Summary

Online resources make up a steadily increasing share of the materials used to support student learning in geoscience courses. No longer do online resources represent copies of class notes and links to a few relevant websites. Our panelists will discuss different ways in which online materials are used in support of teaching. We will learn what happens when the course textbook goes completely online, how students deal with individual online labs or whole redesigned lab courses, and we will examine how online resources can our students with access to learning tools that would otherwise be unavailable. Come and share stories of your own experience with online learning and get some insight from our panelists about new ways to think about your teaching.

Anne Egger

Online readings and resources can replace a textbook, and provide opportunities to introduce students to high-quality resources that they can continue to use beyond the classroom. In a face-to-face course, I use entirely freely available, online readings instead of a textbook. There are challenges involved in this approach, but I find that the benefits outweigh the costs.

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Katherine Ryker

The online learning environment offers a special set of challenges and opportunities for teaching labs. Students can benefit from learning practical skills in a flexible format where they tackle material at their own pace. Though not all practice skills can be moved online, instructors should acknowledge the advantages of online pre-lab activities, adaptive and interactive learning assignments, videos and simulations, as well as the limitations of "conventional" lab activities before dismissing the online environment outright.

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Mike Brudzinski

Effective online education should not simply be recording a classroom experience and projecting it through the internet. Instead, educators should consider the new opportunities and how to best utilize an online medium to accomplish the learning outcomes. In particular, the computer-based environment can provide enhanced opportunities for more regular student-centered activities, use of software for analysis, and automated assignments that provide immediate feedback.