I can hardly believe that this first course is over. Time has really flown by. We have all learned and shared so much in such a short time. I feel good about all that I have learned and have been able to incorporate into both the hybrid courses that I teach and the enhancements to the face-to-face classes I have made. Incorporating live chats, video clips and soon, wikis, are definite enrichments to these classes. I feel that I have a potential for being a good online teacher with continued experience with the technology. The assessments we took regarding our fit for online teaching was encouraging.
I am particularly interested in learning more about audio presentations and arranging for synchronous conference calls. I do believe that there is added benefit to being able to have "voice to voice" exchange. Being a great one for just picking up the phone and calling, I really like this idea. This would be particularly welcome in the doctoral courses that I teach as it would allow real time discussions among the students and alternative learning possibilities when face-to-face is not possible. I would like to incorporate more opportunity for the co-scholars in these classes to take the lead with discussion and to pose the questions to the group rather than just having discussions where the class reacts to questions that I identify. This certainly is a possibility with the discussion board but could be very rich if we used synchronous conferencing. Another use of this media would be to have some of the authors of articles and text that the students are reading available for discussion. Many of these individuals are leaders in our profession and are available and willing to talk with students. This is especially true if travel is not involved making this media a perfect match.
One thing that I have learned by looking more closely at learning styles is that many occupational therapy students appear to be kinesthetic learners. This may be combined with greater success using visual or auditory learning, but many prefer learning by doing. We ask each candidate for both our master and doctoral programs to talk about their learning style in their admission interview. Going through the interview process again this trimester really reinforced this concept. While many of our entry level courses are highly kinesthetic in nature, learning hands on evaluations and interventions, fieldwork, etc., our post-professional students are not with us to learn these techniques. They know the basics and now have chosen to expand their professional experience through finding, learning and creating the evidence to support their advanced practice. This requires a shift in teaching style and means one must be more attuned to their learning styles. This becomes more complex when the courses are hybrid with only a few face-to-face meetings each term. For this reason, I was very appreciative of the opportunity to learn more about teaching style and to assess my own style.
The majority of my doctoral courses were "taught" in the Constructivism model. The philosophy of the program at the University of Indianapolis was "self directed" learning but really encouraged group learning and processing of information to form new and expanded ideas. It was an incredibly rewarding way to study after mainly being educated in the "Campfire" approach. What a pleasant surprise it was to learn in the Constructive style and to be able to use the collective knowledge of my colleagues in the learning process. I do try to use this method when teaching the entry level masters students in OT but do find that a blending of techniques works best. With our new post professional doctorate the philosophy is based on constructivism. We are really guides, mentors and facilitators for the co-scholars in the program. I really respond to Vygotsky's "zone of proximal learning" I have seen how students can develop solutions and solve problems beyond their professional and/or educational developmental level when they worked with peers in a guided experience. Constructivism in on-line teaching seems a natural to me as it allows the students to “do” more of the teaching and sharing of the learning experience. They get involved and stay involved.
Through all of this I have gained more confidence as an online instructor. I know that I am using much of what I have learned and will continue to grow and learn more about the technology available to become a really good online teacher.
I am particularly interested in learning more about audio presentations and arranging for synchronous conference calls. I do believe that there is added benefit to being able to have "voice to voice" exchange. Being a great one for just picking up the phone and calling, I really like this idea. This would be particularly welcome in the doctoral courses that I teach as it would allow real time discussions among the students and alternative learning possibilities when face-to-face is not possible. I would like to incorporate more opportunity for the co-scholars in these classes to take the lead with discussion and to pose the questions to the group rather than just having discussions where the class reacts to questions that I identify. This certainly is a possibility with the discussion board but could be very rich if we used synchronous conferencing. Another use of this media would be to have some of the authors of articles and text that the students are reading available for discussion. Many of these individuals are leaders in our profession and are available and willing to talk with students. This is especially true if travel is not involved making this media a perfect match.
One thing that I have learned by looking more closely at learning styles is that many occupational therapy students appear to be kinesthetic learners. This may be combined with greater success using visual or auditory learning, but many prefer learning by doing. We ask each candidate for both our master and doctoral programs to talk about their learning style in their admission interview. Going through the interview process again this trimester really reinforced this concept. While many of our entry level courses are highly kinesthetic in nature, learning hands on evaluations and interventions, fieldwork, etc., our post-professional students are not with us to learn these techniques. They know the basics and now have chosen to expand their professional experience through finding, learning and creating the evidence to support their advanced practice. This requires a shift in teaching style and means one must be more attuned to their learning styles. This becomes more complex when the courses are hybrid with only a few face-to-face meetings each term. For this reason, I was very appreciative of the opportunity to learn more about teaching style and to assess my own style.
The majority of my doctoral courses were "taught" in the Constructivism model. The philosophy of the program at the University of Indianapolis was "self directed" learning but really encouraged group learning and processing of information to form new and expanded ideas. It was an incredibly rewarding way to study after mainly being educated in the "Campfire" approach. What a pleasant surprise it was to learn in the Constructive style and to be able to use the collective knowledge of my colleagues in the learning process. I do try to use this method when teaching the entry level masters students in OT but do find that a blending of techniques works best. With our new post professional doctorate the philosophy is based on constructivism. We are really guides, mentors and facilitators for the co-scholars in the program. I really respond to Vygotsky's "zone of proximal learning" I have seen how students can develop solutions and solve problems beyond their professional and/or educational developmental level when they worked with peers in a guided experience. Constructivism in on-line teaching seems a natural to me as it allows the students to “do” more of the teaching and sharing of the learning experience. They get involved and stay involved.
Through all of this I have gained more confidence as an online instructor. I know that I am using much of what I have learned and will continue to grow and learn more about the technology available to become a really good online teacher.
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