How can educators effectively build relationships by encouraging safe communication and interactions in online & open learning spaces? What did you already know, what do you know now based on the course readings and activities, what do you hope to learn?
With the sudden shift to online schooling over the past year, it has imposed new complications for university students of all ages. Figuring out how to use all of the new workplace platforms and how to stay on top of all of the work that we are being assigned is just scratching the surface of the difficulties of learning how to work completely online. I believe that in education building relationships with classmates face to face is one of the most impactful experience for all university students to be apart of. With all of the classes now being held via zoom it has made it hard for students to make those face to face interactions and therefore in my opinion is taking away from their university experience.
Teachers/educators can help students make connections online with other students in numerous ways inside and outside of the classroom. From using the breakout group chats in the zoom classes to the discussion forums on the classroom pages there are many ways students can communicate together. Outside of the online resources provided by the institute that one is attending, using social media platforms I believe is a little more helpful than making relationships with students through classrooms. As most students don’t spend the majority of their time navigating the class pages there is a much better chance that they will be on a social media platform of some sort. Although getting students to reach out to each other outside class time is most likely not within educators capabilities it would be a more effective way of encouraging safe communication between students.
After doing some of the course readings I learned a few things that spiked my interest. The one that caught my interest the most was when I came across a list of different strategies for deciding whether to teach online or not. These strategies listed numerous reasons to want to switch towards online classes, but also listed some of the losses from not teaching in person. The strategy that stood out to me the most was “Strategy 1: Consider Core Values”. When reading into this strategy they touch on weighing the benefits of teaching online with what components students are missing out on by not being taught face to face.
Throughout this course and semester I am hoping to learn more ways that my professors will encourage safe communication and interactions with other students online. I support working online as I do believe that it has a lot of very useful components that we will all learn to use, but I will be looking forward to the day that we are allowed to go back to classrooms and get back to our university lifestyle.
References:
https://bright.uvic.ca/d2l/common/assets/pdfjs/1.0.0.30/web/viewer.html?file=%2Fcontent%2Fenforced%2F55418-202009EDCI339A02(11200)CO%2FTeaching_Online_A_Guide_to_Theory%2C_Research%2C_and_P…_—-_(1_Teaching_Online_as_Instructional_Change).pdf%3Fd2lSessionVal%3DzPuvRyk7rmkzokR8mC5CAoFY8%26ou%3D55418&lang=en-ca&container=d2l-fileviewer-rendered-pdf&fullscreen=d2l-fileviewer-rendered-pdf-dialog&height=789#349-59588_Major_ch00_5P.indd%3ATocBack_Link3
Thanks for sharing, Quinton! You have a really good point on using social media platforms that are outside of what institutes provide to communicate and build relationships. Especially for mature students, using platforms like Facebook to connect and chat with provides a more relaxed environment where most of the students are already familiar with the platform. I agree that it has been overwhelming trying to learn all these new platforms with the transition over the year to online learning and having something very familiar (like the social media platforms), can help increase interaction between peers. I appreciate the difference perspectives you bring, they are very interesting and relatable!
This was a great blog to read quinton. You did a great job. I totally agree that making face to t face interactions iwth your peers is a strong and vital role in education of post secondary students. I mean, conversing with your peers is literally how make our friendships are made. You brought up a great point about social media! We are livign in a world where everyting is done online, even learning! Social media is a great way to meet your classmates and have conversations. Furthermore, everyone nowadays is on social media so finding your classmates is often easy. What i have learned is taht when you are struggling in class, someone else in your class is also struggling. And sometimes, reaching out to a classmate via social media can be as simple as “hey, i am in your clas XXX, I needed some help with this assignment, could you please help me out?”. It is hard for some people to reach out to someone you are not familiar with and message them, in an online learning setting, social media can be a strong tool for making connections and wokring/learning collaboaratively. Thus, i wholeheartdely agree with you that instructors should promote reaching out to peers on social media in a respectful manner. I enjoyed reading your blog and looking forward to reading more of what you write.
Hey Quinton thanks for sharing your thoughts! I do believe that face to face interactions are very important when building connections with students. However, some things I have found helpful when teaching online are holding virtual sessions for students to connect with their friends, playing introductory games such as 2 truths and a lie on Flipgrid, and making connections to the students’ homes and families via video.