Many factors can contribute to student success in online courses, but one of the most important is access to constructive feedback. Recent advancements in educational technology provide educators with opportunities for providing richer feedback than they would typically be able to give in face-to-face courses. However, if instructors don’t put adequate time and creativity into planning these interventions, they will not serve as a sufficient replacement for instructor presence and interaction during a course.
How You Can Help Improve Student Success In Online Courses:
Implementing Comprehensive Interventions To Support Student Success In Online Learning This blog post will outline some of the challenges associated with student success in online learning.you can also learn from online courses platform. As an instructor of online courses, I will also share how you can help improve student success by implementing successful practice and feedback interventions.Online learning critics and skeptics often point to the lack of student interaction as a primary issue. This is particularly true for providing feedback on assignments, quizzes and tests. Educators often feel that they cannot adequately provide feedback because of the “silence” in these courses. But, while there is undoubtedly an element of seeing your students’ faces and hearing their voices, there is also an opportunity for you to provide student-centered feedback through online courses. This type of feedback becomes even more critical when you only have one class meeting per week.
Challenges associated with student success in online learning:
● Lack of effective interaction with instructors: In some ways, it may seem more accessible for students to succeed in online courses than face-to-face ones because instructors are not physically present. However, evidence suggests that students experience more difficulties satisfactorily completing the course material when interacting only virtually with instructors or peers.
Some studies have suggested that difficulties related to interacting only virtually might include lack of social support, reduced access to resources and increased feelings of isolation. For example, a study conducted by Joseph and Stevens (2009) found that students enrolled in online engineering courses reported lower levels of interaction with their peers than their on-campus counterparts. This trend was especially marked when the students were assessed for emotional indicators (such as loneliness and social support).
● Lack of knowledge about effective strategies for learning: Online courses may provide students with an opportunity to devote more time to their studies than they would otherwise have had in a face-to-face course. However, it is essential to remember that such an opportunity will not necessarily result in increased learning.
One study illustrated the importance of providing students with strategies to help them learn effectively. In the study, college students enrolled in an introductory physics course were provided with feedback on applying concepts when solving problems. Another group of students received no additional feedback. Both groups were then asked to solve as many problems as possible over 15 minutes (Joseph, 2007). The results showed that the students who had received feedback had solved significantly more problems than those in the other group.
How Do I Help My Students Succeed?
Once you have read about some of the challenges associated with student success in online learning and identified your feelings about them, you might wonder how you can effectively help your online students achieve success both from your course and the discipline itself. Here are some examples of how you can do just that.
1. Demonstrate an understanding of what your students face: When I was an instructor at a community college, one course that I taught had several online learners who were worried about not fully comprehending the material, especially when it came to the subject area of psychology. Some students even reported needing some extra support to help them succeed. This was something that I was not aware of before taking on the course.
I decided to selling courses and ask each of my students to complete an Internet usage survey to address this issue. The survey helped me determine that it was indeed possible for them to comprehend the course’s content thoroughly. The survey also helped me understand their fears about not understanding the subject matter and their confidence in applying what they learned in class.
2. Help your students identify a learning style and support them: Another factor that can complicate students’ ability to succeed in an online course is their learning style and how they prefer to learn best. Some courses may require independent study, while others may benefit from more collaborative peer interaction. To provide my students with the best possible learning experience, I completed an online survey that provided me with a snapshot of their individual preferences. From this, I developed a student-centric learning strategy to enhance their overall success by teaching them how they were able to learn best (and where I could provide them with additional support).
