Stacey Clawson
Summary
When used well, online technolog doesn't replace the instructor, but shifts the focus to the student's relationship with the learning process. The learner becomes mre active in his/her responsibility for learning, and the instructor takes on new roles: facilitator, strategist, and coordinator for the learning activities. Obvously, these roles for both teacher and student require careful attention to strategies that would enhance engagement. This may require a shift in the way faculty think and respond to the activities associated with teaching. Maor (2003) sugested the following strategies are most significant in termst of interactive teaching and learning, "providing feedback and instruction, probing, asking salient questions, stimulating the discussion, sythesizing students' comments, and referring to outside resources or experts in teh field" (p.135). It is noteworthy that five of these six strategies are among those ranked most highly by thefaculty members in this study in both online and face-to-face environments. Moreover, The reverse transfer of some interactive modes of communication involving student-to-student discussion and email communication with the instructor from online to face-to-face environments does point to changes in engagement already taking place from students and faculty alike. While more experienced faculty are leading the way in distance education at the institution studied (average of 19,5 years of teaching experience) the technology and the instructional methods and strategies that are identified as useful and ranked highly by the faculty sample are not generally cutting edge and do not create direct student interaction with course content. The implication here is clear: professional development must be tailored to address both the technology skills and pedagogy needd to produce the engagement that creates meaning and positive student outcomes. In addition, staff development that is embedded into the sturcture to support teaching and learning is neede at varying levels to accommodate all, from the early adopters to the reluctant. Shannon & Doube (2004) stressed that the "need for collaboration and consultation, a combination of top down and bottom up strategies, and the need fort a variety of staff developmnet initiatives to meet different and changing needs"(para 73) should be included in any professional development undertaken in higher education.
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