Online Education

Having some experience with online education as an instructor for the University of Phoenix online and a tutor for smarthinking.com, I have kind of a soft spot in my heart for this new trend in education. Many detractors will argue that the intimacy and rapport that are so important in a “brick and mortar” classroom simply cannot be replicated in a completely virtual setting, which, for them, equates to a less valuable educational experience. Others worry about the learning curve of the technological apparatus itself, claiming that forcing students to learn the necessary communication skills distracts them from the content of the course. Also, there are the instructors to take into consideration. How will they be compensated? Will their work be valued the same as that of the in-person teacher? How will these instructors be trained?

Admittedly, these are all legitimate and responsible concerns, and we should be thankful of the raising of these questions.

I’d like to take this opportunity to draw on some of my experience with online learning to address some of these questions. While I have not officially been an online student, my intensive instructor training for the University of Phoenix allowed me to take the role of a student in a U of P class. For five weeks, I had to learn how to facilitate a U of P class by essentially taking a U of P class. I had certain responsibilities that I had to perform for the class each week. I had to read and respond to discussion question posed by my instructor and peers. I had to create documents and post them online for my instructor to provide feedback on. I had to learn to use the technological apparatus quickly so that I could focus more on the content of the course. It was challenging at first, but I caught on quickly – as did my peers in the course. By the time the course was over, I felt wonderfully prepared to facilitate my own course.

When I started facilitating my course – under the quiet supervision of my faculty mentor – I was able to help the students overcome the technological learning curve quickly because of my own experience being a student. I should also add because this was an introductory writing course, it was the first experience of online learning for most of my students. In fact, after a little frustration during the first week of figuring things out – with a lot of help from me and each other – things were great. Once we were all over the technological hump, we developed a great rapport because we had worked through our first problem together – and we were all amazed that we could do it considering we were reporting in from all corners of the country, never once speaking or seeing each other.

We – most of us anyway – maintained this collegiality for the duration of the ten week course. Indeed, the online discussions about the process of writing were often very engaging. Each week I would post two discussion questions meant to serve as jumping off points for the week’s discussions. Each night I would check in for about four hours and read all of the responses – both to my initial DQs and to one another – and it was very rewarding. The students brought in some material from their readings and, perhaps more importantly, from their various life experiences as we critically engaged each step of the writing process week after week.

To wrap this up then, from my perspective, the training, intimacy, rapport, and value of online education are just as meaningful and accomplishable as in-person teaching. In fact, I can honestly say that I have transferred much of what I learned from my experiences as an online educator to my in-person teaching.