Spring 2010 Distance Education Survey Faculty Response

Summarized and Combined

 

 

After reviewing your student evaluations what do you think went well in this class?
 
  1. Students were satisfied with this online course.  They enjoyed the convenience and would like to see more 100% online courses.
  1. Communication to the class as a whole.
  1. The course seems to be a hit with the great majority of students.  The tutoring services we provide seem to be a positive for some students.  Teletutoring seems too helpful to students who reside off-campus. Overall, the entire course went well.
  1. The students seemed to find the course well organized and to understand what was expected of them.
  1. Students like the interaction online. Students like the relevance of the content.
  1. Students are able to make the work meaningful and relevant.
  1. The students appreciate individual feedback and constructive criticism to enable them to understand and implement quality research studies.
  1. I believe I conveyed the feeling that this course is important, and I enjoy teaching it. I am willing to help students. I see an improvement in delivery using some new tools and adjusting areas I felt troubled some students.
  1. The class was well organized.
  1. This was not a stand-alone course. Students from FINC 3511 N01 and 02D were allowed to complete additional work to receive honors credit.
  1. Students like that the course has only 1 face-to-face meeting.  Students feel that they learned important concepts and areas of responsibility relating to admin of instructional technology programs in k-12 schools/districts.
  1. Students achieved broad understanding of reference sources and services for k-12, and knowledge of specific reference sources.
  1. Students seem well pleased with the course and instructor.
  1. given the responses and numbers, pretty much everything
  1. The assignments and quizzes appeared to help prepare students for the exams and learn the material.
  1. Positive feedback... students appeared to enjoy the class.
  1. My availability online and face-to-face; my flexibility.
  1. The one student who replied was positive about the availability of online course materials.
  1. One person didn't like it, 2 did. Generally, I had one disgruntled student who felt she already knew what I had to teach. Others obviously didn't.  3 evaluations are really not enough to make any judgments.
  1. The students liked taking exams at home and therefore not having to come to the campus for testing. They liked getting feedback of correct answers. They liked working at their own pace on assignments.
  1. Most students were favorable about online class
  1. I think the coursework was easy to follow and organized for maximum success.
  1. The on line components of the course worked as designed.
  1. The basic communication of information worked well.  For a first try the online submission of assignments worked reasonably well.
  1. Good online assistance with technology issues.
  1. I think the format of the class and assignments were easy to follow and understand via distance.
  1. Interactions among students; quality of assignments.

 

 

What was problematic?  What needs to be improved?
 
  1. I look forward to designing an online course and utilizing the discussion board to a greater extent.  This leads to greater student/ and instructor involvement and a higher completion rate.
  1. Getting students to follow written instructions.
  1. None was mentioned over which I have control or would not compromise the integrity of the learning experience & the integrity of the class.
  1. Getting students to complete all the weekly learning module assignments was a problem.
  1. Continue to develop new materials and resources. This is the first time that this course has been taught.
  1. Too many residency experiences required initially.
  1. I would like to do a better job in getting prompt feedback to students, though with as many students as there were in this class that may not be possible. We also still need to address the issue of having two different teachers teaching the two semesters.
  1. As this is a required course, it is usually meet with students wondering why they have to take this course. So an area I am attempting to improve is the stimulation and the relevance of the course to the student. The lowest response was in question 9 I
  1. No major problems were indicated, but some students seem to prefer more face-to-face interaction.
  1. Additional variety in assignment format, perhaps.
  1. The course requires significant time in review of specific reference materials. Although students come away confident that they have learned the material, assignments can seem redundant. 
  1. Improve response time for evaluation of assignments/exams.
  1. Things went pretty smoothly.  No negative feedback from students.
  1. Only 64% of the course evaluations were returned. That was in spite of repeatedly asking them to complete.     Obviously one person, perhaps others that did not respond, did not agree with some of the items.
  1. Need to increase student participation in online course evals to get more data.
  1. I would like to improve the face-to-face skills meetings - require (not just suggest) students to apply what they learned.  Have more of the class do their evaluations.
  1. Classroom interaction and discussion of presentations presented a problem. Students posted case studies and were required to comment on peers' efforts but the discussion was not as meaningful as a 'here and now' discussion because students commented over
  1. Some students are not as comfortable in the online environment
  1. Orientation on CourseDen and assignment submissions
  1. Some students using the Firefox, Chrome, and Opera browsers with CourseDen reported significant problems with downloading course materials including one Firefox user who was unable to access any course content.  I replicate all CourseDen data on course re
  1. Online submission of assignments had some problems, especially with the CourseDen system being down at times when the students were required to submit assignments.  Further, the system for instructors to access student files is horrible. 
  1. Browser checks and uses of Internet Explorer and AOL. My students get kicked out of those.
  1. My response time to students' emails.
  1. Need to do a better job orienting students to technology.
  1. One student seemed to feel I was unavailable for assistance. I believe that I am often online and try to be available for my students. Having a more specific training on the 'who's online' feature and the use of the chat feature to get assistance might help.

