Sunday, August 11, 2013

Challenges Providing Feedback to All Students in an Online Course


Challenges Providing Feedback to All Students in an Online Course

Giving feedback to students in a F2F class is already difficult since you want to treat them all equally with timely assertive and proactive assessment. Can one imagine how it is to give feedback to learners in an online course? To be empathetic to all students in terms of assessment and to give them what they deserve to fully develop their knowledge and understanding in the subject matter of one’s course, it is needed to consider the following details: 1) students’ course engagement, 2) instructors’ commitment to his/her course, and 3) changes in the course evaluation.

Students’ course engagement is one of those elements to consider when giving feedback to them. Learners have to be active participants in online learning; the course is designed for them to acquire knowledge that they can apply in real contexts in their lives. But what if students don’t feel fully engaged in forum participation, personal reflections, and course assignments? In that point, one starts to question how students can –firstly- be motivated to work on the course content for the teacher to be able to deliver timely, formative feedback. For that reason, it is imperative that teachers explain learners what the expectations for the online course are. By large, students should become very responsible for their own learning, which can be well guided by the instructor to enhance it. If such responsibility is exercised by the student, no doubt that teachers can give all students the feedback that they need.

Once students have understood course expectations and their responsibilities, teacher commitment to providing ongoing feedback is the next ingredient to mix in our online student feedback recipe. Part of the course expectations is much related to instructors. In other words, not only teachers but also learners need to bear in mind when they are meant to provide student feedback to class members and how frequent. Instructors must have an online working agenda to guarantee their teaching and social presence with their students. Among the agenda’s duties, it is important to have some room for online student hours to provide feedback in situ. In this way, learners can have a way to contact instructors to get guidance and some formative assessment. Additionally, it is also essential for teachers to have already-prepared feedback rubrics to answer FAQs learners may have while developing assignments, projects, and the like.

Formative assessment is a crucial factor in providing students timely and quality feedback, but what happens if the course grading criteria aims at giving learners summative grades? As it can be seen in many colleges, higher education institutions, or schools, most of the course outlines or programs signal the importance of summative assessment since its end is to provide students with a passing or failing grade. Summative feedback does not allow instructors to monitor student learning per se. It can give teachers an idea of what’s going on with individual students, but in an online classroom, formative assessment can address problems in a timely fashion and allow time to assist students who are struggling with course content. But what happens if teachers cannot make changes in the course evaluation to fit it to VLEs? If faculty authorities do not give some sort of freedom to their instructors, providing feedback to a whole online class turns a failure from the start.

If a teacher really wants to give his/her students timely and quality feedback, three elements need to be stressed to make this happen. The instructor needs to engage students by making them commit to their learning and the platform/course responsibilities. Student commitment is not enough if s/he does not set a realistic working agenda to satisfactorily deliver feedback to students who need it or who are looking for guidance to complete projects appropriately. But on top of all, it is also necessary that faculty authorities give teachers some sort of grading criteria freedom to move away from pure summative assessment to a symbiosis of formative-summative feedback to satisfy students’ need for learning.
E To fully develop and comprehend this teaching issue, it’s advisable to research and expand these areas:

1
Student commitment in VLEs
2
Setting course participation expectations
3
Instructor working agendas in online teaching
4
How to transform a summative evaluation into formative
5
The difference between summative and formative feedback


Professor Jonathan Acuña-Solano
ELT Instructor & Trainer based in Costa Rica
NCTE - Costa Rica Affiliate
Resource Teacher at CCCN
Senior ELT Professor at Universidad Latina
Freelance ELT Consultant four OUP in Central America

For further comments or suggestions, reach me at:
@jonacuso – Twitter
jonacuso@gmail.com – Gmail

Other blogs and sites I often write for my students at the university are:

 

Get new ELT material and ideas by visiting my curated topics on http://paper.li/ and http://scoop.it/






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Steps to Follow: Implementing Changes in a Blended Learning Course


Steps to Follow: Implementing Changes in a Blended Learning Course

After being confronted with a new chance of transforming a course that I will teach next term at the university, Principles in Curriculum, I want to make some “radical” changes to make students get the best of their efforts and of class content. For that reason, mulling over “the project” I want to execute, there are three basic steps I will have to follow: 1) deciding on the type of assessment I want to use, 2) the way in which the project needs to be implemented, and 3) the foresight of possible challenges to overcome.

