Online Course Delivery Presentation by Linda Ffolliott, ECAT March 22, 2007

Online course delivery – what does this mean? Teaching classes or doing instruction Somehow the Internet is involved in teaching, as opposed to correspondence course Today we are looking at tools, then doing a discussion of pros and cons compared with face- to-face

My experience Have taught at least 15 distance classes, starting with delivered courses, moving over to web, have used WebCT for several courses, and have used Breeze and currently using podcasts Have taken 7 classes myself, some lasting for multiple months and others just a few weeks Encourage you to take distance classes to see what it is like from the “student” side

Handout Outlines tools and gives contact information or URLs for more information

Any experiences taking online classes? International Webmasters Association (not free, $150+ charge); have to buy book Hewlett Packard sponsored classes (lasting a couple of weeks) (free but limited in scope) Linked from cals.arizona.edu/ecat/classes

Components involved Delivery of content through the Internet Communication with students Interaction of students with materials and each other Instructor is physically separate from students Students can be and often are separate from each other

Tools D2L Moodle Breeze Password protected site on CALS Listservs Blogs Podcasts

Live or not-live? Synchronous – students and instructor are connected and “doing the class” at the same time Asynchronous – students and instructor for the most part are connected at different times; makes it easier for people who are working with schedule conflicts or are in different time zones

D2L Learning management system Replaced WebCT on UA in 2005 Lots of features such as time-release of materials, discussion area, calendar, notices, online quizzes, surveys, within the course, chat, dropbox, FAQ, glossary, online gradebook

D2L continued Requires a University NetID to use system, so rules out using this for classes for public If the class is non-credit, there is a charge of $14.50 per seat per year to deal with manually adding and deleting students into the class has links for tutorials and to request a sitewww.help.d2l.arizona.edu/forinstructors.htm

Moodle Online course management, open source (free), available on UA computer, NetID is not required Being used by several other land grant institutions Not being used for any real classes at UA, limited support See book Moodle E-Learning Course Development ($40)

Moodle (and D2L) designed for interactive learning The theory is that people learn best when they interact with the learning material, construct new material for others, and interact with other students about the material. Interaction is not required but that is how this tool was set up.

Interaction with course materials Assignment (uploading files to be reviewed) Choice (a single question) Journal (an online journal) Lesson with conditional, branching activity Quiz Survey (results can be shared with others)

Interaction with other students Chat (live online chat between students) Forum (discussion boards) Glossary (students and instructors can contribute terms) Wiki (shared web document) Workshop (support collaborative, graded efforts among students)

Moodle continued Has time release of files, discussion forums, calendar, notices, online quizzes, chats, glossary, ability to generate certificate online. Does not have online gradebook nor within the system. Contact Jim Austin at to set up site Example courses at

Breeze Web conferencing system available through Learning Technology Center A synchronous tool, so people can conduct a “meeting” while being in different locations Can share documents or applications on your computer Contact Wayne Brent at to be set up as meeting organizer

Password protected site on CALS You can create a website on CALS which is password protected. Fast way to get up content, but does not have online quizzes, time release of files, discussion forums Would have to use with a listserv or blog for communication Contact Linda Ffolliott for help with setting up a password protected folder

Listservs on CALS Entire course can be delivered through but it is doubtful you would use this alone Two options on CALS server –Mailman – graphical interface, more functions and configuration options –Majordomo – send commands to manage list People can have any type of but must be CALS faculty/staff to request Request at

Blog Special user-generated website where entries are made in journal style and can be “threaded” Typically contains text, images, links, web pages, and other media To request a blog, contact Stuart Glogoff at This would probably not be an entire course

Blog continued css/resources_tools_blogs.cfmhttp://graphics.ltc.arizona.edu/ltc- css/resources_tools_blogs.cfm

Podcasts Media files distributed by subscription (paid or unpaid) over the Internet. Can be audio or visual with audio People play files on iPod or using iTunes on computer General information at

Recording Powerpoint To record Powerpoint talks with voice can use Camtasia. Release 4 lets you export as Quicktime movie (with special settings) which makes it useable by iTunes. Camtasia sold by TechSmith Single user license is $299. Can download trial.

Discussion of Experiences and Observations Why are you considering an online course? Can this be used with all students?

Face-to-face teaching Advantages? Disadvantages? Student requirements? Instructor requirements?

Online teaching Advantages? Disadvantages? Student requirements? Instructor requirements?

Think about Is this totally being taught online or is there a face-to-face component? Length of class (length of individual “lessons” and over what time period and at what interval) What do you want students to learn? What expect students to do/show?

Things to do Decide on content and its format Decide on length of a given session and frequency Decide how students will interact with each other Decide on exercises or quizzes Decide about topics for discussion