Teaching from a Distance

Distance teaching and learning can be a rewarding and exciting experience for both teachers and students. For faculty, teaching a distance course is a very different experience from a traditional course delivery. Moving a course from a campus-based environment to a fully online environment will require a redesign of course materials and often the assessment methods used, along with development of different teaching skills.

CCRI provides a comprehensive set of course tools for faculty interested in teaching from a distance. Faculty who are teaching a telecourse build their curriculum around videos telecast via Rhode Island cable.

Faculty who teach fully online web-based courses will use WebCT/Blackboard Learning System as their primary application.  WebCT has been merged into Blackboard Learning System and the name will change in the next upgrade that the college installs. Faculty in some departments may use off-site systems such as MyMathLab and MyITLab. WebCT is a course management system that includes a large variety of tools encompassing communications, organization and distribution of materials, and tools for assessment and evaluation. Courses can be developed from scratch within WebCT or instructors can draw on and adapt pre-packaged content developed by publishers called e-packs. Although MyCCRI has a limited number of course tools that may be adequate for classroom courses to use as a web supplement, a fully online course will need the added tools and features contained in a the full course management system of WebCT/Blackboard Learning System.

Using the full course management system of WebCT/Blackboard Learning System, faculty can:

  1. have students work in groups through the Students Presentation tool;

  2. use to the Discussion Board to:

    1. have threaded and unthreaded discussions postings

    2. alert you to new posting

    3. mark as read those you already reviewed

    4. compile and print discussions for grading purposes

  3. integrate into the course with materials distributed on a CD-ROM

  4. store larger files and have more overall storage capacity than MyCCRI

  5. monitor students activity in a course, what content they viewed, and what postings the students have made;

  6. do online testing where you can:

    1. generate a random set of questions for each student,

    2. have answers listed in random order for each student;

    3. prevent students from copying or printing the test

    4. analyze the submissions of online test to judge effectiveness

  7. do online survey of students and conduct anonymous post-course evaluations

  8. allow anonymous online postings of questions by students in the Discussion Board.

  9. maintain an online grade-book where online test scores are automatically entered and students can view their current grades in the course for each test, assignment, or project

For a complete comparison of tools available to faculty, go to the IT page on “Comparing WebCT, MyCCRI, and Faculty Web Pages."

WebCT

E-Packs
Ready, Set, Go!

Pedagogy for Distance Courses

Content Resources

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