Bearing in mind two complementary concepts in standard evaluation, Bloom’s Taxonomy has to be present along with formative/summative assessment in my Principles in Curriculum course. To start with, a formative/summative approach to grading needs to be implemented to guarantee that learners get timely feedback on what they are doing, guidance or peer coach to go on, and a grade that really reflects their effort and real meaningful learning. As an instructor I want to aspire –within Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning- to have students who can confidently apply their newly acquired knowledge into thorough and convincing case analyses that will be published online. In this way, learners can also contribute with their field of study and work by providing their insights and thoughts of given topics of analysis.

To implement this learning dichotomy linked to Bloom’s hierarchical thinking skills and a more traditional way of grading students in terms of formative and summative assessments in Curriculum, a plan to implement this learning joint venture with students needs to be devised and executed as well. The implementation is a threefold plan: the creation of a Curriculum class wiki, a course blog page, and students’ reflective blogs. The class wiki will become a repository of students’ written assignments [Bloom’s application & analysis] and reports [Bloom’s understanding]. The course blog page, which already has been created and designed [http://bin-20.blogspot.com/] will be the source of additional online readings or articles to complement the topics, research, and analysis that students will carry along the course [Bloom’s evaluation]. Finally, the students’ reflective blogs will become the place to assess their reflectivity and assimilation of class content [Bloom’s understanding] and reflecting journaling [Bloom’s application]. I tried the use of reflective blogs, combined with forum participation, and it worked quite successfully. But, with the inclusion of a class wiki and a more systematic way of working online, the result can be much more profitable for instructors and students.

There are challenges to overcome in any “ambitious” blended learning teaching project, and among the things that need to be taken care are: Student motivation and autonomous thinking. Students must be motivated at all times, and one’s social and teaching presence is vital. For that reason, formative assessment needs to be timely and qualitative. Guiding students through the course and helping them to strive with difficulties are two important parts of that formative evaluation that can provide meaningful learning to pupils. On the other hand, having learners move away from the use of quotes and become autonomous thinkers is another challenge to work on. That is why, the understanding and use of Bloom’s Taxonomy is exponentially essential in pushing students away of traditional copy-paste thoughts instead of their ideas.  


The first attempt to work with students on a blended learning format can be a great challenge but worth-taking. With some good rationale in terms of assessment techniques or approaches, the use of learning online technologies available for teachers and students, and having specific goals in mind to avoid trouble or overcome challenges can lead an instructor into providing a much more rewarding learning experience for students with long-lasting effects in their field of practice.
E To fully develop and comprehend this teaching issue, it’s advisable to research and expand these areas:

1
Assessment in VLEs
2
Formative vs. summative assessment
3
Combining formative and summative feedback
4
Bloom’s Taxonomy and feedback
5
Types of exercises based on Bloom’s Taxonomy


Professor Jonathan Acuña-Solano
ELT Instructor & Trainer based in Costa Rica
NCTE - Costa Rica Affiliate
Resource Teacher at CCCN
Senior ELT Professor at Universidad Latina
Freelance ELT Consultant four OUP in Central America

For further comments or suggestions, reach me at:
@jonacuso – Twitter
jonacuso@gmail.com – Gmail

Other blogs and sites I often write for my students at the university are:

 

Get new ELT material and ideas by visiting my curated topics on http://paper.li/ and http://scoop.it/






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Formative or Summative Feedback?


Formative or Summative Feedback?

When it comes to talk about assessment in an online class, the very first thing to consider is what seems to be happening in our F2F courses at our teaching institution. What is really going on in terms of student assessment and how is it that we are providing feedback to students? Are we instructors (and students) rather affected by the university evaluation practices? Let’s explore the topic a bit in depth.

As a college professor at Universidad Latina in Costa Rica, I have to admit that there is no written assessment code or guidelines provided by our faculty departments. In spite of this absence of “guidelines,” course outlines permeate summative assessment in course evaluation criteria and learning objectives. Although professors can decide on how course grade percentages are going to be graded, most will work on midterms and final exams, course final projects, term papers, quizzes, and the like. All of which are summative assessment-oriented.

In my particular case, being a language instructor, we language teachers tend to be rather formative, since we have to deal with helping students to develop their second or foreign language. Language instructors do use summative assessment tools to grade learners, but there is a tendency of transforming these tools into formative ones to strengthen areas in which students are struggling because of the need for recycling in language learning. In content courses in ELT (English Language Teaching), in spite of the absence of “guidelines” for assessment, both types of feedback are somehow present depending on how the instructor is evaluating the learning outcomes in his/her course.

How are we instructors affected by this lack of explicitness in assessment guidelines? To start with, let it be borne in mind that summative assessment does not allow teachers to: 1)  spot students’ weaknesses and strengths effectively, 2) identify those areas in which learners need extra work, 3) recognize where students are struggling and failing to understand, and 4) address problems in a timely fashion. Feedback can get to students indeed, but it may get a little too late when they are not really learning what they must. Feedback needs to be right on target and timely; otherwise, students will not fully develop the strengths a course is meant to teach them for their career.


