Optimize your Use of E-Tools 

Co-Create with Learners

Integrate the "Real" World

Key Strategies for Online Student Engagement

Learner to Learner

Learner to Content

Learner to Instructor

Actively establish your presence and engage students:

-engage before the course starts; you may want to offer an introductory video, discussion prompt, fascinating article or online text to prompt engagement

-promote student activity early in the course

- timely feedback to student questions, postings and assignments is key!

-engage in discussion groups and activities; guide conversations by striking a balance between being absent and being overly directive  

-teach, model and reward critical discourse rather than procedural commenting

Use discussion boards in innovative ways:

-online debates

- online focus groups

- group or individual blogging

- collaborative exams

- collaborative notetaking with each group's notes available to all others

-one-on-one discussion boards with each student

-group case study problem solving

- sharing of completed assignments for the benefit of other learners

- dialogue with university or community experts

- require regular contributions and follow up if students don't make them

Go beyond the standard tools - try some of these:

- twitter

- podcasting

- livepolling(Alec Corous sheet )

- google suite - including for collaboratively developing documents or resource libraries  (Justin Longo)

- videos (especially of things other than lectures; including role-plays, news clips, scenarios, experts performing professional tasks, interviews)

- 3D virtual environments, simulations and gaming

- student video journaling

Facilitate effective learner to learner interactions:  

- include synchronous experiences such as webinars

-  host dedicated online spaces for groupwork (such as Zoom meeting rooms) that can be utilized at any time

- establish private discussion boards for each student group

-plan interactive icebreakers which may make use of a variety of media (videos, pictures etc)

- place students in deliberately diverse groups

- encourage students to meet where they are most comfortable which may be social media platforms, mobile apps, etc.

Co-create with Learners

Engaged learners are active members of the course rather than passive recipients.

By allowing students to shape the course collaboratively you increase student buy in and build a strong online community with engaged students.

• Involve students in co-designing course structure and content
  
• Allow students to collaboratively "complete" the syllabus
•   Create depository of relevant materials which all students contribute to (you could use Google Docs, Pinterest, a message board, etc.) Justin Longo does this using Google Suite.

Curriculur Co-design

• Provide categories of readings and allow students to select from within a category. Having students share their learnings from selected readings gives all students exposure to more content and varying perspectives on a topic.
  
• Allow students choice in assignments, texts, formats or mediums of information reporting , etc.
  

Self-directed Readings & Assignments

• Encourage students to reflect on and report or assess their own learning
  
• Incorporate self-reflective assignments
• Encourage students to identify their own knowledge base and knowledge gaps; use these understandings in subsequent activities, for example to groups students with varying strengths
  

Meta-cognition

- Establish partnerships and have students  undertake work that contributes to those partner organizations and the community (Alanna Cattapan did this in JSGS 880)

-E- Service Learning

- E-field Trips - can be augmented reality field trips or field trips taken in person (by instructor or other students) and webcast live with student interaction

- Data analytics, interpretation and visualization, especially when shared

- Student creation of course related  resources (instructional tutorial, podcast, apps)

- Digital curation

-Creation of augmented editions of key texts (i.e. digital critical editions of texts that track changes over versions, contextual information and provide links to related online resources)

- Use students' professional experiences as the basis of case studies and class discussion

-Host webinars or discussion boards that include current professionals as participants

- Have students apply theoretical content to their own work context

- Have students share assignments that explore their professional experience with the whole group

Engage with Professional Experience and Settings

Engage with Content /Data

Engage with Community

Problem Based Learning (PBL)

In PBL complex and ambiguos real life challenges are addressed by teams of students in a self directed manner.

For successful PBL online:

•  
• work hard to establish a connected community of learners
• build diverse student groups
•  
• take a supportive role as the instructor rather than a directive one  
•  
• give students many means of exploring problems together
• encourage students to  use social media and mobile devices to connect
  
•  
• use video or multi-media problem prompts
•  
•   

Consider a flipped classroom approach in which students view pre-recorded lectures in advance and spend class time discussing issues and working on their problem

Use problem-based activities as assessments in order to assess high level skills authentically. This helps avoid the common problem of assessment methods being misaligned with course objectives.

Case / Scenario Based Learning

Simulations / Interactive Scenarios

Cases can also be the basis for role plays or interactive scenarios. For example, some instructors use cases with legal implications as the basis for role played trials with students playing the role of defendants, prosecutors, witnesses etc.

Policy cases lend themselves to game or role plays in which students take on the role of various policy makers and stakeholders and collaboratively work to arrive at a policy solution. Jim Marshal, JSGS Instructor, facilitates a Treasury Board Simulation in which students play the role of decision makers responding to complex financial information, varied stakeholder demands, and changing circumstances to allocate resources.

Case Studies

Real world cases are often most engaging for students. Consider having students develop cases, especially based on their own professional experiences.

Cases can be used as the basis for live discussions as well as asynchronous written discussions, team projects and formal debates. If you will be conducting discussions about cases using written responses, provide students with clear guidelines and examples of what constitutes a thorough and constructive response.

In circumstances in which students are responding asynchronously to cases, they can be encouraged to provide linkages to

specific course materials when analyzing the case. You can also have students work together to create shared depositories

of materials relevant to the case with a social bookmarking tool.

Experiential Learning

-  

Virtual Field Trips and Field Experience

Increasingly students can visit field trip locations through recorded or virtual reality tours. These can be existing tours you access online or videos created by you or students.

Also consider taking students on live field trips by conducting trips yourself, streamed live via webcast to your student group with the use of a Go Pro. You could also give students the option of leading a live tour of a relevant destination in their area with relevant commentary as part of an assignment.

