Tips for Designing and Teaching an Online Course

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Tips for Designing and Teaching an Online Course

Be consistent

Develop a weekly or unit routine and use it throughout the course.
Try to keep common due dates the same week to week. (see examples below)
Original Discussion posts due by noon on Wednesday
Discussion replies due by 11:30 pm on Thursdays
Practice Quiz due by noon on Friday
Weekly Exam open from 2:00 pm Friday to 2:00 pm Saturday
Set all modules to open on the same day of the week at the same time.
Use similar teaching methods throughout the course.
Use similar technology tools throughout the course to help prevent tech overload for you and students.

Offer Online Office Hours and inform students about them.
Indicate Online Office Hours in your syllabus.
Remind students about Online Office Hours early in the course.
Require students to RSVP for Online Office Hours via email
Create a Course Q&A Discussion Forum and add it to your course homepage.
Tell students to post general questions to the forum instead of emailing you.
Post your answers to the forum for all students to see.
Make sure students know that posts in this forum are public, not private.
Create a special Widget to place this discussion forum on your course homepage. Email Eric for help with this.
Inform students of your expected response times. See the Online Course Syllabus Template for an example.

Record a Welcome Video and post on the course homepage (News).
Send a Welcome Email at least one week prior to the start of class.
Send weekly emails to the entire class to summarize the week’s learning objectives and to check in.
If students do not complete their work, email them immediately to ask them if they are okay and to encourage them to get caught up.

Create a Begin Here module and tell students about it in your welcome message.
Provide links to campus support offices for students.
Use one of the Online Course Templates (click D2L Course Templates and follow the instructions to copy the templates into your course)

Create your own introduction (written or video) AND have students create their own too.
Discuss behavior expectations with students.
In your syllabus
Repeat them in discussion forum descriptions
If students behave improperly, address the behavior immediately.
Encourage students to help each other.
Have students complete a pre-course survey to learn more about them, to learn more about where they may struggle in the course and to start developing instructor-student relationships with them.
Contact Eric for a survey you can use or modify to meet your needs.
Have students complete a mid-course survey so you and the students can make adjustments before the course is over.
Contact Eric for a survey you can use or modify to meet your needs.

Tell students to complete the Online Student Orientation and use the feedback they receive to develop their online skills.
Direct students to the Student Support webpage.
Encourage students to set up D2L text notifications so they are alerted when due dates and quizzes are approaching. You can do the same.
Encourage students to add their course calendar(s) to their personal calendars.