Learning to Teach Online: Promoting Success through Professional Development

Abstract

The study reported in this paper examined the types of professionaldevelopment activities, support systems, and organizational structures necessary for community college faculty to make transitions from traditional teaching to Web-based teaching. Results indicate that (a) instructional change can by initiated through sustained professional development; (b) change is more meaningful and effective when it occurs in context over a sustained period of time; (c) faculty can embrace innovations when supported by knowledgeable professionals and their peers; and (d) students welcome the use of Web-based components in course work. The implications for practice may be useful to those wishing to increase faculty's online instructional competence.Many colleges and universities are offering online courses to serve wider audiences, deliver more cost-effective instruction, or increase the quality of learning in existing courses (Harley, 2002). According to a recent National Center for Educational Statistics (2003) report, 56% of all 2-and 4-year degree-granting institutions offer distance education courses. User-friendly Web-based course-delivery systems are enabling faculty to teach online or integrate Web-based resources into course materials easily. Colleges are investing in these systems with the expectations that faculty will incorporate them into instructional practices (Floyd,

Faculty Development Programs: The Frequency and Variety of Professional Development Programs Available to Online Instructors

“…These program types included: (1) institutionally-supported self-teaching opportunities, (2) peer mentoring, (3) collaborative course design, (4) workshops, (5) online training, and (6) quality assurance evaluation programs. These faculty development program types were selected based on a review of the literature citing common faculty development programs for online instruction [4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11].…”

Transformative Perspectives and Processes in Higher Education

“…In this respect, instructors occupy the central role in making fundamental changes to teaching and learning (Govindasamy 2002 ;Anderson and Elloumi 2004 ;Desai et al 2009 ). Online courses are only as effective as their implementation and require an intensive preparation, planning, intentional design and attention to detail, which often are neglected in face-to-face teaching (Hinson and LaPrairie 2005 ;Conceicao 2006 ;. This places a new demand on the instructor in the sense that they are faced with many considerations (Cowham et al 2005 ;Schoonenboom 2014 ).…”

“…This places a new demand on the instructor in the sense that they are faced with many considerations (Cowham et al 2005 ;Schoonenboom 2014 ). Instructors must reconceptualize their teaching while shifting from a teacher-centred instruction to a more student-centred instruction when teaching online courses, thereby making substantial changes in their practice (Jaffee 2003 ;Pedersen and Liu 2003 ;Conrad 2004 ;Hinson and LaPrairie 2005 ;Tallent-Runnels et al 2006 ;Conceicao 2006 ). Teacher-centred instruction starts with the instructor's agenda and methods and a greater instructor direction whereas student-centred instruction focuses on learner needs and goals (Barker 2003 ;Jaffee 2003 ).…”

Preparing Teachers for Hybrid and Online Language Instruction

“…The Professional Development Model for Online Course Development (Hinson & LaPrairie, 2005) inspired a five-step plan that will be presented in this paper. It was originally created to help college instructors transition from teaching traditional face-to-face classes to teaching online.…”