What can be done to palliate and eradicate this malady in assessment? Basically, what instructors and faculty members ought to do is to move towards a combination of formative and summative assessment. In an online scenario, formative assessment is closely related to one’s social and teaching presence within a learning platform. This form of assessment can create the “human” bond we are looking forward to having with our students within our learners’ community of learning. The analysis of their “summative” performance can also be used to raise the standards of quality needed for F2F or online teaching and learning.

E To fully develop and comprehend this teaching issue, it’s advisable to research and expand these areas:

1
Understanding formative assessment
2
Understanding summative assessment
3
Combining formative and summative feedback
4
Defining assessment guidelines
5
How to give students feedback


Professor Jonathan Acuña-Solano
ELT Instructor & Trainer based in Costa Rica
NCTE - Costa Rica Affiliate
Resource Teacher at CCCN
Senior ELT Professor at Universidad Latina
Freelance ELT Consultant four OUP in Central America

For further comments or suggestions, reach me at:
@jonacuso – Twitter
jonacuso@gmail.com – Gmail

Other blogs and sites I often write for my students at the university are:

 

Get new ELT material and ideas by visiting my curated topics on http://paper.li/ and http://scoop.it/



Get a copy of "Formative or Summative Feedback by Jonathan Acuña" right over here.




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Sunday, August 4, 2013

Challenges to Motivate Students in an Online Course


Challenges to Motivate Students in an Online Course

“What do you think will be the biggest challenge you face when motivating students in an online course environment?” Several thought whirl around my mind trying to make sense of what usually happens in virtual environments and what has happened in my blended learning experiences. My eyes have chanced to fall upon three challenges I feel now prepared to deal with: Marketing the LMS, creating a real community of learning, and having students meet deadlines.

Challenge 1: Marketing the LMS

Based on my experience with college students taking English in a blended learning modality, marketing the LMS is the very first thing instructors have to deal with. The LMS’s virtues need to be stressed, which in our cases is the fact that students can continue practicing the target language beyond the class time boundary. The knots and bolts of the system need to be fully explained to users, so learners get some sort of training before the face the platform on their own. Having students understand the possibilities the college LMS provide and having them comprehend how it works, the dos and don’ts, they can have a pleasant interaction with the system’s interface.

Challenge 2: Creating a Community of Learning

As it has been customary in my discourse about online and F2F teaching and learning, the creation of a Class Culture is necessary. This kind of culture is the first step towards the creation of a community of learning. Within our community, students can feel at ease and confident when it comes to learning. In a community of learning where students’ affective filter is low, students can be easily motivated towards the accomplishment of learning goals, based on the course outline objectives. By creating this community of learning, whose main ingredients are a great class culture and low students’ affective filter, it becomes easy and smooth the monitoring of student work and motivating them as the ultimate goal in learners’ education.

Challenge 3: Meeting of deadlines

As a blended learning language instructor, one of my main concerns –within our culture- is students’ procrastination. Procrastination in college education is Costa Rica is and has always been a problem. Although this is not meant to be taken as an overgeneralization that obviously does not affect early birds, this postponing of priorities is a common practice among university students. The need for friendly reminders for learners to meet deadlines is a must. Additionally, reminding them of their online performance is also necessary to have students comply with their responsibilities. It can be useful, -from time to time-, to have them go back and review the course expectations for learners to have them in the lookout.

To conclude, there may be more than a single challenge to face as an online instructor. Perhaps there might be more issues to be ready to deal with beside the one outline here. One thing is quite true, the fact that no matter what kind of teaching scenario we face, we have challenges to solve in a F2F class or within an LMS. Having some sort(s) of protocols to approach problems is the best, and wise, way to find the right path to have students feel at ease and willing to learn.


E To fully develop and comprehend this teaching issue, it’s advisable to research and expand these areas:

1
Student training in LMS use
2
How to market an LMS in your course
3
Creating a community of learning
4
The community of learning and class culture
5
Procrastination in VLEs


Professor Jonathan Acuña-Solano
ELT Instructor & Trainer based in Costa Rica
NCTE-Costa Rica Affiliate
Resource Teacher at CCCN
Senior ELT Professor at Universidad Latina
Freelance ELT Consultant four OUP in Central America

For further comments or suggestions, reach me at:
@jonacuso – Twitter
jonacuso@gmail.com – Gmail

Other blogs and sites I often write for my students at the university are:

 

Get new ELT material and ideas by visiting my curated topics on http://paper.li/ and http://scoop.it/






at No comments: