HOW ONLINE SCHOOL TUITION WORKS
STUDENT SUPPORT
Most criticism of distance education comes from people who have never experienced it; or have only experienced poorly delivered courses. The most common criticism these people make is that it is impersonal or that opportunity for practical learning is severely limited (some would even say non existent).
There are however a variety of ways that interaction can occur between teaching staff and students in a distance education course. In some instances i.e. through the application of contemporary technology, the practical component of a distance education course has the capacity to be stronger than in an on campus course.
Practicals
On campus courses are limited in the quantity and quality of practical delivery in a face to face situation. The biggest limitation is cost. It simply costs a lot to provide teaching staff to demonstrate or oversee practical work, and if the group involved is too large, the quality can begin to drop. In reality, many on campus courses have actually reduced practical course components when faced with funding pressures.
Video and IT technology has been increasingly adaptive and innovative in response to the challenge of teaching practical course components. There undoubtedly will always be some components of some courses that are better taught face to face. Nevertheless, most things which were taught primarily face to face in the past can now be conveyed just as well using video or IT technology. One major advantage of video is that the instruction can be perfected and is not subject to human error, or variations in the quality of the instructor.
One must consider, if it better to watch an outstanding expert demonstrate cleaning a spark plug on video; or is it better to see a moderately competent instructor demonstrate the same thing to a group of twenty people all crowded around a work bench trying to see what is being done.
In reality: despite all the arguments about the benefits of face to face instruction, these are often the options.
Ways of Providing Real Time Support
These include: video conference, social media, chat, workshops, mentors
Video conference
Various applications can connect several people to the same video call at the same time. In effect, any number of students can be talking to a tutor, all having the opportunity to speak as well as hear each others comments.
Schools can schedule video conferences at predetermined times for the delivery of mini lectures, tutorials or simple question and answer sessions.
Regardless of the fact that the students can see each other there is still a risk of some degree of confusion, and people talking over each other. This risk can be reduced significantly by applying rules and ensuring each session is well prepared. Larger session involving more people will most likely also require more preparation and rules.
Possible ways of controlling participation:
- Appoint someone to chair the meeting; or the instructor should from the start, indicate that they are the chair.
- Regulate who can say what, when (e.g. students are only allowed to ask one sentence questions or one sentence statements before allowing someone else to speak; or require ALL questions to be submitted to the tutor prior to the meeting; or distribute a discussion paper prior to the meeting and allocate each student a specified time period in which to speak).
- Produce an agenda breaking the session into sections with times allocated for each section.
- Specify the scope of the session very clearly and do not tolerate discussion outside those parameters.
- Tell the students that either dominant and aggressive behaviour, or submissive, or reclusive behaviour will result in loss of marks in their assessment. Make it clear that you seek (and reward) balanced and mature participation.
- Images and sound transmitted can however be stilted or jerky; depending upon the type of equipment and connection you are using. If the distance between terminals is not as great, this problem may be lessened.
Social Media
Most progressive colleges are harnessing social media as a tool for supporting students, and finding new ways to do so, all the time.
Chat
This involves several students and a teacher (or several teachers) being connected together via computer terminals, normally over the internet. As with video conferencing, they interact in real time, by typing onto a computer keyboard, rather than speaking. Everyone will be able to see what everyone else types.
As with video conferencing planning and control are critical in making this work. Phrases can also be typed into a word processing document before starting a session, then cut and pasted as you go.
If there are concepts you wish to raise and illustrate to the students, have illustrations pre-prepared and ready on your desk top, then cut and paste them into the chat as you go along.
A potential problem with chat has been the capacity of students to understand and use the technology. Some find it hard to work out how to use it; and may drop out in a session. It is a good idea to give those people a “trial run” before any important session.
However computer literacy is rising and most people now expect as well as understand internet (and chat) usage.
Mentors
Effective and meaningful mentoring is very possible for staff assigned as one to one mentors or tutors to individual students.
This is achieved through a variety of communication modes such as email and telephone and is particularly useful in dealing with those students with individual problems in a very meaningful way, irrespective of distance. If the student lives close enough they may even arrange to meet a tutor face to face. The opportunity for real time communication may not always be practicable, but is possible when the need arises.
Providing personal attention such as this is often considered too costly, and many distance education colleges will in fact put limits on this type of interaction. If courses are well structured though, and easy to follow, there will be far less reason for students to seek help, and the demands on the mentor will be greatly reduced.
Experienced tutors or mentors will also find that issues which are raised by students are in the main, the same ones over and over. The tutor/mentor will over time be able to prepare standard responses, keep those on file, and simply cut and paste the stock response from a word processor file, then make a few minor changes. Students will in the main appear to be receiving long personal type responses even though they may not be. Even though it can become increasingly possible to provide what a student perceives as lots of personal attention, once this system is in action it becomes an efficient and cost saving reply mechanism.
The advantage of distance education mentoring is that highly skilled and experienced industry people can often be used in this role. Consider: A skilled professional who works a full time job might never be able to visit and lecture in an on campus course; but they can correspond with a distance education student, because emails or letters can be answered at any time of day or night.
Workshops and other Attended Events
Some distance education courses may have course requirements that includes some student attendance, for certain components, at a particular point in time. These might be for instance:
- Practical workshops or block release programs held periodically on campus
- Requirement to do a component with some other organisation (e.g. A Red Cross First Aid Certificate may be required for some Certificates or Diplomas).
- Work experience – it may be a requirement for certain practical skills to be attained though work experience (well structured documentation may be put in place to ensure the appropriate skills are attained and verified).
- Attendance at events conducted by industry groups (e.g. Seminars, Conferences, Workshops, Training sessions, Trade shows, etc).
- Practical Assessments –the student may be required to attain certain skills then have them verified by an appropriately qualified expert who fills in checklists or writes a report that they sign and return.