 

What do you plan to change next time you teach the course?
 
  1. I plan on teaching Life-Span Development this summer online.  I will utilize the discussion board to a greater extent and I will involve students in group interaction via the discussion board.
  1. Intensify the amount of information to students.
  1. Based on the majority of students input, try to keep doing what I am already doing.  I anticipate natural progression and update of course material.
  1. I plan to add some more discussion assignments to get the students participating more.
  1. Add new content from additional theorists.
  1. We have already planned to change the course sequencing and to tie some of the residency experiences to new courses.
  1. I don't know.  Once again, I am teaching the second semester of this course, and some of them are, once again, coming in unprepared to do the work, as they took the first semester of this course with a different instructor.
  1. More relevance, more student participation in the task of learning. Finding a way to increase the comfort level of the students
  1. I hope to segment the lecture material into smaller, more manageable portions.
  1. Segment the lecture material into more manageable portions.
  1. Additional variety in assignment format; increased use of web 2.0 tools for collaboration.
  1. Improve response time for evaluation of all assignments/exams.
  1. I changed books this semester (and therefore test banks); also took out most of the instructor presentations because they were not being utilized.
  1. Perhaps more case analyses.
  1. I will probably not change anything major - it works for the majority that responded but I will always look for ways to improve. I will do the course evaluations face-2-face next time - hopefully for a better response rate.
  1. Encourage greater feedback on course evals from students - may use a midterm survey within the course to get feedback.
  1. Skills requirements
  1. Consider scheduling a Wimba class for presentations.
  1. Will build in more individual accountability related to assignments. Although not listed in comments, accountability issues were present in some groups.
  1. I do not plan to make any substantive changes the next time I teach.  In the future (Fall 2010) I plan to expand the use of CourseDen to include the use of podcasts and online discussion forums.
  1. I will alter the parameters and deadlines for the online assignments.  This will make it simpler for the students to cope with.  I will also provide an alternative hard copy submission option to allow students to avoid online submission if they choose.
  1. I will make more supplemental information available online.
  1. Not all of the students who responded to the survey were aware that the library has a distance learning support service to help them get the research materials they might need. I will need to make sure they are aware of this in future courses.
  1. I want to add more structure to how things are arranged within the course to make things easier to find.
  1. I would spend more time showing the 'who's online' feature to my students so that they may get assistance when they need it.
  1. I may retry to reduce the workload for my students. For example, instead of asking them to post 3 responses I may ask them to post only one or two.

 

What was the largest adjustment you made in teaching a distance course and how was this addressed?

