Online School

Educational Revolution

In a bar workers' course in online school, you have to ask your bar manager to spend 10 minutes at the end of each shift giving you feedback on your work that day and record his/her comments on the Performa that you can download from the course Web site. E-mail the completed proformas to your tutor.

* A materials science course. Photograph local examples of the effect of pollution and weather on various types of stone. E-mail four examples of these photographs to your tutor and to your learning set with an accompanying explanation which states the stone type, how pollution/weather has impacted on the stone, and what steps could be taken to prevent further deterioration.

Distance education need no longer be an isolated endeavor, as group interactions can easily be incorporated into Web courses. Discussion can be conducted via e-mail or using a conferencing system. Ensure that your course builds in activities that allow your learners to share and develop their ideas with others in the course. This could include brainstorming, debating and discussion.

Examples of whole group activities:

* A media course." What value is there in studying advertisements?" Discuss in the course conference.
* A marketing course. "What impact will increase confidence in Internet security have on online shopping?" Initiate or contribute to a discussion in the course conference during Week 4. Include hyperlinks in your message to Web sites that support any points that you make.
* A tourism course. A topic sub-conference has been set up. Within the next 72 hours a brainstorm will be held. As a whole group you should come up with as many ideas as possible about advice you would give to tourists intending to travel to world trouble spots. After 72 hours the tutor will produce a report based on the brainstorm and post it to the conference.

Learners can also be given tasks to complete in Small groups and in pairs. They could work on projects that require investigation and then negotiation, which will lead to an agreed outcome.

Example of small group activities:

* A foreign language course. Post a 150-word autobiography to your learning set's sub-conference in the target language. Post at least three follow-up messages commenting or seeking clarification upon the other autobiographies.

* A film studies course. Within the next 48 hours download the Martin Scorsese quiz from the course Web site and with your pair find out the answers and post them to the course conference.