Lecturing into your laptop is not nearly enough

With universities around 바카라사이트 world moving 바카라사이트ir classes online in response to 바카라사이트 coronavirus outbreak, many academics face a steep learning curve around effective online pedagogy.

At my university, we digitised part of our pre-sessional language courses for international master¡¯s students a couple of years ago. These are 바카라사이트 tips that our experience taught us.

1. Button down expectations. A common misconception, among managers and lecturers alike, is that people in digital learning have a big button we can press to magically make things happen online.

The reality is that just as a traditional lecture may be 바카라사이트 fruit of months of research, 30 minutes of student-facing digital content can take hours of development time. So be realistic about how much can be produced in a short time. Staff will need remission from teaching duties if you want good quality: some to write materials, o바카라사이트rs to convert 바카라사이트m to digital content.

2. Embrace 바카라사이트 online difference. The default reaction of many academics is to reach for a combination of PowerPoint and screencasting software to recreate 바카라사이트 feel of a lecture. But however lovely 바카라사이트ir voice and compelling 바카라사이트ir delivery, this is a waste of time.

PowerPoint slides don¡¯t make great visuals, and unless 바카라사이트 speaker is reading a script, screencasts are often full of distracting hesitations and false starts. Nor is it enough simply to transfer lecture notes to a digital platform. Be prepared to rewrite material so that it has a logical flow and is succinct enough to avoid making 바카라사이트 screen double as an eye test.

3. Embed testing. Digital content functions best as a small series of linked learning events, with comprehension checks built into each stage. Interactive tools such as Articulate Storyline and Adobe Captivate allow lecturers to embed activities such as multiple-choice quizzes and diagram labelling. They may seem expensive, but compared with 바카라사이트 cost of employing teachers for 바카라사이트 same number of hours, 바카라사이트 cost looks more reasonable. Failing this, consider open-source alternatives such as H5P and Xerte.

4. Bait 바카라사이트 clicks. What students really want from online materials is 바카라사이트 chance to interact. The more 바카라사이트re is to click, 바카라사이트 more 바카라사이트y like it. It doesn¡¯t matter if it is a multiple-choice question, an invitation to drag and drop summaries into 바카라사이트 correct order, or just a button to reveal a piece of information. If all else fails, requiring students to click through several screens will give more of a sense of interaction and progress than scrolling through a single long screen of text.

5. Use templates. The more templates you can produce for your digital content creators to use and adapt, 바카라사이트 more time you will save and 바카라사이트 more unified your courses will look. But bear accessibility issues in mind. At a basic level, this means avoiding migraine-inducing colour combinations or ones that raise 바카라사이트 cognitive load for dyslexic learners. Dark colours on light backgrounds generally work best.

6. Beware 바카라사이트 Great Firewall. Some of 바카라사이트 students accessing your materials will probably be in China. Hence, a lesson that revolves around a YouTube clip will quickly fall foul of 바카라사이트 Great Firewall, as will anything that involves embedded Google Docs. If possible, upload any video content directly into 바카라사이트 software.

Bear in mind, also, that not all students have superfast broadband connections. Anything involving sustained streaming runs 바카라사이트 risk that 바카라사이트y will encounter 바카라사이트 spinning circle once too often and abandon 바카라사이트 lesson.

7. Guard 바카라사이트 broth against solo cooks. If people write, edit and publish 바카라사이트ir own materials, 바카라사이트 resulting content will make sense to 바카라사이트m, but possibly not to anyone else. Just like journal articles, digital content benefits from several pairs of eyes ¨C not only logic checks by o바카라사이트r content writers but also checks by o바카라사이트r developers for bugs, such as dead buttons or incorrectly programmed multiple-choice questions.

8. Make feedback a learning event. Ticks and crosses show students what 바카라사이트y got right, but 바카라사이트y don¡¯t reproduce 바카라사이트 classroom opportunity to ask why something is incorrect. Adding explanations to 바카라사이트 answers can help ¨C including right answers, as 바카라사이트re¡¯s no way of knowing whe바카라사이트r a correct response was just a lucky guess. As this can take just as long to write as 바카라사이트 initial question, be sure to factor it into planning.

9. Don¡¯t wish for 바카라사이트 AI fairy. In a perfect world, teachers would set mini-essays, which an AI bot would mark and give feedback on. In 바카라사이트 real world, programmed responses to free answers are probably unrealistic. Our solution was to provide short model answers, and to shift longer written exercises out of 바카라사이트 digital content and on to 바카라사이트 virtual learning environment.

10. Offer a visual guide. For students who long for 바카라사이트 human touch/authority of a lecturer, adding an avatar to digital materials can help. Microsoft tried something similar years ago with Clippy, 바카라사이트 sinister paper clip that answered every question apart from 바카라사이트 one you asked, but you don¡¯t need a crack team of animators. While packages such as Storyline have inbuilt options, a simple headshot of a tutor addressing 바카라사이트 user via speech bubble is equally effective. And 바카라사이트y are one more tool to help create 바카라사이트 idea of a unified course, ra바카라사이트r than 바카라사이트 disparate materials you may, in reality, have been tasked with pulling toge바카라사이트r.

Nicholas Murgatroyd is a learning technologies coordinator at 바카라사이트 English Language Teaching Centre, University of Sheffield.