Ocotillo Spotlight on Instructional Technology
Note: The Ocotillo Spotlight is no longer published, but all previous issues will remain on this site.
spotlight for September 2003
In this September 2003 Ocotillo Spotlight Angela Ambrosia takes us inside Rio Salado College's Online Virtual Tour that is designed to orient new students and help them become familiar with the features of Rio's online courses.
Rio Salado College Online Course Tour
written by Anglea Ambrosia, CIS faculty, Rio Salado College
angela.ambrosia@riomail.maricopa.edu
Students often get more than they bargained for, and sometimes less, when they start taking online courses. Their experiences can be filled with impressions of excellent customer service, convenient learning support, and thoughtful instructional design that indicate that they will have a successful learning experience. Or, their experiences can include poor communication paths, less than convenient support access and confusing navigation. It is important to indicate from the start that there is a purposeful design for the online course and all of the support functions so that students can start with a positive impression and confidence about their upcoming experiences. Rio Salado College's Virtual Tour of our online courses is an important link for new students. It enables students to see that the college has thoughtfully and systemically designed and developed the online course materials, and the support functions; and effectively implemented the necessary information, activities, and access. It provides new and potential students an opportunity to view and become familiar with the structure of our courses.
The first part of the tour illustrates how to use the log-in process to access an online course. Once registered for a course, students are automatically emailed information about accessing their online course(s).
Next, the tour takes the student to a sample Course Homepage that they will see in any of Rio Salado College's online courses. This page links them to important course components, services and the email function they will be using.
From the homepage students view a sample syllabus. This document contains the course description, course competencies, grading procedure and scale, and pertinent policies and procedures of the course and college.
New and potential students are then introduced to the email system they will be using to communicate with their instructor and submit assignments
Students also view other components of the class, such as a calendar of assignments, textbook ordering instructions, information about the instructor and in-person requirements.
The subsequent pages demonstrate the instructional framework of the course, including lesson objectives, reading assignments, formal evaluations, content summary activities, and the like.
By helping new and potential Rio Salado College students understand our course structure and navigation, we believe this tool is contributing the successful enrollment and completion of our courses.
The tour can be accessed at the following address:
http://www.rio.maricopa.edu/courseTour/main.shtml
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