#COVID19 #Coronavirus School Closure Online Learning Resources

As COVID-19 spreads around the world, the discussion of how to keep teaching and learning going in the event of school closures has been ramping up on social media. It's wise to be ready in case school closures hit your community. As resources have been shared, I've been collecting them in a Wakelet, which I have embedded below so others might consult it as needed. I will continue to add quality resources as I find them.

My favorite resource so far has been a blog post from Kasey Bell of ShakeUpLearning. It is based on an interview with a teacher in China whose school has been conducting online learning for several weeks now. What I love about it is the emphasis on process and procedure over tools, including the fantastic tip that now is not the time to try all of the new tech tools! It is the first resource in my Wakelet, but I encourage you to read it now before you even start looking at the other resources I've collected: 

Coronavirus Closures? Online Learning Tips for Teachers and Schools [Interview with an American Teacher in China]


I hope the resources in this Wakelet are helpful for you. If you have additional resources to share, please do so in the blog comments!

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All original work in this post by Sandy Kendell is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). Please see specifics on my re-use policy before re-posting/re-using any of my blog content.

Still MOOCing Along...

Image Source
Used Under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND License

Week 4 of the Foundations of Virtual Instruction MOOC I started on June 30th is wrapping up today. By this time next week, I will hopefully have successfully completed my first MOOC.

Overall, it's been an interesting experience. Because I've completed an online masters degree, read extensively on virtual learning, taken an online course in facilitating virtual PD courses, and even helped design and facilitate a few online staff development courses in my school district, much of the content covered has been somewhat familiar to me. The upside of this has been my ability to focus more on the experience than the content in the course.

Quick Updates

In case you read my post on starting this MOOC, or if you decide to go back and read it, I'll update a few of my early observations:

• The 2 to 4 hours per week of work was a pretty accurate estimate. I've spent that much time on the content most weeks. Closer to 2 hours than 4.
• After a couple of weeks in the course and success on the quizzes, I decided to go ahead and pay for the Coursera Signature Track option, which will allow me to earn a verified certificate.  I'll put this on my CV/resume at some point and we will see if this makes any difference in future employment endeavors I might pursue.
• In my last post, I estimated there were about 200 people in the course based on activity in the discussion forums. Boy, was I off on that estimate! At the end of our first week in the class, the instructor sent us an update letting us know that there were over 12,000 people enrolled in the course!

New Observations and Thoughts

I'm really glad this hasn't been a full-blown college course. I had to say goodbye to a very precious pet during the second week of the course and have also been fighting allergies or something for the past week, so my enthusiasm for learning hasn't been what it normally is.

Although I've spoken to others who've taken MOOCs that they felt were the equivalent to college courses, I think this course is a pared down version. There is a ton of material in the lectures each week, but the assignments have not been super challenging. Multiple choice quizzes that make sure we are understanding the content which are between 8 and 10 questions each week plus one assignment where we had to turn in a lesson plan and then assess three of our peers plans have not been too demanding. And in the end, if things did become too overwhelming, I could have quit. No GPA to worry about. No harm, no foul. The no GPA part is good, because the final exam coming this week might be a challenge, given that I haven't been as focused a student as usual (see previous paragraph).

I do need to make an A in the course though if I want to keep open the option of doing an 11 week practicum with UC Irvine after finishing three more Coursera courses. Fingers crossed!

Discussion Boards Weren't So Bad

Public Domain Image

In my previous post I mentioned that the discussion boards were going to be a challenge, and that I would have to be ok with participating in conversations while missing a whole lot of others at the same time. Well, the discussion boards did become the most interesting part of the course for me, but not in the way that I thought they would. I found myself hardly participating on the boards that were tied to the course content (these were encouraged but not required) and focusing a lot more on tangent topics/conversations started by my fellow students. I've been involved in threads on iPads in the Classroom, a thread that cropped up discussing the usefulness of the legal content presented this past week, and my favorite thread which has been actively discussing the quality of assignments we peer assessed this week.

