.” Journal of Reading, 34: 122-129.

Images

Tennis Mind Map: CC BY-SA 2.5, Link
Girl with book: Photo by sean Kong on Unsplash
Students and laptop: Photo by John Schnobrich on Unsplash

Susan Fein, Ecampus Instructional Designer, susan.fein@oregonstate.edu

Mega phone & speech bubble May I have your attention please? This is what we are saying when we add an announcement to an online course. Typically, the announcement tool is used for reminders, deadlines, or other key pieces of information. Announcements are quick, efficient statements meant to get the point across in just a few words.

But have you considered using the announcement tool to promote instructor presence? As Arbaugh (2010) noted, “Instructor presence is a positive predictor of perceived learning and student satisfaction.” Students want instructors that are engaged or present in the course (Eom, Wen & Ashill, 2006). This is easy to achieve in a face-to-face classroom, where students can see the instructor, ask questions, and get immediate feedback. Achieving this can be difficult for online instructors, though. Given the 24/7 nature of the online classroom, engaging with students in a timely, effective, and efficient manner can seem time consuming and sometimes daunting to instructors. The announcement tool is an effective and efficient way for instructors to remind students they are on hand and involved.

Try using the announcement tool to summarize the week’s activities or discussions and provide insight into content. Or maybe use it to point out key topics and notable student discourse. These are just a couple of great strategies for maintaining presence in your course without feeling you have to participate in every discussion post.

-Cyndie M McCarley

References:

Arbaugh, J. (2010). Sage, guide, both, or even more? An examination of instructor activity in online MBA courses. Computers & Education., 55(3), 1234–1244.

Eom, S. B., Wen, H. J., & Ashill, N. (2006). The Determinants of Students’ Perceived Learning Outcomes and Satisfaction in University Online Education: An Empirical Investigation*. Decision Sciences Journal of Innovative Education, 4(2), 215–235.

Term Paper

Those two words can be the cause of stress and anxiety for some but it doesn’t have to be that way. The creation of staged assignments can help!

For students, the looming deadline of a paper near the end of the term can be complicated by poor planning and/or leaving inadequate time to complete the assignment. This procrastination means an assignment gets done all at once and possibly poorly.

For faculty, papers done in a rush at the end not only require attention on a shorter time frame but the quality is often poor and grading can be arduous.

What is “staging”?

5 Steps of a staged Assignment as listed in the article text

Staging is the sequencing assignments and activities to allow ample time to develop ideas and make revisions.

To do this, look at the large assignment in your class. Think about how it could be divided up and assigned throughout the term to allow for greater success (and less procrastination).

You’ll likely find some breaking points that students could do in smaller assessments. This will build in structure that doesn’t allow them to procrastinate as much and give you more opportunities to provide feedback.

How do I stage an assignment?

Let’s take a research term paper and break it down.

The expectation is that the paper has a title, an abstract, the body of the paper with organized content, and references in order to have a complete paper and for it to be free of grammatical errors. How can we stage this assignment?

Week 2: Article Abstracts – Find articles that relate to what your project might be, cite, and provide a summary.
Week 4: Project Proposal – Based upon your articles and feedback from your instructor, create a proposal
Week 6: Outline of Paper including references
Week 8: Rough Draft of entire paper to be instructor and peer reviewed
End of term: Final paper with revisions based upon peer and instructor feedback.

With this staging, both you and the student will know the paper is on track and will have both have had the time to head off problems before the final submission. It’s a win-win!

Read more: Queen’s University: Formative Feedback & Multi-Stage Assignments

Icons made by three from www.flaticon.com is licensed by CC 3.0 BY

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a practical tool for guiding course design to ensure that every learner succeeds, based on scientific insights into how humans learn (cast.org).

As seen from the illustration below, there are three main principles of UDL, namely:

multiple means of representations,
multiple means of engagement, and
multiple means of expressions

(image by Tianhong Shi, CC0)

There are many applications of UDL design principles in OSU Spring 2018 online courses.

A. Multiple Means of Representations as seen in BA 354 S18’s weekly content planning.

- reading in text (Chapter 1 of Trevino and Nelson, Managing Business Ethics)
- listening to podcast (Ponzi Supernova podcast audio from Radio-lab
- watching instructor lectures in video (Course Introduction)
- Watching complicated assignment explained in video and graphics:

B. Multiple Means of Engagement as seen in BA 354’s discussion forums and assignment feedback:

- Students submit Personal Ethical Action Plan Initial submission – Instructor provides feedback students incorporate feedback from instructor and submit final submission;

Discussion forums: students post answers to prompts; students reply to peer classmates’ canvas discussion forum.

