I was engaged in a conversation about on-line learning recently, with someone who has never taken an online course nor taught in that context. I must confess that some of those conversations were interesting at one time. But after teaching on-line courses for fourteen years now I find myself weary of addressing the same rudimentary questions from the uninformed. My impatience usually is with those who are quick to dismiss online learning without having done the responsible work of investigating it. My interest in talking further wanes when it becomes evident that they have thought as little about the pedagogy of the classroom courses they teach.
Which confirms what many know: it’s not the technology, it’s the pedagogy. One scenario I’ve run into is with professors who confess, “I tried teaching online once. I didn’t like it.” Usually what happened is that they felt pressured to offer an online course, from their administration or from some internal neediness to at least appear “with it.” They embark on the venture with apprehension (some with a level of emotional terror) rather than with a spirit of adventure—which in itself pretty much determines how this experience is going to go. Some of the apprehension is out of the fear, often well-founded, that their students will be savvier and more adept in the virtual environment than they. Most of these teachers will struggle through putting their on-line courses together with little training, support, or guidance, often fighting a deadline for launching the course. They’ll spend more time figuring out the mechanics of navigating the interface than they will thinking about the pedagogy necessary for online learning. Most will experience constant exasperation at trying to do online the same thing they do in the classroom, rarely considering that there is a necessary shift in methodology required for success and effectiveness.
After getting the course up and running they spend an unsatisfying semester trying to “teach” a course on-line while learning how to do it (and the fact that they’re trying to do “online teaching” rather than facilitating on-line learning is a clue they haven’t “got it” yet). At the end of the semester they’ll lament about what an awful experience it was and that online teaching does not work for them or for their field of study. That despite the fact that there are any number of other folks teaching the same course, in the same field, successfully online.
Most of those frustrated teachers seem to forget the reality about what it took for them to get good at the teaching they do in the classroom. Most likely had little support, direction, or training when they taught their first classroom course. They put together a course, and taught it, the way they experienced it (or even suffered through it) from their teachers. Their first attempt at a course likely was unsatisfactory if not frustrating. They spent the next two to three times teaching the course figuring out what worked and what didn’t, likely with no integrated theory of learning to inform their approach. By the third or fourth time teaching the same course they began to get their rhythm and pace, anticipate student responses and questions, and get comfortable. By the fifth time teaching the same course it was in good enough shape to be a pretty good course and a good experience for their students. The golden rule here is: “It takes three years to get competent at anything.” Why these same teachers expect different with online learning is a wonder.