I was especially interested/distressed to find out that even in MOOCs, people try to cheat! Reports of lesson plans copied entirely from other locations on the Internet (not even in a format that met the rubric) were posted on the discussion board. There is a way to report these in Coursera. I should not be shocked, but I was. I am always disheartened by cheating. Especially from people involved in education!

Reports of cheating aside, I've really enjoyed making connections and hearing the perspectives of people from K-12 to higher ed and from California to New Zealand to Malta. It has been a refreshing reminder of the very large world we live in, how connected it can be thanks to today's technology, and of the similar challenges that face education and educators everywhere.

As I write this, I'm in sixth place in discussion board participation. That's with just 52 posts on my part, which tells you how active the boards are (or aren't) even with 12,000 people enrolled in the course. 

One More Week...

Week 5, the final week of this course, starts tomorrow. After I survive the final exam and finish out the course, I'll be sure to share my final thoughts. Including whether or not I'll go on to the next course in the four course sequence. 

Any other MOOCers out there? I'd love for you to share your impressions/thoughts/experiences in the comments, including links back to your own reflective blog posts. :-)

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All original work in this post by Sandy Kendell is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Please see specifics on my re-use policy in the right-hand column of my blog before re-posting/re-using any of my blog content.

So I'm Taking a MOOC...

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Under a Creative Commons License

Late last week I was innocently checking my Twitter feed, and I saw an announcement for a MOOC called Foundations of Virtual Instruction.  I clicked to investigate, and I was immediately intrigued for several reasons.

• The course is aimed at learning about K-12 online instruction, which I'm interested in knowing more about.
• The course is offered through Coursera, a known online learning platform which I have heard and read good things about.
• The course is offered by an existing higher education institution, the University of California at Irvine.
• The course lasts five weeks and requires two to four hours of work per week. Perfect for summer learning, especially since I work through the summer.
• The course is taught by an instructor who has experience in teaching online in K-12. (You can watch the video on the course info page to learn more about her.)
• I can take the course for FREE, but for a small fee I can also earn a verified certificate that proves I have completed the coursework. (More about this below.)

So, I found out about this course late last week and made the decision to jump in and sign up a couple of days before the course started on June 30th.

My Experience So Far

Public Domain Image

I will sum up my experience so far with the sophisticated phrase: "It's been really cool!"

Here is what I have liked:

• The course syllabus clearly communicates what is expected and how the course grade will be calculated.
• The video lectures are professionally created and presented in short chunks and are interactive! During the videos, pauses are built in which ask you to type in a short answer or to answer a multiple choice question based on what you are learning. I don't know if data is kept on these questions, but they are excellent for giving the learner an opportunity to reflect on what they are learning.
• I have the option to earn a verified certificate for a small fee. I signed up for the verified certificate trial so I could evaluate the quality of the course and my likelihood of completing it (I've started a couple of MOOCs in the past and not made it through...) before paying any money. 
• They are serious about the verification thing! I had to take a headshot of myself with my webcam and input a typing sample that would identify me by my unique typing pattern prior to taking the first quiz! Apparently, I will have to do this each time I take or turn in any assignment in the course that is graded. This is more verification than I had to do for the online master's degree I completed four years ago!
• This course is the first in a set of courses that build upon each other. If I complete all four courses and earn verified certificates for each of them plus complete a capstone project, I can earn a Specialization Certificate from UC Irvine and Coursera. Coursera and its partner organizations currently offer 10 different specializations. It's not the same as college credit, but it is cost effective and shows your current or prospective employer that you are serious about continuously educating yourself.
• Based on the activity in the discussion forums, there are over 200 people in this course, and they are literally from all over the world! It's fascinating to see all of these people, in some cases to get a piece of their story, and along the way learn from their insights.

The one big challenge for me...

• Did I mention over 200 people? It may be many, many more than that; there is no official listing of the members of the course that I have found. The discussion boards became overwhelming to me within the first two days. People posting literally all the time from time zones around the world. The discussion boards are not required as far as the grade for the course goes, but they are highly encouraged in order for participants to engage more with the material. I want to engage with others, because I'm that kind of learner. I'm going to have to make peace with the fact that I can't read everyone's contributions, and much like I do on Twitter, I will just catch and interact with a few. I have managed to have more interaction on the "unofficial" open discussion boards which are not based on course content. So hopefully that will continue to be a place for connection.

