Most recent public comments by Jaime Jamison https://nowcomment.com/users/147354 https://nowcomment.com/documents/377143?scroll_to=3328501 https://nowcomment.com/documents/377143?scroll_to=3328501 I have never taught online. Instead, I was an instructor who attempted to facilitate Emergency Remote Learning (ERT) for a lab-based course for two summers during the COVID pandy. The distinction between ERT and true online teaching is considerable. That is not to say that I took this responsibility lightly or grossly failed to plan the instruction, I simply lacked the time and tools to do it real justice, especially knowing what I know now in terms of the instructional design process. Also, as a side note, outside stressors including the health and safety of all individuals involved, greatly impacted the 30,000-foot perspective on the situation: is learning (under these circumstances) how to distinguish dependent vs. independent variables on a scatter plot, for example, even important when you’re a student who’s afraid to go to a family event for fear of getting sick? Or, possibly even worse, not being able to visit a hospital-bound grandparent due to visitor restrictions? Being in academia I obviously view education as invaluable; however, as a human I realize that you have nothing if you don’t have your health or the feeling of safety and stability. Needless to say, the term “emergency” definitely fits the circumstances surrounding the COVID ERT epidemic. On the contrary, building a successful “learning ecosystem” as described by Hodges, et. al. (2020) requires careful instructional design planning and development using a systematic model (pick one!); it’s NOT simply online content delivery. This learning ecosystem should intentionally incorporate the Nine Dimensions of Learning, choosing the best options within each dimension, for the greatest effectiveness. I appreciated the line stating, “careful planning for online learning includes not just identifying the content to cover but also carefully tending to how you’re going to support different types of interactions that are important in the learning process” (Hodges et.al., 2020). This, again, emphasizes that content delivery is NOT enough! Addressing the fact that learning is both cognitive and social is a crucial element to planning instruction that supports the following interactions: student-student, student-content, and student-instructor. I endorse the definition that [good] online education is a robust ecosystem that fully integrates and supports the cognitive and social aspects of learning, not just a hierarchical transmission of information from teacher to student. It requires full and active participation from instructor and learners alike, which in actuality, is not very different from [good] traditional face-to-face education. Good education, whether in person or online, requires abundant resources, careful planning, and participation. Sat, 06 Jul 2024 14:39:02 -0400