Working OnlineTutor skills for handling online chats, discussions & content.

Encouraging online participation / motivation

Tutor skills for handling synchronous and

asynchronous work online

Sample rubric(s) that give rationales for course

design decisions

Encouraging Online Participation & Motivation

Encouraging Online Participation & Motivation

• Use pre-course questionnaire and communicate expectations clearly.

• Well staged tasks with in detail information including assignments, due dates and resources set a positive attitude.

• Use a variety of media with different group interactions.

Encouraging Online Participation & Motivation

• Design meaningful high quality tasks that seem reachable but challenging

• Too many tasks in a module, might make them feel frustrated and it can demotivate participants.

• Offer choices to learners different students learn in different ways

Encouraging Online Participation & Motivation

• Feedback impacts motivation. Include both strengths and weaknesses in easy to understand comments.

• Inspire learners falling behind to move on in positive manner.

• Give students the benefit of the doubt , don’t jump to conclusions

• Encourage learners to evaluate their own progress

Encouraging Online Participation & Motivation

• Use participants’ reflections to improve your future courses and tasks.

• Create a pleasant and relaxed atmosphere in the course.

• Develop a good relationship with the learners. Create a Café or Common room to encourage students to socialise.

• Create private channels to spot students’ frustration

Encouraging Online Participation & Motivation

relies on having a good guide that is actively present, offering feedback and creating ways to make participants contribute and socialise with each other.

Synchronous and Asynchronous Work Online

• Set a code of conduct or Netiquette rules for all participants to follow.

• Set tasks to promote collaboration and encourage all students to participate.

• Praise the dominators participation but point out that all should have a voice.

• If issues arise, be prepared to step in and deal with them straight away.

• Keep students on task .

Synchronous and Asynchronous Work Online

Synchronous

• Use it when you want an instant response .

• When a message is not enough.• It’s important for participants to see and

hear each other.• Like in any meeting ,it needs to have a

purpose and a timeframe.• Set rules for communication. E.g. the

procedures to follow to make a comment.

• Ask questions directly to quiet participants.

• Summarise outcomes at each stage of the discussion.

• Be aware that the technology can fail. Have a plan B for when this happens.

Asynchronous

• Use it when learners need time to prepare what you're going to say.

• When difficult for participants to be available at the same time.

• Use email when is important that everyone gets the message.

• If you require a written record of your message.

• When delivering sensitive information, use the phone or better meet in person when possible.

• Create group tasks to encourage students to start their own threads

• Summarising and weaving at the end of each discussion will make it clear that it is closed.

Synchronous and Asynchronous Work Online

A tutor can play a useful role in ensuring that synchronous and asynchronous discussion facilities are used effectively.

Rubrics for Online Learning

• Use rubrics to make grading easier and to clarify expectations for the student. • Establish peer feedback activities

using rubrics or checklists to provide an opportunity for students to revise and improve assignments before final submission to the dropbox.

(Time Management Strategies for Online Instructors – http://www2.uwstout.edu/content/profdev/rubrics/time_management.html)

Rubrics for Online Learning

• Rubrics should be easy for teachers to use, and easy for students to understand. Along with clear instructions of any given task, they give students something to aim for.

• When possible, they should be adaptable with the possibility of adding (or omitting) categories or band scores when necessary.

• They should come with clear guidance for use (e.g. suggests key features that may be typical of a certain band score for each construct to be assessed).

Guidelines

Rubrics for Online Learning

Participation Language Chat Interventions

Punctuality*

Excellent: Full participation

Fully Coherent 8+ Early Bird

Very Good: Demonstrates willingness to participate

Minor lapses that do not affect message

5-8 On time

Adequate: Keeps up with chat, demonstrates some willingness to participate.

Generally clear despite some instances of incoherence

3-5 Late-ish (1-5 minutes)

Interacts only when prompted sporadic participation

Often difficult to understand/or not sufficient language produced

Less than 3 Late (5-20 minutes)

No Relevant participation

Limited language None Better late than never (20 minutes +)

Sample Rubric for Conference Chat Activity

Rubrics for Online Learning

• Part of the aim of this rubric would be to motivate participation. Marks for punctuality encourage participants to log on early. Chat interventions & participation show how they can pick up bonus points (or gain the bare minimum). Language explains that they are not expected to communicate perfectly and that clarity of message is the key (should reduce any language anxiety)

• For this particular task an extra element could be Number of Questions Prepared, especially if this were a requirement of the chat as per the one we participated in.

Chat Rubric Rationale

Rubrics for Online Learning

• A follow up activity requesting that students edit their own participation from the Chat Script document and mail it to the moderator could as a form of self-assessed reflection.

• The rubric should also serve in the establishing of clear expectations.

Chat Rubric Rationale

REFERENCES• Engagement and Motivation in online courses, COFA online UNSW

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=DvJuzE-g7OM

• Claudia Jordan Building Motivation into Online Education http://www.train2do.com/moodle/pluginfile.php/38650/mod_resource/content/0/jordan_motivation.pdf

• Dornyei and Csizer ‘Ten Commandments for motivating language learners: results of an empirical study’ 1999 Language Teaching research.

• http://www.fastrakconsulting.co.uk/tactix/Features/realtime/realtime.htm

• Time Management Strategies for Online Instructors http://www2.uwstout.edu/content/profdev/rubrics/time_management.html

• Contributions made by all the participants of the current e-moderators course.http://www.train2do.com/moodle/course/view.php?id=235