Topic- 4 reflections

From my experience designing blended, fully online or hybrid courses might be very challenging if you do not proceed with a careful planning. Of course this might be adjusted during the delivery of the course, but the main framework should be in place since the beginning. ( Salmon., G. 2013) Certainly knowing your participants is the first step you need to make  to start planning. However, this is true for small cohort of students and it is not applicable to bigger groups, like the courses created for the Moocs, for example, where there can be up to thousands of participants in one course. Having said that, to promote active learning you should place the student at the center of your designing process, by analyzing their needs, expectations  and last but not least by making sure they are familiar with the digital tools and that they can easily access them ( Salmon, 2013). For instance you should know in advance if your students have a specific impairment and for this reason one should plan a more inclusive lesson.( Steinfeld. E & Maisen J, 2012). Another point we might want to consider is to be flexible and open to changes  during the delivery. This will help the teacher to keep the students engaged and motivated. In fact things may change over time, and the needs and expectations that students had at the beginning might be different as a result. For instance students might come up with problems or the situation around them can be disruptive. Just consider what happened with the onset of the pandemic 2 years ago. This will address not only the amount and type of activities you have planned for the course but also the mode of delivery either synchronous or asynchronous.

As for the synchronous and asynchronous activities , we should combine those in a way that they suit our learners needs and expectations. Also these might change during the course so we should be available and ready to restructure and revisit our intervention in order to keep our students engaged and make them active participant of their learning process rather than just passive consumers of it. ( Floris. D.F & Renandya W.A, 2015)

To conclude, I think that thinking about the design of a course means not only structure, plan and anticipate problems but it also involves another major skill which is oftentimes neglected and is about being flexible, open to changes and finally to reconsider the choices you made at the beginning. The same happens in on-campus courses. In fact we need to consider who the people in front of us are, be them in a face to face setting or behind a screen.

Reference:

Floris. D.F & Renandya W.A, (2015) ‘Transforming the teaching of listening and reading using the SAMR model’ http://www.modernenglishteacher.com

Salmon., G. (2013) ‘E-tivities. The key to active online learning’ , Routledge.

Salmon., G. (2013) ‘E-moderation’ The key to teaching and learning online), Routledge.

Steinfeld E.& Maisen., J. (2012) Universal design . Creating inclusive environments. Wiley.