Monday, October 24, 2022

7 Steps to Creating Presence in Online Courses - Step 7

Online teaching and learning should be "an experience" where presence is felt by both instructors and learners. How is presence created?  

The seventh step for creating online presence is to use the Framework described in Step 6 to create a Design Plan. Remember, the Framework includes the Learner-Centered Model and the Determinants of Presence. Let's look at an example of how the plan was developed by a science instructor. In her course: 

  1. the Content she created was both content- and process-based.  
  2. the Format included a blend of individual and group work (more individual in the beginning, transitioning to group work after the first few weeks). 
  3. the Interaction Activities she selected supported the Content and fit her students’ needs.
  4. the Roles she played as instructor were determined by the level of institutional Support she had, the course Content, and the Format she had created (as a result, she played a number of Roles).
  5. the Technologies she chose were to implement the Format and enable the Interaction Activities. 
  6. the Support she used included three types: instructional, technical, and self-support. Self-support is an important new addition to this determinant and focuses on setting self-boundaries and taking care of self. This is important not only for the instructor but also for the learners.

The science instructor's Design Plan illustrates this seventh step.

But Step 7 is an expansive step. In online learning you are creating a “learning experience” …so you’re designing in phases; not just when the course happens (during) but also before the course begins, at the end of the course, and even after. In the next weeks you’ll see how our instructor expanded the Design Plan to develop these phases. 

 

Reference 

Lehman, R. M., & Conceição, S. C. (2010). Creating a Sense of Presence in Online Teaching: How to “Be There” for Distance Learners. Jossey-Bass. 

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