Please begin letting your students know about these sessions.  This will help the students feel comfortable with their online course(s).

For more information on the sessions, please contact Rafael Martinez (martiner@cnm.edu).  

Teaching Tips for Online Instructors

• Students come to any online course with diverse backgrounds and experiences.  Students who are new to distance learning and the online course environment should be made to feel comfortable.  When a student makes the instructor aware of this situation, instructors should make sure to respond to that student in a warm and personal way (might be via course email).  The instructor should minimize this student’s anxiety about being able to perform all that is required.  This can be accomplished by assuring the student that there have been many students in this same course, for whom this course was their first exposure to distance learning, and those others were successful in completing the course and most earned excellent grades.  The instructor should express confidence in this student’s ability to do all that is required.  The instructor should also comfort this student by making sure the student understands that (unlike f2f classes) this instructor is available to them to answer any questions and give feedback 24/7.  It helps to let these students know in advance how frequently you will check emails and course discussion areas.  Tell them how quickly they should expect your response…and deliver the responsiveness you have told them to expect!
   
• Find ways to make the students’ experiences relevant to the course material.  I teach several management courses.  I have had many students who do not have any management experience (some have no work experience at all).  Many of these students have been surprised when I tell them that being a parent (raising children) is a full-time management position.  Most all facets of management are present in parenting children; budgeting, forecasting income, planning and organizing daily routines, leadership by example, and frequent follow-up are but a few of the tasks performed by parents.  These are also tasks performed by managers.  Therefore, many of these students who may be thinking that they have no experience with management are quite wrong.  In fact, their parenting and family experiences are valuable resources for their own understanding of management, as well as valuable resources to others in the course who may not have had these experiences.
   
• Perhaps the most important piece to make an instructor effective and appreciated in distance courses is to be online frequently.  Unlike f2f courses, where the instructor’s presence is only offered for 3 hours per week, the instructor in an online course should be there (online) daily.  This includes weekends.  The instructor should read every discussion entry.  When the instructor responds to student discussion entries, occasionally and randomly, all students quickly realize that the instructor is there, reading every entry.  To the distance student, this ‘being there’ translates to caring about each student individually.  If an instructor will be away from the online environment for 24 hours or more, they should tell students ahead of time about their absence, and when they can expect the instructor to return.

Teaching Tips provided by Ken Lindenman, DL Faculty member in the Business and Information Technology Division.