Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue

The first morning of the workshop there was an invited speaker. Dr. Chere Campbell Gibson spoke to our group regarding the process that we would be going through in the 2 days. She framed the workshop by giving a talk on "Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, and Something Blue". We all attend workshops or conference sessions where you wish the speaker would just stop and surrender to the group. Dr. Gibson was in a league of her own! She was motivational, academic, and knowledgeable in the subject of elearning- characteristics I highly value in the field of online learning.

Something Old

• Distance Education and Quality Assessment.
  This was a great way to frame the conversation with Dr. Gibson. She began by describing the "Something Old" in context of e-learning. That something old is DISTANCE EDUCATION! It has been around for years and the exercise of assessing quality in distance education is old as well.

Something New

• Technologies
  Audio, Podcasts, Tapes, VOIP, Video, Print, Computer
  Refers to the NEW technologies that are used to deliver Distance Education.

Something Borrowed

• Quality Characteristics of Learning
• Feedback
• Stimulating conversation
• Participation
• Motivation=engagement
• Hands on
• Assignments/Exercises relevant to the content
• Realistic Application
• Enthusiastic/Passionate Teacher

Something Blue

• Learner that Fails

Quality Characteristics: NEED ACCESS TO SUCCESS

What do learners wants?

• Course Structure and Good Design
• Learning Community
• Access to Technical Support: 24 x 7
• Information on what students need before the course starts
• Consistency between courses
• Assignment detail and clarity- what is expected?
• Detailed feedback
• Faculty member biography and intellectual knowledge of the course/subject matter
• Mandatory learner orientation

Anything available to the F2F learner should be available to the online learner!

• Program Information
• Q&A readily available
• self-assessment

What do faculty need from Administrators to be successful elearning instructors?

• Incentives- release time, rewards
• Class size restrictions
• Instructional Designers
• Resources
• Understand why and how the course fits within the mission of the institution
• Experienced knowledge
• Policies and procedures "segregated fees"
• Forward thinking technologists
• 360 evaluation of graduates- document the positive/negative