So far, so good! The positives are definitely outweighing the challenges four days in to the course. Based on my experience thus far, I think Summer 2014 might see me complete my first MOOC. I will keep you posted!

Have you had any experiences with MOOCs? If so, I'd love to hear about it! Please leave a comment below. :-)

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All original work in this post by Sandy Kendell is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Please see specifics on my re-use policy in the right-hand column of my blog before re-posting/re-using any of my blog content.

Reflections on an Online Master's Degree - The Stuff That Could Have Been Better

In early February I wrote about the positive aspects of obtaining a master's degree online, and although I feel very accomplished in my studies and I'm very glad that I completed my master's degree, I think it is only fair to also write about the parts of the experience that I wish had been different.

Before I begin, a couple of side notes.

First, I intentionally did not name the university where I obtained my degree in the positive aspects post, nor will I be naming it in this post. My purpose is neither to recommend nor to critique a specific program, but rather to share my own expeirences and perceptions of obtaining a degree online. If you are really curious as to the school where I completed my program, a bit of poking around my blog will reveal it, since I had to complete some assignments as blog posts.

Second, I feel it is fair for me to publicly share "the stuff that could have been better" here because I have also already shared these observations/suggestions in end of course surveys throughout the degree program.

Now, on to my wishes for improvement. They are numbered for convenience but not necessarily in order of importance. Well, except maybe #1...

#1 Wish for Improvement: Professors Who Participate in Conversations About Subject Matter

I believe the program would have been vastly improved if the professors were more actively involved in the learning experiences of students. At minimum professors should participate in the discussion boards so that in addition to learning from their peers students can learn from the instructors' experience and instructors can learn from their students who are out in the field.

With few exceptions, each of our courses required us to complete weekly readings and post reactions to those readings on course discussion boards. We were then required to respond to the posts and ideas of our classmates. I can only remember one or two occasions throughout the eleven regular courses I took when the professor or an instructional associate (IA) posted their own thoughts on the readings or any reactions to the students' thoughts.

A few courses into the degree, the professors began offering live web conferences, and these conference opportunities became more regular as I progressed throughout the degree program. Attendance on the part of students at these conferences was rarely required, and they primarily boiled down to a question and answer session about the assignment or project expectations for the week. Other course subject matter or content was never a topic of conversation.

Having done my undergraduate work at a small university where professors personally taught our classes, I had greater expectations for interaction with my instructors. I wanted to ask them questions about course content, and I wanted them to question and challenge me on my learning. We were, in fact, discouraged from directly contacting professors in most circumstances and instructed to only contact our IAs who acted as go-betweens.

I also feel that interaction on on a deeper level would keep the professors more informed on the real-world job circumstances under which each of us were trying to complete our coursework. Staying in tune with the environments their students are working in can only serve to help the professors keep the content of their classes realistic and relevant to the K-12 world.

In the final course of the degree program, which was the culmination of an internship/capstone experienec, the professor was very involved in the discussion boards. The primary purpose of those boards was answering questions about the internship portfolios we were finalizing as we really didn't cover any new content in this course. Due to the high level of interaction with the professor, I felt like the professor truly cared about what I was doing.

Interaction between students and instructors is a key component of pedagogy and learning.

#2 Wish for Improvement: Authentic Feedback on Assignments

Every assignment we were given, including in some cases discussion board posts, had an assessment rubric attached to it. While most of the time I understood exactly what was required of me on an assignment, I never received any truly helpful feedback beyond a grade and comments like "Thank you for completing Week 3 Assignment" from the IA. Grading stopped with the rubric. I started my degree in June 2009, and I blogged about my frustration with rubric-only assessment at about the midpoint of my degree program. Unfortunately, it never really improved.

