Group items tagged

"With teachers and students separated, maintaining a sense of community relies on some of the same practices they used in the classroom."

"One of the most common questions we hear from instructors who are first moving to an online teaching environment is, "How do I build community in an online class?""

"The online teachers provided support by building ties to students through interactions via discussion forums and individual communications. Peers also provided support through online forums and webinar-facilitated exchanges. Online teacher and peer student support contributed to the formation of virtual online learning communities. This is important as social and academic integration are mechanisms for retention and success. This research is significant as the numbers of online students have increased markedly in recent times, but student support services do not appear to have changed accordingly. Further, support models for retention and success have not been adequately adapted to suit online learners' needs."

Many of these would work for any level, even post-sec.

Meaningful learner interaction is critical to developing second language skills.... What are some tasks that facilitate interaction and build learner community when teaching and learning online?

"Stephen Hersh outlines six steps for how you can create a community of active learning online if you 'use the medium.' "

From Georgia Virtual Learning: "The Effective Online Teaching course content is free for all learners. Learners are prompted throughout the course to complete blog postings to document learning and artifacts. This allows learners to share their work within their professional learning community or with their professional learning leader or coach. Participants may also enroll in verification for the Effective Online Teaching course."