Faculty Role in Online Learning and Managing Online In Nursing Education

Nursing Education and Faculty Role in Online Learning and Managing Online

Faculty Role in Online Learning In Nursing Education, Managing Online Discussion and Faculty Role In Nursing Education.

Faculty Role in Online Learning In Nursing Education

    The faculty member's role as an educator undergoes a change when he or she is teaching online courses (Halstead, 2002). First of all, real time, face-to-face interaction with students becomes more limited, with many interactions occurring asynchronously. Most importantly, in online courses the educator is less likely to be the primary source of information for students. 

    Instead, the educator's role becomes one of facilitating students' learning experiences. Students assume more responsibility for their own learning needs and being self directed in how they choose to meet identified learning outcomes. For some faculty who are new to online teaching, this results in feeling a loss of control over the learning process. 

    Teaching online may require faculty to rethink long held beliefs about the role of the educator in the teaching learning process and explore new paradigms of teaching (Shovein, Huston, Fox, & Damazo , 2005). Becoming a “facilitator” of learning, however, does not lessen the need for the educator or the importance of the educator's role in the learning process. 

   The educator retains responsibility for identifying the expected outcomes of the course, designing learning activities that will promote active student involvement in the learning process and higher-order thinking, and evaluating student performance. Facilitating online discussion is another important role for faculty who are teaching online (Bristol & Kyarsgaard , 2012). 

    Faculty should encourage peer interaction rather than student instructor conversation. There should be variety in the types of discussion, which may include reflection, critical thinking, and post clinical conferencing. Clear grading rubrics to evaluate discussion provide timely feedback to students, so that they will know whether they are achieving the desired learning outcomes. 

    Two common concerns of faculty who are engaged in online teaching for the first time are related to how to facilitate and manage asynchronous online discussion and how to manage time most effectively. Faculty have indicated that their workload increases when they engage in online teaching (Ryan et al., 2005). 

    In their comparison of faculty workload in web based and face-to-face graduate nursing courses, Anderson and Avery (2008) found that, although the amount of faculty teaching time did not increase in a statistically significant manner in online courses, there were differences in the amount of time spent in course preparation and student contact time, with those faculty teaching online courses reporting more time devoted to each of these activities. More research is needed to more fully understand the demands on faculty workload created by online teaching. 

Managing Online Discussion and Faculty Role In Nursing Education

    Time management frequently becomes an issue for faculty teaching online courses because of the amount of student communication generated within the course. The communication generated by students in online courses can be overwhelming if the educator has not given some prior thought to how to manage it. 

    Successful management of asynchronous discussion requires the educator to initially identify the purpose of the discussion and to be sure that all students are contributing to the discussion (Halstead, 2002). As the online discussion unfolds, the educator may find it necessary at times to change the direction of the discussion or to correct any factual errors students may have made in their postings. 

    However, faculty usually serve as discussion facilitators (Zsohar & Smith, 2008). It is not desirable to respond to every comment made by students in online discussion; Faculty should strive to avoid dominating the conversation, reserving their comments to emphasize or summarize key concepts, praise students and provide feedback as appropriate, and make other similar contributions. 

    Because online courses promote student flexibility and convenience in learning, students tend to access the course, post comments, and send e-mails to faculty at all hours of the day, 7 days a week. That is why it is essential to implement time management strategies before the course begins. 

    By having a plan in place, faculty can respond to student comments in a timely manner while still retaining a sense of control. Some strategies for managing online communication that have proven helpful include:

(1) deciding how quickly to respond to student inquiries (eg, within 48 hours) and informing students of this time frame so that they will know when to anticipate an answer

(2) establishing individual student electronic file folders in which to retain a record of course communication

(3) using a separate e-mail account or the learning or CMS e-mail option for student communications, so that student e-mail is automatically separated from other professional or personal correspondence

(4) establishing “electronic” office hours to interact with students

(5) creating and saving standardized responses to the most commonly asked questions that can be quickly accessed and individualized for students. 

    Faculty may also find it helpful to “block out” scheduled amounts of time each week to devote to the online course. Another means of managing online communication is to have students provide peer feedback to postings in the discussion forums. 

    Students can critique posted assignments, lead and summarize group discussions, and participate in collaborative group learning activities. Students can be responsible for synthesizing and analyzing the responses in the forum, thus providing faculty and classmates from other groups an opportunity to respond to summarized work. 

    Faculty can appoint and rotate student discussion leaders to provide opportunities for all students to experience a leadership role. Not only do these techniques foster timely feedback and reduce sole reliance on the faculty for feedback, but they also promote active learning (Phillips, 2005). These strategies also work to effectively manage discussion in classes that have larger enrollments.