A Community of Practice
This WordPress site is the community hub and resource space for faculty cohorts developing online courses through Distance and Extended Education (DEE) at the University of Idaho. This site and all its content and blog are open to anyone interested in online learning and we welcome your suggestions and ideas. If you are interested in joining a future cohort, please review the online application.
Faculty working within the DEE cohorts (see list at right) are involved in an eight-month design process where they personally identify course goals and explore tools that support student learning. Below are the three main takeaways of this online course development process:
- Communication and community building are essential for online learning environments. Until recently, online education has been viewed as a kind of digitized correspondence course but with very little correspondence. We know that participatory learning results in learners gaining a deeper and longer-lasting understanding of course material, so designing learning environments that afford social interactions and group inquiry is something we take seriously at DEE.
- Starting with the end result in mind is the best way to make sure students learn what faculty want them to learn. We ask faculty to start with the question, “If the students really learned to critically interact with the material and concepts of this course, what would that look like?” The answer to this becomes the assessment criteria for the course. The next question becomes the basis for learning design, “What can students produce to demonstrate they have learned what I want them to learn?”
- A learner-centered approach is the most effective way of tapping into student engagement around a subject. Giving students a chance to articulate their own learning goals, finding out what they already know, and designing learning activities that allow them to explore their individual interests is critical to designing learning that “sticks.”
Please explore this site. More information can be found at the BbLearn First Look site. If you have any questions or ideas about DEE or how to get started designing your own online courses, please contact DEE at dee@uidaho.edu
