On Friday, February 10, at 11 am, the College of Arts and Sciences Office of Distance Education hosted a Teaching Forum to discuss gauging student workload, planning for an appropriate pacing of course content, and other aspects of designing online courses that are challenging, yet accessible and transparent.
Design choices about anticipated student workload, and how that will translate to an estimated weekly work time that aligns with the appropriate amount for the course credit hours, is an essential part of developing a plan of instruction. Faculty from the College of Arts and Sciences and the ASC Distance Education Coordinator shared their experiences designing and reviewing courses with student workload estimation in mind, and discussed balancing direct and indirect instruction to create an effective and cohesive learning experience.
Anticipated Outcomes – Our goal was that by the end of this session, attendees would be able to...
- Delineate the amount of work that is prescribed as appropriate for a course’s credit value and length of offering
- Identify specific resources that can assist in estimating student workload
- Understand how issues of access, accessibility, and diverse learning communities intersect with how students experience the assigned work in a course
- Assess one’s courses with a lens that provides clarity on how to think about structuring students’ time and effort in an online course.
Panelists:
Michelle Everson (Department of Statistics)
Christopher A Reed (Department of History)
Ila Nagar (Department of Near Eastern and South Asian Languages and Cultures)
Jeremie Smith (ASC Office of Distance Education)
(Transcript for this event can be downloaded here, Captions are also available in the video recording)
List of links and resources that were referenced during the panel discussion:
- ASC Office of Distance Education Instructional Design Consultations
- Distance Learning Template for Carmen
- Carmen Fast Facts for Instructors
- DL Course Review Process and Required Documents
- ASC Distance Learning Syllabus Template
- ASC Online Course Syllabi Examples
- ASC Curriculum Approval Archive (ASCNET)
- ASC Distance Approval Cover Sheet
- Distance Approval Cover Sheet Instructional Resources
- Rice University (original) Course Workload Estimator
- Wake Forest Enhanced Workload Estimator 2.0 Tool
- Austin Peay State University Resource on Direct/Indirect Instruction
- Department of African American and African Studies (AAAS) Credit Hours and Direct Instruction Webpage
Teaching Forum Evaluation Survey
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