 
  1. This version of Blackboard is much more cumbersome and difficult to navigate than the version I have used in the past.  I took over for another instructor who was promoted.  She did a great job setting up the course, and I facilitated the course.
  1. Packaging the course for asynchronous delivery.  I normally spend the entire unpaid summer creating the course and its content.  The development of extensive & high quality online offerings will grow with appropriate incentives
  1. Taking advantage of the discussion tools.
  1. For this course it has been challenging to organize the content in reasonable ways.
  1. I have organized the folders differently and chosen different, more extensive resources for each folder.
  1. Adjustments are finding the time to develop new material and include it in an online area.  This requires always looking to improve delivery which often includes learning a new piece of software.
  1. Requires more effort to keep 'in touch' with students.
  1. Feedback to students has to be ongoing, extensive.  I try to establish a dialogue with each student, and foster discussion and collaboration among students.
  1. After over 10 years experience teaching online I think there is no need to make large adjustments
  1. Managing my time to check in frequently with students - tried to check the course early AM each day during the week.
  1. Getting the modules up and available early in the course so students could work at their own pace. Some wanted to do the modules all in a short period of time while others paced completion based on other course work and their other responsibilities.
  1. Fewer F2F encounters with this class made me more vigilant with online communication - students, however, were not as vigilant. Will need to address this next time.
  1. Having all assignments listed with requirements at the start of semester.
  1. I use the distance component to ensure communication of basic course information for a class that is primarily in person.  I feel that I have adjusted to the use of CourseDen's limited flexibility in a manner that permits effective access to information f
  1. All of my habits for grading are based on having a hard copy that I can carry with me and grade where I happen to be.  This cannot be done with electronic submission.  Further, electronic submission eliminates all written comments and the comment and mark
  1. Time spent recording lectures and has to create a zip folder, unzip and upload the file.   I am going to a Course Den tutorial.
  1. Planning all assignments and due dates in advance
  1. I have not taught this course in several semesters, so in addition to regular class prep, making materials user-friendly in an online environment was a challenge.
  1. Student teacher communications....shared telephone number.
  1. I find that I need to be much more organized when I teach distance courses. Writing everything into my planner helps as does color coding things.
  1. Trying to make things accessible and easy to understand was sometimes a challenge. Organization and planning is the key to helping with this.
  1. Planning and organization. When I put up materials for each class session I find it is necessary to have it all together before putting it up for students. It helps me stay organized and the course stay organized.
  1. The largest adjustment was made in communication with students.  Since the course was totally online, I had more frequent online interaction with students. I posted my general comments for all students, emailed students my comments for each assignment, an

 

After reviewing student evaluation questions, what do you think of the level of non-academic support provided for this course by student services the library the distance education center and the instructor?
 
  1. The support services are excellent at UWG!  I was confident when I referred students for these services throughout the duration of the course.  The students seemed to be pleased, as well.
  1. Sufficient, but very not very transparent or easily accessed.
  1. Our local non-academic support is fantastic!    As for the USG support, it is terrible and getting worst by the day. Now, even when a Faculty denies access to a student, the student is allowed in regardless of the wishes of the Faculty.
  1. I think students need more guidance when registering about what to expect in a distance learning course.  They seem to expect that online classes will be easier when they are actually harder.
  1. The instructor needs to better communicate these services to students.
  1. I think the level of support of our distance education center is wonderful. They frequently use the library services well. Registration seemed to pose no problems. As far as the instructor's non-academic support, I think I went beyond the call of duty.
  1. Some of my students are library/media student who access the information for the class via the search engines available to them and not use UWG library. Software appears to be a non-threatening medium. The few individuals who used the Helpline found it to support services seem sufficient.
  1. Non-academic support is provided on many levels.  Students often do not utilize available support services, however.
  1. As far as I can tell services were more than adequate.
  1. The level of support students receive (if they are willing to utilize it!) is outstanding.
  1. Seems good but these students are at the end of program and may already know about services.
  1. For me, excellent; not sure that the students took advantage of the services available even though they were in place.
  1. The students were hesitant to seek help from the experts...I was clearly not the IT person to help.
  1. Varies according to question - it seems there is a need for more advising related to distance education expectations (Q18).
  1. I think the level of support is excellent.  I think the knowledge of students about the availability of support could be improved.
  1. I think the level of support was sufficient for this course.
  1. Non-academic support for my course was very good.