Designing online learning experiences is hard work. What you gain in the flexibility from the asynchronous nature, you lose in the ability that you have as a teacher to gauge the response of your audience, to improvise and revise on the fly, and to co-create your content. Every step of an online course must be explicitly thought out and documented in advance. However, high quality online courses can be a great way for teachers with limited time to access professional learning experiences or to provide professional learning remotely (i.e. in rural ares) or at scale. Online courses may take the form of webinars (synchronous chats with voice, video, and multimedia), online courses (whole courses or course modules, which may be self-paced and individual, or may be part of an online community with discussions and peer review), or MOOCs (massive open online courses which are free courses that enroll hundreds or thousands of students across the world). A day of scheduled webinars is also referred to as an “online conference”.

Platform does matter in online courses. Modeling is important online and as a coach, so it’s recommended that you use the platforms and tools you expect your teachers to use. Typically that may be an LMS designed for completely online experiences (i.e. Canvas or Moodle), a tool like Google Classroom for hybrid experiences, and Google Sites for a portal.

The US Department of Education has a quality review tool for online learning experiences. Additionally, the design of online courses should align with the Quality Matters standards, should be rooted in good online learning principles and the principles of andragogy, and should allow for personalization and individualization as discussed earlier in the unit. MOOC literature defines two types of MOOCs - cMOOCs which are connectivist MOOCs that focus on experience and communication in forums, and xMOOCs which are courses that look like more traditional online courses. The Friday Institute has developed a set of MOOCs for Educators based on social constructivist principles with a mix of activities from cMOOCs and xMOOCs.

PD Portals

ITFs may choose to create a portal website. In addition to being accessible and reflective of good online learning, the hub should be a place that teachers can turn to for resources. The hub should represent the principles of good web design: being accessible, easy to navigate, clean, and designed for the user. A website should also be updated, have enough resources for teachers to use it, and should have links to internal PD support and activities, relevant tools and resources, and curriculum aligned resources. When you share a tool with a teacher, you should always add it to the website so that teachers can refer back for URLs and a record of resources.