C. Multiple Means of Expressions as seen in BB 481/581 S18 and BA 354’s assignments:

Graphic expression – Assignment #1: Create a three-dimensional image
Audio/visual expression – Assignment #2: Create a video to explain what “reciprocal space” mean to you

Textual expression – Assignment #3 & #4: Literature search & Quizzes & Discussions & write a letter to a relative to explain why the Fourier transform is so important to NMR spectroscopy
Textual expression of application – Application type of project: Personal Ethical Action Plan

(Icons from SlidesCarnival’s Solanio template)

If you are interested in applying UDL in your courses, feel free to contact us at to brainstorm possible applications together.

Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft

In online education courses, providing effective feedback is essential. It’s can be easy to provide students with a number or letter grade on their assignments, but it is the additional feedback where the opportunity for student growth occurs. While there are many forms of effective feedback, there are 5 elements that can help you provide more meaningful and effective feedback regardless of the method of delivery.

Give Timely Feedback
- Timely feedback to students sends the message that you are engaged in the course and the student’s work. Having just finished an assignment, the student is also going to be more open to the feedback you provide because their work is still fresh in their mind. They have the opportunity to immediately incorporate your feedback into the next assignment, improving their overall performance going forward. Students in a master’s degree program were more likely to ignore feedback comments on their written work that were not provided promptly. (Draft & Lengel, 1986) Including a statement in the syllabus about your expected time of feedback on assignments, and sticking to it, helps students understand your timeline and will reduce questions to you later on.
Start with a positive message
- Creating a feedback sandwich (compliment, suggestions for correction, compliment) for your student pairs together both specific positive feedback and any elements the students should work on. The positive feedback encourages the student and prepares them with a positive outlook when hearing about areas that need improvement. Finishing again with positive feedback such as “I look forward to seeing your next assignment” tells the student that even though they have corrections to make, their work is still valued and that they can improve on future assignments.
Use Rubrics
- One of the best tools that can be used are rubrics. A detailed rubric sets clear expectations of the student for that particular assignment. While completing their assignment they can constantly check their work against what you expect to see in their finished work. Another benefit to creating the rubric is that you can use it to analyze their papers with that same criteria. Some instructors have found that by using a rubric, it helps to be more consistent and fair with grading. No matter if it is the first paper, the last paper, or if you might be having a good or bad day, the rubric helps.
Give personal feedback and help the students make the connection between the content and their lives
- Connection is key. Providing personal feedback to your students while helping them see the connection between the content and their lives will show that you have taken time to personally respond to them instead of using “canned responses.” Students who don’t feel as if the content in the class will ever relate to their lives now, or in their careers later on, will often lose interest in assignments in general as well as feedback because they don’t see the connection. Getting to know your students at the beginning of the term assists in giving good personal feedback while helping them see the connection between the content and their life.
Consider using alternative formats of feedback
- Students are used to getting feedback in written form and while that format can be very effective, using an alternative way to provide feedback can be equally or more effective. They enjoy the personal connections that can be created through audio and/or video feedback. Students appreciate receiving specific feedback relating to the grade, rubric, and overall assessment. In fact, some students say that: “..video encouraged more supportive and conversational communication.” (Borup, West, Thomas, 2015) Give it a try!

By employing these strategies, your students will be appreciative of the feedback you provide and you might just get some fantastic feedback yourself. In one case, an instructor shared a great comment from one of their students comparing past courses to the instructor’s:

“…I never received personal feedback [in some other courses]. Your course however has been wonderful. Thank you for putting so much time into each of your comments on my writing. I can tell you really made personal feedback a priority. You don’t know how nice it was to really know that my professor is reading my work.” The student goes further to say; “Thank you for taking your teaching seriously and caring about your students. It shows.”

Getting personal and effective feedback like this should inspire you to begin or continue that great feedback!

References:

Borup, J., West, R.E., Thomas, R. (2015) The impact of text versus video communication on instructor feedback in blended courses Education Tech Research Dev 63:161-184 doi: 10.1004/s11426-015-9367-8

Draft, R.L. & Lengel, R.H. (1986. Organizational information requirements, media richness and structural design. Management Science, 32(5), 554-571

8 ideas on how to take the sting out of providing feedback:

Self-checks

Screencasts

Campus Partners

Self-assessments

Group feedback

Text expanders

Social pressure

Chocolate

Signs that a student is disengaged:

Disengaged students may feel isolated and reluctant to reach out for help. Here’s what you can do:

Establishing presence

Maintaining presence

References

Why Accessibility?

What can I do?

Provide the equivalent alternative to multimedia

Provide “alternative” description for images

Make all file types accessible

Creating meaningful link names

Use contrasting colors

Becoming a Student Again

The Needs of the Online Student

Meeting Our Students Where They Are

Active Learning Online – Part 2

A Picture is Worth…

Close Encounters

Want to Try?

References

Images

What is “staging”?

How do I stage an assignment?

There are many applications of UDL design principles in OSU Spring 2018 online courses.

A. Multiple Means of Representations as seen in BA 354 S18’s weekly content planning.

References:

Contact Info