Teach Online:
Adapting Lecture-Based Courses
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In an online lecture-based course (synchronous or asynchronous), the online instructor will typically record and post voice over lecture slides in the LMS, and a handful of check-in activities with learners to ensure that everyone is making sense of the concepts and content. Learners may have online discussions, practice sets, or other homework assignments to complete. Learners in larger classes may also have the opportunity to attend office hours with you, or with a TA, to ask questions and go over challenging material.
Step 1: Create a module
Create a module in your online learning management system (LMS) to contain and organize all the reading, videos, and related activities and interactions for the topic, week, or class session. Make sure to name the module and contents in a way that make them are easily recognizable to learners and that function as advanced organizers for the concepts, themes, or topics. Clearly outline the specific steps learners will need to complete. Consider what will they need to watch, read, complete, submit, or discuss, etc., and if the order of the activities is important, make sure that is clearly articulated.
Step 2: Build your video lectures
Build your video lectures using campus supported tools. Add those lectures to your course module. Keep the following tips in mind as you build your video lectures.
- Keep your lecture recordings short (no longer than 10 minutes). It is OK to have multiple videos for one lecture.
- Watch and listen to your first video to make sure that images and audio are clear and easy to see and understand.
- If you are in the recording, find a location that is well-lit. You do not want the primary light source to be behind you.
- Use a headset or earbuds, or a stand-alone microphone, to increase sound quality. Although many newer computer systems have adequate microphones built into them, your audio will be even better if you use a headset or microphone.
- Some instructors draft scripts before recording. If you do draft a script, consider posting it as supplemental material for learners. This also helps with accessibility.
- Be sure to provide a transcript and closed-captions to comply with accessibility regulations.
- Generally, learners don’t mind if the production values aren’t perfect! If you occasionally say “um” or repeat a word, don’t feel you need to re-record.
Step 3: Create quizzes as comprehension checks
Create quizzes to help students self-assess their comprehension. If there are typically independent homework assignments after the lecture, giving learners a way to check in and to make sure that they comprehended key lecture concepts, facts, themes, can be useful.
- Create low-stakes comprehension checks in the form of quizzes, or self-assessments, to ensure that your learners are getting what they need from the lecture and related homework assignments.
- Create rich feedback using the quiz functionality that points the learner back to specific areas in the lecture, or additional materials for targeted concepts.
- For this type of quiz, err on the side of shorter, and lower stakes. This is not a test of learner knowledge, just a check-in to let both the instructor and learner check comprehension and progress.
Pro tip: Be sure to enable the feature that allows learners to retake the quiz multiple times, so they can check and recheck their comprehension. —this practice encourages learners to go back to the lecture or reading materials to review any material that they may not have fully understood. Often textbook publishers have these questions ready for you to import into your course as test bank questions. These questions make excellent low-stakes quiz, or self-assessment questions.
Step 4: Create an “Ask a Question” discussion forum
Create an “Ask a Question” discussion board forum in your LMS to provide a place for learners to ask questions, and to help and learn from each other. Encourage learners to use the discussion areas you create in the course for any of their public questions related to the lecture content, rather than opting for private individual communications with you. This will help you be more effective and efficient with responses, provide and opportunity for learners to assist each other, and make both questions and responses available to all learners.
Step 5: Set up a synchronous room
Set up a synchronous room for virtual office hours, TA sessions, or other supplemental instructional sessions to assist, clarify, and answer any learner questions. Alternatively, you can also create a discussion forum in the LMS called “Talk with the Professor,” for example, to clearly direct learners to a space where they can have access to their instructor.
Adapted from: https://keeplearning.umsystem.edu/instructors/adapting-lecture-courses
