I'd like to raise a topic that I haven't seen discussed here much on Moodle and that is the advantages and disadvantages of synchronous and asynchronous teaching via Moodle. As you probably know, I am going to be offering online courses in Egyptian hieroglyphs. I want to offer asynchronous courses but I want to find a way to incorporate some of the advantages of synchronous courses into these courses somehow:
Here are the primary reasons I want my courses to be asynchronous:
1-Students can enroll at any time. They don't have to wait until the next course is available. This will I hope encourage more spontaneous enrollment.
2-Students can finish the course at their own pace. Egyptian hieroglyphs are not an easy topic and require a lot of time, and I want my courses to be accessible to busy people who want to study simply as a hobby. I do think I will have a generous time limit after which people will have to pay a supplementary fee to remain enrolled simply so they don't continue to freeload off of the resources available indefinitely.
I am very interested in creating a community of learners, helping one another. I'm concerned though whether the asynchronous nature of the course will hinder this. In a synchronous course, everyone would be at the same level at the same time and would be in a boat together and facing the same problems together at the same time. On the one hand, I think having more advanced students mixed together with less advanced students in a single course could be beneficial if the more advanced students were willing to help the less advanced students. But if they don't athen it might be more difficult. I hope however that the discussion forums will with time grow to become a resource of their own as the course gets used.
I would love it if anyone would share their experiences with asynchronous versus synchronous learning online, regardless of the subject matter, and any suggestions on how to achieve the goal mentioned in the above paragraph in an asynchronous environment would be helpful.
imho (half a year experience as teacher having 2 classes), if Students have motivation, then synch/asynch doesn't matter.
And as You tallk about having problems in the same place at the same time:
no prblem - the place ish the same - jus't it's virtual ;).
time - yes managing time is more complicated - but virtuality also gives flexibility: You'll have to give longer periods of time to acomplish tasks, but You can give several tasks, so someone, who is quick, doesn't have to wait for everyone.
And as You tallk about having problems in the same place at the same time:
no prblem - the place ish the same - jus't it's virtual ;).
time - yes managing time is more complicated - but virtuality also gives flexibility: You'll have to give longer periods of time to acomplish tasks, but You can give several tasks, so someone, who is quick, doesn't have to wait for everyone.
Hiya, I've been using synchronous and asynchronous support on my Open University physics Course this year. Interesting that the ones who use these facilities are the ones who also make the effort to attend face to face sessions.
I've found using synchronous chat useful for exploring very specific concepts and problem solving where it's hard to extend over a longer discussion.
I'm doing a project over the next couple of years specifically about synchronous support, but looking at things that go beyond chat (shared whiteboards, documents etc). I'd also love to work towards a state where students get together to work on specific tasks, synchronously, or where there's an open chat/session at the same time each work - I've heard lots of anecdotal evidence of these kinds of sessions working well.
One issue - if a student leaves a course - are his/her postings lost?
Andy D
I've found using synchronous chat useful for exploring very specific concepts and problem solving where it's hard to extend over a longer discussion.
I'm doing a project over the next couple of years specifically about synchronous support, but looking at things that go beyond chat (shared whiteboards, documents etc). I'd also love to work towards a state where students get together to work on specific tasks, synchronously, or where there's an open chat/session at the same time each work - I've heard lots of anecdotal evidence of these kinds of sessions working well.
One issue - if a student leaves a course - are his/her postings lost?
Andy D
Hey there,
It's almost a year since this was posted, but this is exactly what we are looking to do. A little more structure, possibly, but the same idea. I'm very interested in whether you or others have started to do this yet, and if so, how it is going.
In particular, as I reflect on this strategy, I am a little concerned that newbies will ask the same kind of questions/have the same kinds of contributions to create a kind of eternal loop, which can get frustrating, or that discussion by those who have been there longer would not be able to move into a deeper level or use technical language without discourgaing newbies. Has anyone seen this happen? Any thoughts?
Thanks,
Jennie
It's almost a year since this was posted, but this is exactly what we are looking to do. A little more structure, possibly, but the same idea. I'm very interested in whether you or others have started to do this yet, and if so, how it is going.
In particular, as I reflect on this strategy, I am a little concerned that newbies will ask the same kind of questions/have the same kinds of contributions to create a kind of eternal loop, which can get frustrating, or that discussion by those who have been there longer would not be able to move into a deeper level or use technical language without discourgaing newbies. Has anyone seen this happen? Any thoughts?
Thanks,
Jennie