E-Service Learning 

Service learning can be done completely online. Identify community organizations that require  work in the form of analysis, reports, drafts of policies, etc. that can be conducted at a distance and delivered as electronic documents. Assign student teams to partner with organizations and provide a finished product that contributes to that organization's work (like our Policy Shop student group does).

Alternatively, have students partner with local organizations in their communities to do a service project as part of the course. 

Citizen Science & Crowdsourcing Initiatives

Have students identify and / or participate in existing citizen science or crowdsourcing initiatives. 

Especially relevant may be initiatives which are crowdsourcing policy or citizen input. Students can checkout the CrowdLaw Catalogue to see if their are initiatives in their home jurisdictions they can get involved with.

Engagement with Practitioners

Students may reach out to  practitioners in order to arrange shadowing opportunities, interviews about their roles or a specific aspect of what they do. These interviews can be shared online as video or audio recordings, reports, or transcripts. Interviews can even be conducted over a distance.  

Practitioners can be public servants but also politicians, advocates, representatives or non-profits, public boards, etc.

In order to make a collective impact, the class could curate a gallery of interviews and share it publicly.

More resources...

U of S Intro to Teaching Online Course (Available to all JSGS Faculty)

U of S Distance and Online Learning Faculty Guides & Resources

Experiential Learning Resource List from McGill

Problem Based Learning Info & Resources from Queen's

edshelf.com  - a search engine and bookmarking tool for educational websites, apps, and programs

References

Mind Mapping 

Creating Infographics

Blogging

Interactive Polling

Social Bookmarking

Creating Videos

Screen Casting

Creating Custom Animation

Podcasting

Free Assets - Music, Pictures, Etc.

Find programs, apps and tools for:

Make Great Videos

Free to download software to record what you are doing on your computer with voiceover.

Active Presenter 7

Online, easy to use video creation service with free plan.

Typito

Opensource downloadable software for screencasting best for those with some skill.

OBS Studio

Online screencaster, easy to use. No download required.

APowersoft

Cloud based video and presentation editor offers free education accounts.

Moovly

A social video creation site for education that can help connect online students.

Flipgrid

Screencasting

Custom Animation

Free open source software to download for audio recording and editing.

Audacity

Online animation software with free plan. Includes a the ability to make whiteboard animations.

Animaker

A strong option for easy podcast upload and publishing for free.

Podbean

Popular audiosharing platform with a large built in audience.

Soundcloud

Another free online option. However, the free plan has limited assets.

Animatron

Adobe's paid software will give you the best results but has a learning curve and a price. 

Adobe AfterEffects

Podcasting

Free Assets

Coggle is an easy to use online mind mapping tool with a free plan.

Coggle

A well curated resource providing beautiful modern images for unrestricted use.

Unsplash

A basic open source mind mapping program for download.

FreeMind

Collaborative white board app that makes for easy, illustrated mind mapping and more. (Free plan).

Sketchboard

A compendium of music and sounds with creative commons copyrights.

Freesound

A search engine of multiple image sites with varying re-use licenses. 

Everystockphoto

MindMapping

Interactive Polling

Diigo allows you to collaboratively bookmark and annotate websites and PDFs.

Diigo

Poll your students live, display results instantly in your Powerpoint Presentations. Free < 40 students.

Polleverywhere

Collaboratively bookmark photos, documents, web links and more.

Padlet

Share documents in an easily accessible, familiar way. 

Google Docs

Instantly get feedback or assess students.

Socrative

Allow students to propose answers to a question and vote.

Tricider

Social Bookmarking 

Creating Infographics

Turn slide presentations interactive   by live streaming them to students phones and including polls, notes and more.

Hypersay

Easy to use online software with limited assets in free plan.

Easel.ly

Create more visually engaging and connected slide presentations.

Prezzi

A fairly basic presentation tool  that allows for collaboration.

Google Slides

Free open source illustration software. Has a steep learning curve but lots of usability for free.  

Inkscape

Infographic and presentation making software with free version.

Visme

Presentations

Resources that informed this document

Brooke, Stephanie L. 2006. "Using the case method to teach online classes: Promoting Socratic dialogue and critical thinking." International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education 18 (2): 142-149.

Devine, Kay and Deborah C. Hurst. 2018. Online student engagement and success in graduate studies. In On the Line edited by  Khare,  Anshuman  and Deborah C. Hurst,  97-109. New York: Springer, Cham.

Bolliger, Doris U. and Florence Martin. 2018. "Instructor and student perceptions of online student engagement strategies." Distance Education  39    (4): 568-583. DOI: 10.1080/01587919.2018.1520041

Conrad, R. and J.A. Donaldson. 2012. Continuing to Engage the Online Learner. San Francisco, CA: Jossey‐Bass.

Kauffman, Heather. 2015. "A review of predictive factors of student success in and satisfaction with online learning." Research in Learning Technology 23. ISSN 2156-7077

Meyer, Katarina A.  2012. "Creative uses of discussion boards: Going beyond the ordinary." The Community College Enterprise 18( 2): 117– 121.

Meyer, Katerina A. 2014. "Student engagement in online learning: What works and why." ASHE High. Edu. Rept. 40: 1-114. doi:10.1002/aehe.20018

Redmond, Petrea,  Amanda Heffernan, Lindy-Anne Abawi, Alice Brown and Robyn Henderson. 2018. "An online engagement framework for higher education." Online Learning 22(1): 183-204. doi:10.24059/olj.v22i1.1175

Waldner, L.eonora, Sue McGorry and Murray Widener. 2010. Extreme e‐service learning (XE‐SL): E‐service learning in the 100% online course. MERLOT Journal of Online Learning and Teaching 6( 4):839– 851.