Supporting Online Learner Success

Online learner success is supported by thoughtful course design, clear expectations, meaningful interaction, timely feedback, and an environment in which learners know where to find help and feel comfortable using it.

Online instructors can help create the conditions for success while also helping learners develop the strategies they need to plan, monitor, regulate, and reflect on their own learning.

These skills are often described as self-regulated learning. Faculty can help learners develop them by making effective strategies visible, providing opportunities to practice them, and building prompts and supports into the course.

• Go deeper: Explore What Successful Online Learners Do for a detailed look at the strategies learners use to manage learning online, or Understanding Self-Regulated Learning Online for the theoretical framework and original SRL categories.

  Plan & Manage Time  

  Online learning gives learners flexibility, but that flexibility also requires them to make deliberate decisions about when and how they will complete their work. Clear course structures and planning supports can help learners manage academic, professional, and personal responsibilities.

  Faculty can support this by:

  • Providing a clear and predictable course schedule with assignments and due dates.
  • Using LMS calendars, due dates, announcements, and reminders consistently.
  • Breaking large projects into smaller milestones with intermediate deadlines.
  • Making expected time commitments and particularly demanding weeks visible in advance.
  • Providing reminders before major assignments, exams, or changes in the normal course rhythm.
  • Reviewing course workload to make sure expectations are realistic for the credit hours and level of the course.

  Help learners practice this by encouraging them to:

  • Establish a regular schedule for checking the course and completing course work.
  • Review each module early and identify what is due and when.
  • Break larger assignments into smaller, manageable tasks.
  • Plan ahead for competing responsibilities and possible technology problems.
  • Use calendars, reminders, or other institutionally supported planning tools.

  Useful resources:

  • Penn State World Campus Time Management Calculator
  • Wake Forest University Workload Estimator

• Organize Learning & Manage the Learning Environment  

  Online learners work in many different environments and often manage course information across the LMS, readings, documents, media, notes, assignments, and other digital resources. Faculty can help learners develop routines for organizing information and creating conditions that support focused learning.

  Faculty can support this by:

  • Using a clear, logical, and consistent module structure throughout the course.
  • Keeping course materials and activities in predictable locations.
  • Providing clear file names, headings, labels, and instructions.
  • Modeling effective ways to organize course materials and digital work.
  • Encouraging active learning strategies such as note-taking, summarizing, retrieval practice, and self-testing.
  • Avoiding unnecessary tools or platforms that add complexity without clear instructional value.

  Help learners practice this by encouraging them to:

  • Develop a consistent system for organizing course materials and assignments.
  • Take notes and summarize important ideas in their own words.
  • Use annotation, outlining, concept mapping, or other strategies to actively process course content.
  • Create a regular time and place for focused course work when circumstances allow.
  • Reduce avoidable distractions and plan for interruptions.
  • Back up important course work using institutionally supported storage tools.

  Useful resources:

  • American Psychological Association: Six Research-Tested Ways to Study Better
  • How Research from Psychology Can Help You Study Effectively

• Seek Help & Connect with Others  

  Asking for help is an important learning strategy. Online learners need to know whom to contact, how to ask questions, where support is available, and that seeking assistance is an expected and appropriate part of learning.

  Faculty can support this by:

  • Clearly explaining how and when learners can contact you and when they can expect a response.
  • Providing opportunities for learners to ask questions privately and publicly.
  • Creating a course space where learners can ask and answer general course questions.
  • Offering office hours or other opportunities for individual interaction.
  • Making technical, tutoring, writing, library, accessibility, advising, and other support resources easy to find.
  • Checking assumptions about what learners already know about college processes, technologies, terminology, or expectations.
  • Reaching out when a learner appears to be disengaging or struggling rather than waiting for the learner to initiate contact.

  Help learners practice this by encouraging them to:

  • Ask for clarification whenever expectations or instructions are unclear.
  • Seek help early rather than waiting until a problem becomes difficult to resolve.
  • Use instructor feedback, office hours, tutoring, advising, and other available supports.
  • Connect with classmates for appropriate peer support and collaboration.
  • Know where to get technical assistance before they need it.

• Monitor Progress & Use Feedback  

  Learners are better able to make decisions about their learning when they can see where they stand, understand expectations, and use feedback to decide what to continue or change.

  Faculty can support this by:

  • Keeping the LMS gradebook current and using it consistently.
  • Providing clear grading criteria, rubrics, checklists, and examples where appropriate.
  • Providing feedback early enough for learners to apply it to future work.
  • Explaining what successful performance looks like rather than relying only on grades or scores.
  • Creating opportunities for learners to revise, practice, or improve when appropriate.
  • Using available early-alert or learner-support processes when a learner may need additional assistance.

  Help learners practice this by encouraging them to:

  • Check the LMS gradebook and course progress information regularly.
  • Review assignment instructions, criteria, examples, and due dates before beginning work.
  • Read and use feedback rather than looking only at a grade.
  • Ask questions when feedback or expectations are unclear.
  • Identify patterns in their performance and decide what they may need to change.

• Reflect & Adapt 

  Reflection helps learners think about what they understand, how they approached a learning task, what helped or hindered their progress, and what they might do differently in the future. These metacognitive skills can be intentionally incorporated into online course activities.

  Faculty can support this by:

  • Building brief reflection questions into modules, assignments, discussions, or assessments.
  • Using self-assessment and peer feedback where appropriate.
  • Inviting learners to identify what they understand and what remains unclear.
  • Asking learners to reflect on how they used instructor or peer feedback.
  • Giving learners opportunities to reconsider strategies that are not producing the results they want.
  • Encouraging learners to make connections between prior knowledge, current learning, and future application.

  Help learners practice this by encouraging them to ask:

  • What did I learn?
  • What helped me understand this?
  • What was difficult or unclear?
  • What feedback did I receive?
  • What will I do differently next time?
  • Where else can I apply what I learned?

• Build Confidence, Motivation & Relevance 

  Learners are more likely to engage when they understand why their work matters, can see their progress, and believe they have meaningful ways to improve. Faculty can support confidence without lowering expectations by combining challenge with clear guidance, useful feedback, appropriate support, and opportunities to apply learning.

  Faculty can support this by:

  • Maintaining high expectations while providing clear pathways for learners to meet them.
  • Recognizing specific progress, effective strategies, improvement, and accomplishments.
  • Providing meaningful opportunities for learners to make choices in topics, examples, projects, or approaches when appropriate.
  • Connecting course concepts and activities to authentic disciplinary, professional, civic, or real-world contexts.
  • Designing early opportunities for learners to become familiar with course technologies and expectations.
  • Providing examples and models that make quality and expectations visible.
  • Helping learners understand that effective strategies, practice, feedback, help-seeking, persistence, and adjustment can all contribute to improvement.

  Help learners practice this by encouraging them to:

  • Connect assignments and course topics to their interests, experiences, goals, or future work.
  • Notice progress as well as final performance.
  • Use feedback to revise their approach.
  • Try another strategy when the first approach is not working.
  • Seek suggestions and assistance when they need it.
  • Recognize the relationship between their learning strategies and their outcomes.