Why was I bothered by not receiving more individualized feedback or a few comments? There were several reasons it bothered me. First, I felt like I was just completeing activities on someone's checklist, and they were just being glanced at and checked off. When I put in several hours of work on an assignment, there wasn't any evidence that it had been thoughtfully assessed. Second, I didn't know if my ideas/approaches to completing the assignments were practical/useful/real-world possible in someone else's opinon. It's fine that it met a rubric, but could it translate to a real-world application? Third, no one is perfect. Even if I scored high on an assignment, I needed reasons why someone thought it was good (so I could replicate it in the future) or ways it could be improved or expanded. It did not help that when points were missed, I often had to email the IA for an explanation as to why; this information did not come automatically with the grade.

Again, in my final course, I had an IA who gave specific comments/compliments on different components of my internship requirements. The specificity she provided gave me a sense for the first time that someone on the other end of the "upload" button was really looking at my work.

#3 Wish for Improvement: Professors Should be Familiar With the Courseware/Learning Management System (LMS)

More than once during my classes when we got questions through to the professors via emails facilitated by IAs or web conferences, the professors admitted to not knowing how we (the students) were supposed to upload assignments or where something was located in the courseware. They frequently pointed us back to the IAs or even the technical help contacts for the courseware. Through information shared during the degree program and research I've done since completing the degree, I believe a third-party company was uploading all course content and the professors may not have had direct access to administrative features of the courseware.

Having been through training in the use of an LMS and having had to turn around that training to others, I understand that LMS's can have a steep learning curve. I also believe, however, that to maximize the effectiveness of thier pedagogy, an instructor needs to be familiar with and comfortable in whatever environment they are teaching in, whether it is a physical classroom or an online environment.

Concluding Thoughts

I am very thankful that I had the time, resources, and opportunity to complete my master's degree online. As I stated in my "Good Stuff" blog post:

Overall, I am glad I completed this degree online and I definitely see where I have grown professionally as a result of completing it. My perspectives on education and educational technology have been broadened. My interest in online teaching has also been piqued, and as a result I hope to find ways to facilitate online professional development courses for educators in the near future.

I do wish, however, that I had been able to interact with my professors more and glean more from their perspectives and experience. The interaction with my peers was exteremely beneficial and broadened my perspectives, but the lack of instructor involvement definitely left me with a "missing piece" feeling throughout my degree program.


Because of the way the courses in this program were delivered, I also have an overarching concern. I am concerned that the program is turning out graduates who may be in charge of online or e-learning initiatives in their schools and who may think limited involvement on the part of the instructor is quality practice because of the model they experienced while completing the program.


I believe based on my limited interaction with the professors that they have good intentions, and I realize I was in one of the first cohorts to complete the program. I sincerely hope that the feedback given by myself and other students throughout the program will lead to continuous improvement in the instructional delivery of the courses.


Have you or are you completing a degree online? What are your concerns about the experience (if you have any)? Post comments or blog about them and post a link below. Most importantly, make sure you are sharing your concerns with your professors/school when you are asked to do course evaluations.

Dynamic Digital Portfolios #SXSWedu

Notes from SXSWedu 2011 breakout session...

Carol Teitelman
Region XIII Distance Learning

Link to Prezi from presentation: http://prezi.com/xty5ijclree_/dynamic-porfolios/

Dr. Helen Barrett
http://www.electronicportfolios.com/balance/index.html

Portfolios fall into two different types. (Epsilen allows you to do both at the same time.)

• Internal (learning or reflection)
• External (showcase or accountability)

Reflection a key part of keeping a portfolio. Why is this artifact in my portfolio and why do I want to keep it here?

The showcase aspect of a portfolio can be a PR tool for yourself and what is going on in your classroom. Share what your students are doing with the world.

