At AISH the past several months we’ve been learning about online learning as we develop the “Leadership Skills and Impact Series” in collaboration with Global Online Academy (GOA).
GOA organized a course for AISH Faculty and Advisors on quality online learning, modeling the techniques that we will be using in our courses, so that we could personally experience them. A far cry from the “talking head” of years past, I couldn’t wait to get up in the morning to see my colleagues introduce themselves and read their insights about articles. I appreciated when the instructor sent a one-minute video directly to me, in response to something I said in the forum because I knew he had reflected on my response. It was especially meaningful when the course participants co-constructed an online learning mural for our final assignment that captured our shared aspirations of what online learning should look like.
Stefan Hrastinski, in “Asynchronous and Syncronous E-Learning” makes that point that in his analysis of asynchronous discussions, “(facilitated by email and online forums where participants are not online at the same time) a vast majority of the responses were classified as content-related.” Contributions were generally considered to be more thoughtful compared to synchronous communication because learners have time to reflect before they respond. As the author notes, almost 90 percent of the time was spent discussing issues related to course content rather than “small talk”. He concludes that both types of learning, asynchronous and synchronous, are important online and complement each other. The synchronous communication, facilitated by videoconferencing, chat, etc. more closely resembles face-to-face communication that “enables monitoring the receiver’s reaction to a message,” and helps students get to know each other and not feel isolated in their learning.
In AISH’s online courses, we’re using both asynchronous and synchronous methods. Whatever the method used, we believe that the platform will add value to the learning experience. With 475+ members in 90 different countries, we know that flexibility is vital so that regardless of one’s geographical location, there is access to meaningful content and an interactive forum, facilitated by the course developer, a fellow colleague. With the vast array of online tools available, we’ll be utilizing discussion boards and video forums to bring the relevant content alive and to facilitate learning from each other.
Link to the article: Click here.