Summary

Congratulations on completing the course!

In this final week, you have looked at ways in which you might change and develop your practice as an online educator. You have considered the different ways in which an internet connection can benefit learners and the expectations about learning in a classroom that may no longer apply online. You have also reflected on the skills that learners need when they move online and been introduced to learning design and its uses. You have also reflected on the skills that learners need when they move online, been introduced to learning design and its uses, and considered how assessment changes in online contexts.

Your final activity of the course is to see how Rita’s getting along and to reflect on your learning.

Well done for making it through the course. We hope you have found both the content and the experience useful. Taking your teaching online can be daunting, but completing this course will have given you insights that enable you to take on the challenge and create exciting new opportunities for your learners.

If you wish to explore online education further, take a look at The Open University’s range of microcredentials in teacher development and online learning [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] , and our Postgraduate Certificate in Online and Distance Education.

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Transcript

RITA:

OK. This is the exciting stage. I think that I now have everything I need to try something. I have identified which elements of the existing classroom-based course that I want to retain, which I will change or adapt, and which learning outcomes that I want my learners to meet in a new way in the online environment.

With these new materials, I will go back to my usual processes for designing learning materials and use my learning design knowledge to ensure the pedagogy underpins what I’m doing. Only then will I allow myself to start getting excited about technologies, media and Open Educational Resources! I’m going to start work on preparing my online teaching materials, and I will hope to see you when I have produced something.

[CLOCK TICKING]

Hello again. I am glad you are still there. I have been working for quite some time, but I think I have a first draft of my online teaching materials ready. I built a framework using my redesigned learning outcomes, and I slotted into it items that would repurpose from my existing classroom materials.

Some of my classroom materials needed a bit of revision, for example making PowerPoints more meaningful and accessible to stand on their own.

Once I had identified where there were gaps, I started looking through all of the OER material I had downloaded from the repositories. When I started looking through it, some of it was immediately rejected due to being the wrong level, not sufficiently accessible, or using teaching techniques that I don’t think are ideal for my learners.

But I did find some wonderful materials too, and with a bit of adjustment to make them suit my purpose, I filled up most of the gaps in my course that way.

Finally, I had to create a few items from scratch as I could find nothing that would do the job. But now I am ready to ask my friends and my accessibility colleagues to look at it and give me feedback. I’m nervous about what they will say, but I am happy to have got this far now.

End transcript