Portfolio Tools

• Text
  Google docs
  Word processor
  Scan - lower grade kids still do hand-produced work
• Photos
  http://www.pixlr.com/ - Allows layered editing - can pull pictures from your computer or anywhere on the Internet - great opportunity to teach about copyright - teaching "how to" you can pull in any picture - going to repost you must pay attention to copyright
  http://www.pixenate.com/ - Has icons for tools so easier to use for nonreaders or struggling readers
  http://www.picnik.com/
  Digital Camera
  Scanner
• Video
  http://www.jaycut.com/
  http://animoto.com/education
  http://www.youtube.com/
  iMovie or Windows Movie Maker
• Sound
  http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
  http://www.free-sound-editor.com/

Mashups

• http://www.slidebomb.com/
• http://memolane.com/ - Just announced yesterday. Allows you to pull all of your content on the Internet into one place.
• http://www.speakingimage.com/

Examples

• Gallery of Teaching & Learning - http://gallery.carnegiefoundation.org/

Online Tools - How do we embed these in portfolios?

• www.intel.com/education/teachers
• http://www.classtools.com/ 

Portfolios need to be dynamic, living documents. The web is not a place to park stuff

iTunes U Unleashed! #SXSWedu

Notes from SWSWedu 2011 breakout session...

Tom Burnett, PhD
Manager Stategic Initatives
Apple, Inc.

Education Trends Near and Dear to Apple

• User Created Content
• Mobility
• Learning Communities

Digital Learning Environments: - A new sequence of learning

• Create
• Access
• Distribute

The 21st Century Learning Environment Provides Access to Numerous "Knowledge Points" - Places where students can find the information they need.

"Culture easts strategy every day of the week."
Example: Can we keep kids from using the all the technology at their disposal, or can we teach them to use it appropriately and use it for learning?

University Channels

Duke University - Approached Apple about posting lectures to iTunes and gave every incoming Freshman an iPod. Another set of Univeristies Followed - MIT, Yale, UC Berkeley, Stanford. Now, almost 500 universities worldwide have created their own iTunes U sites and are sharing their content freely with the world. For FREE!!!!

Just click the iTunes U button at the top of iTunes...

MIT Channel - Walter Lewin, Science professor and "national treasure", has his entire Physics I course lectures on their channel - FREE!! (Look up his awesome kinetic energy lecture where he tries to smash his own face!)

University of South Florida - College of Education - Lit2Go - Professional Readers have read 200 classic books; they can be downloaded and listen to for FREE! The text of the book will also display on a Touch or iPhone!

Apple provides the architecture for Universities and Colleges to create iTunes U channels for FREE!!

Beyond Campus Channels - Look under Quick Links on right side of iTunes U screen

Libraries, museums, organizations
KQED, Library of Congress, Connexions from Rice University, Kahn Academy, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Supereme Court

Kahn Academy has entire courses posted in their channel.

KQUED Quest - Science lessons

Rice University Connexions - Open source textbooks - Algebra II textbook is actually on the state adoption list in California

K-12 Education Channels - 20 States Have Channels - Including Texas!

Virginia - paying for education apps to be developed - just noticed they have tech tutorials

Tennessee - Presenter's favorite channel - They are putting all of their state shared content in iTunes
Example: Four minute lesson on Nouns for 2nd Grade

iTunes U has 400,000 pieces of content, educator created, vetted, and FREE!!!

In a school setting, you can block all the rest of iTunes out and just get to iTunes U (Need to investigate how to do this...)

Trending Fast in iTunes U

• Playlists - can combine thematic information into playlists and share with students on their iPods
• ePUB - Newest format supported on iTunes; Lets you interact with content. Can make electronic "sticky notes" in books you are reading, look up words in dictionary and thesaurus. CK12 and Connexions have ePUB books in iTunes U

Burnett demonstrated creating an e-publication using Pages on a Mac. Put in text and added lectures he had downloaded from iTunes. They play within the Pages document. You can export the document as an ePub. Add the ePub to your iTunes library, sync to iPad or iPod Touch, and Presto! A self-published ePub document, customized for your students! Way cool!! I bet this doesn't work on Windows...

Top 10 Reasons to Use iTunes

10. Builds a strong statewide "band" for wuality content
9. Become part of a worldwide learning and PD community
8. Quickly get conetnt to meet needs (ie new standards)
7. Cross platform: Mac &  PC
6. Share greata content/buld community of learners and developers
5. Saves time and money
4. High quality PD - on demand
3. Anytime/anwhere access to conent
2. Aligned vetted conent ins safe environment
1. Increased student achievement!

