Before you orient your students to your online course, it's good
to get some experience with what such an orientation should include.
In this first activity, a type of scavenger hunt, you will get
a taste of the online experience yourself, as if you were a student
seeking information about your first online course.
1. You are a college freshman and you want to take your first
online course. Choose one of the following courses: English Composition
and Rhetoric, College Mathematics, or General Psychology.
2. Now, choose one of the colleges below where you can take
your chosen course. Click on the link that will take you to your
college’s web site.
Brevard
Community College (FL)
DeAnza
College (Cupertino, CA)
Northern
Virginia Community College
The
University of Idaho
Honolulu
Community College
University
of Texas at Austin
Pennsylvania
State University
Maricopa
County Community College (AZ)
Capital
Community College (CT)
3. Your job is to search the web site for the information you
need so that you can take the online course you chose. On a piece
of paper, record the answers to the following questions about
the course you chose:
- What college or university did you choose?
- Is the course provided completely online?
- How much is the tuition? How much are
any additional fees for the online course, if any? How much
will it cost an out-of-state student to take the online course?
- Is a course syllabus provided online?
- What is the prerequisite for the course?
Is there information provided for this prerequisite? (e.g.,
Course description, syllabus, or course outline)
- What are the titles of any required textbooks?
Can they be purchased online?
- When is the course offered (start and
end dates)?
- Is there any required on-campus meetings?
(e.g., for tests, orientation, oral reports, etc.)
- Is the instructor’s name and contact
information provided?
- Can a student register online for the
course?
- Is the prospective student offered a peek
into an online course?
4. After getting answers to these questions, go to the forum
for Online
Course Scenario and describe how difficult, or easy, it was
to find this information.
|