The insight that ONL181 has given me into distance and online learning is inexplicable. This course has not only created a platform for bettering ourselves as online tutors, but it’s also given us the opportunity to put ourselves into the shoes of a student, and understand what goes into online studies. Week by week, my eyes have been opened to various aspects, some of which, honestly speaking, I have not paid enough attention to. Below you’ll find details of a couple key points I’ll be taking with me from this experience.

1. The past few weeks have highlighted that the culture of distance studies is vastly different to that of full time studies. It’s quite evident that it takes a world of dedication, motivation and perseverance to commit oneself to studying online/distance. We have to acknowledge this, accommodate and encourage our students. Support is so important in a course where you often don’t get to interact with students face-to-face.

2. From a student’s perspective, I’ve come to learn that time management is crucial, something we need to stress on. We need to constantly remind students of deadlines as a course progresses so that they are able to stay ahead of things.

3. Clear guidelines needs to be given to students so that they know what is expected of them from the outset. This can easily be done in the form of objectives, whereby students are able to “tick-off” as they go along. There is such a feeling of satisfaction and achievement when you’re able to strike off as you progress. There’s also nothing more frustrating than being enrolled in a course in which you have very little to no information and guidance.

4. Continuing from the previous point, the key is to give students enough support so that they know you are accessible to them should they need assistance, but to also leave the ball in their court. This makes more of a difference than we realise as they become more confident to engage and participate.

5. Always provide feedback. No matter the type of feedback, it’s what students look for to improve themselves and their studies. Even if it has to be criticism, it can be constructive in the long run.

6. We have to find ways to keep students engaged. Especially in the online/distance space, where it’s so easy to disengage and drop out, we need to keep them focused and involved so that they see the purpose of them being enrolled for the course. Engaging with others, whether it be in groups or during topic discussions, creates realization that they have a voice and their opinion matters.

7. There are so many different tools/platforms available, admittedly, none of which I was familiar with previously. I’m more of a PowerPoint kind of girl, and deterring from that has never crossed my mind. However, in our presentations each week, we’ve used so many fun tools like Prezzi, PUBhtml, Coggle, etc., all of which I am extremely excited to experiment with going forward. These are the little ways in which we can make a course a little more enticing to students.

All in all, I’ve learned that to be an online tutor/lecturer, you have to be able to go beyond just delivering content. There is unbelievable amounts of effort from both the educator and the student to ensure that all runs smoothly. I have no doubt that, going forward, all I’ve learnt in this course is something I will carry with me and incorporate into my teaching methods.