A Project Share Story: Ensuring a Successful Implementation #SXSWedu

Notes from SXSWedu 2011 breakout session...

Jill Galloway
Coordinator of Instructional Technology
Irving ISD
jgalloway@irvingisd.net
Twitter: @ajillgalloway


Irving ISD has had a very peaceful roll out of Project Share. They are sharing things they wish they had known ahead of time today.

All Irving ISD high schools are 1:1 with laptops. Middle school migrant students also have laptops.

Irving has Blackboard in their district and it is heavily used, but Galloway sees great potential for Epsilen and feels it is more of a 21st Century platform.

Questions to Ask:

• Who will manage institution?
• Who will pilot? Irving is a large district with 35,000 students, so they wanted to find a small group for piloting. They decided to start with T3 grant participants, instructional technology specialists, and high school math teachers who needed access for training materials. T3 teachers saw a lot of potential for students, but student accounts cannot be created without email addresses, and Irving ISD doesn't have student email addresses.
  
  Tipping Point: Presented Epsilen to upper administration, who started using it in ways they had not planned yet but were happy to see.
  
  Special Ed department began creating online professional development courses in Epsilen, which helped them leave a mark since their positions will not be funded next year.
  
  Grant writers are using it for grant facilitation. They can collaborate with other districts participating in the same grant.
  
  Principal of a new middle school is using Epsilen to network with the teachers she is hiring for her campus.
• What about the kids? Irving wanted to use ePortfolios with their students. They created ePals email addresses for one 8th grade teacher's students so he could pilot with them.
• What will students access? You can choose the level of access for any type of user. Irving did not change access levels at first, so they had to go back and enable some features during roll out. For example, students by default cannot search for courses. Irving enabled this to make enrollment in online courses easier than the "invite to course" method. They use access codes so just anyone cannot enroll in the courses.
• Who can access ePortfolios? Irving has decided to keep the ePortfolios within Irving for now since they are using with 8th grade and 4th grade and are not applying to college at this time.
• Will students be searchable? Irving did not enable this at this time.
• Will students have profile pictures? Irving does allow this.
• Will students blog? By default they do not have rights to blogging features. Irving turned this on because of its potential for instructional use.

Initial student roll out - Can create student role in Epsilen and give certain access rights

• 8th grade science and 4th grade class.
• Students are using ePortfolios and enjoy uploading their information to them.
• Interactive notebooks
• Students post projects for presenting to peers
• Homebound instruction - Homebound instrutor works with a homebound student this way. Teacher back on campus uses drop box with student to look at work and give feedback.
• Stay connected with each other. One teacher who was at a training away from campus used Epsilen chat feature to communicate with his students back in the classroom. Teacher can also hold virtual office hours in the evening.

Tips in Hindsight:

• Have a training plan. Hands-on workshops initially, but then met one on one with teachers who were interested in using it. Also did a lot of webinars through illuminate. In the beginning overview trainings were very much in demand. Also how to work with your ePortfolio. Course creation is a popular topic. If you know these three topics you can use the rest of the system.
• Teachers can create courses, and those must be approved by an administrator. NOTE: Administrator does not get an automatic notification when a new course is submitted in Epsilen for approval.
• Pick a starting point for users. ePortfolios - charge teachers with creating one for themselves. One district (not Irving) required teachers to create ePortfolios.
• Populate the system with content for your staff. Get teachers using the system so they'll see the benefits of it.
• Course Tips:
  - Make all teachers certified faculty so they can create courses
  - Define student acess levels ahead of time
  - Simplify the course menu so as not to overwhem students. Don't have features you are not using enabled on the menu. Teachers have this control over their courses
  - Turn on drop box notifications so teacher knows when students turn in their assignments. Date and time stamp is very helpful!
  - Collaborate across classrooms with Workgroups. Can create groups with kids who aren't even in the same class. They complete group projects. Sharing files, leaving notes for each other. True 21st Century collaboration!
  - Facilitate a virtual classroom via chat (virtual office hours, interact with students when you are away from school.
  - Save often in Take Notes - especially if wireless access is an issue. This has been Irving's biggest challenge
  - Back up your course content with Resources
  - If a teacher leaves, institution admin can change the administrator or instructor of a course so it can be reused
• Student oversight - Teachers can delete inappropriate content inside course blogs. Institutional admin can delete content from individual student blogs. Not sure if teachers can get to student email. Make sure students are signing an AUP every year and incorporate Epsilen into it.

