Online Teaching Strategies and Interaction and Engagement

Educational games and simulations can engage students in higher-level cognitive thinking, such as interpreting, analyzing, discovering, evaluating, acting, and problem solving. Recent technical advances in multiplayer, user-created virtual worlds have significantly expanded the capabilities of user interaction and development within these simulated worlds. This ability to develop and interact with your own simulated world offers many new and exciting educational possibilities. This article explores the technical capabilities and educational potential of these new worlds. Additionally, it presents and illustrates a model, which uses interaction combinations, to identify course content and topics having educational applications in virtual worlds.

Critique_It is an online virtual classroom critique system originally developed at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in Croquet and ported to Second Life. The critique is a rudimentary instructional methodology in the arts that can be applied to most other disciplines. Critique_It provides an environment for simulating authentic learning strategies and allowing the possibility for feedback from peers and experts from outside the campus.

An online virtual case-based management system was developed to provide an interactive learning portal using simulated case scenarios, collaborative learning, decision support, and real-time assessment of student motivation and decision skills. Learn how to dynamically create and implement online case scenarios using virtual characters, speech, and other media-rich content.

Realizing the learning opportunity in students' involvement in their learning process through the use of podcasting, a study was conducted at the University of Southern Mississippi to determine students' knowledge and attitudes of podcasting use in teaching and learning before the campus-wide implementation. The results of the study will be presented.

Attrition continues to be a major issue in higher education. Attrition rates for classes taught through distance education are 10 - 20% higher than classes taught in a face-to-face setting. Educators should engage students early and often, using different learning strategies customized to the class content and the students' pre-existing knowledge. The goal for the professor is to develop relationships with the students such that they feel comfortable in the environment. The professor should facilitate learner-learner integration and collaboration so that they will learn from one another and expand their knowledge base together. Through an integrative literature review, this article presents key concepts in online learning and a review of different methods of engaging students with the goals of enhancing the learning process and reducing attrition rates.

The instructor’s inclusion of authentic activities improves the quality of student interaction and learning in online classrooms.

Successful online students share their secrets for getting the most from online classes, focusing on time management, active participation, and practice.

A survey substantiates some ideas about online learning and refutes others.

Successfully fostering interaction in online courses requires incorporating both instructional and social types of interaction in discussion boards.