Irving ISD's next steps: New middle school coming online is trying to be as paperless as possible. They are putting forms in a course in Epsilen. Using embedded Google forms inside Epsilen pages. A course gives them more tools to use than a group.

Galloway is a Google certified teacher and had Google Apps for Edu at her previous district. She feels Epsilen and Google Apps are excellent compliments to one another.


This was offered up from a member of the audience: Join 6tech group in Epsilen. Region 6 has developed a trainer of trainers document that you can get for free!
http://www.epsilen.com/grp/119578

Reflections on an Online Master's Degree - The Good Stuff!

In November 2010 I completed a master’s degree in Educational Technology Leadership after 18 months of course work entirely online. I had taken isolated online classes in the past for professional development or to work toward additional teaching certifications and enjoyed learning in that manner, so when an opportunity for advancing my education this way came along, I took advantage of it.

There were definitely positive aspects to obtaining a degree this way.

Due to the way my particular program was structured, the courses were delivered “one-at-a-time” and each course lasted for five weeks. As a working adult it was definitely a plus to be able to focus on one course at a time. Each course also followed a predicable rhythm with weekly readings, required discussion board postings, and assignment due dates that kept me on a reasonable schedule and helped me to not fall behind. I found out that five weeks can go incredibly fast when the topic is of high interest OR there is a major project incorporated into the course.

(By the way, they aren’t misleading you when they say you’ll spend a minimum of ten hours a week on your coursework. Most weeks I spent ten to fifteen hours completing all of the course requirements for the week. There were occasional weeks when it was twenty or more hours.)

Occasionally there were web conferences where we could login to talk with the professor and our fellow students. In most cases we were not required to attend the conferences, but they were helpful for clarification on assignments or projects. The web conferences were recorded about 50% of the time, so even if we missed them, we could access the information at a later time. Other than the live web conferences, I was able to work on all of the course requirements – watching recorded lectures and completing assignments and readings – whenever I wanted to as long as I met all of the deadlines.

I appreciated that the degree was aimed at working educators and to that end a large number of the assignments were designed to be directly applicable in K-12 education. Examples that jump to my mind are an Instructional Design class where the major project was developing an online course for students or teachers or in a Leadership for Accountability class performing a comprehensive needs assessment for a campus and designing a staff development experience which would target an area where improvement was needed.

Group projects were another enjoyable aspect of the online experience. In two classes, we had major projects spread over several weeks that had to be completed with classmates who were spread far and wide geographically. My knowledge and skills in using online chat clients and collaborative spaces such as wikis and Google Docs and Sites grew tremendously through completing these projects. I was also always fortunate to work with dedicated group members who all did their part to contribute to the projects.

When I had questions about any aspect of a course, I was able to email the instructional associate (IA) assigned to my course. This was not the course professor, but someone who acted as a liaison between students and professors. If the IA could answer my question, they would, or they would pass the question along to the professor if clarification was needed from that level. The IAs also graded our assignments. It was nice to have access to someone who could answer our questions quickly, always within 24 hours at the most but more often within only a few hours.

Overall, I am glad I completed this degree online and I definitely see where I have grown professionally as a result of completing it. My perspectives on education and educational technology have been broadened. My interest in online teaching has also been piqued, and as a result I hope to find ways to facilitate online professional development courses for educators in the near future.

Of course, no experience is perfect. In an upcoming blog post, I’ll share a few things about my online degree experience that I would improve, if I were in charge of the world. :-)

Have you completed college coursework at any level online? What did you enjoy about it? Please share your experiences in the comments, or blog about them and share a link!

If you found this post interesting, you may also want to read my March 11, 2011 follow-up post: Reflections on an Online Master's Degree - The Stuff That Could Have Been Better