Assisting Struggling Learners

OK, so what if someone is struggling in the course - At what time do you intervene? How much support is too much?

I have one student, who from the beginning, I thought - uh-oh, this person is going to run into trouble at some point... Let's call him John... John barely posted and from the limited tracking capability on this particular CMS, I could see that by mid-week, he hadn't even started the work... So I e-mailed saying that I had noticed that he hadn't begun the work yet and asked if he needed anything - help with time management, or understanding the flow of online vs F2F courses... He said he was OK and would catch up...

By week 4 and the first major set of graded items, things hadn't changed much for John - He was barely posting and by Sunday night (of the due date) at 8:30 pm, he hadn't begun any of the 4 hefty written assignments due that week.... So I thought, well, let's see what he can do at zero hour... I mean after all, this is adult ed - so people have to squeeze it in when they can...

Monday comes around and all assignments are posted... but disastrously... poorly done, incomplete, no evidence of synthesis or time devoted to the work...

So the e-mail with the scores goes out and a question to John - "Are you finding it difficult to find the time to do your assignments with the rigor needed to be successful?"

The classic answer comes back for online learning -

"I didn't think online learning would take this much time"

But other typical student responses for those not doing well were also there - "I didn't know there was all this work for Week 4 due" (when numerous e-mails with detailed instructions for completing the work AND opportunities to submit work early for feedback before the final submission) were sent at the beginning of the week... including the essay question and the rubric... This happened every week in the course - so he clearly wasn't reading the e-mails either.

So John was clearly under the common misconception that online learning was going to be a breeze - and now the rude awakening had arrived...

But this also brings up the age old question - why do some students (no matter the level - these are graduate students) not take advantage of supports available to them to be successful?

One big thing I think is the misconception about how easy online learning is...

The other is that people bite off more than they can chew... They over-schedule - over-plan and then they end up not being able to do everything in a meaningful way...

So I think this has to really be hammered home for students new to online learning - the work load involved and time demands and self-directed nature of the learning... If students who can't spend the time needed still opt to sign up for the course, then the only alternative is consequences for their actions through grades they will earn...

While part of me wants to support, remind, prompt, cajole students to get the work done and do it in a meaningful fashion... if students don't step up to the plate, there isn't much I can do - or want to do at some point in the process...

One other final thought - In this CMS, I have only e-mail to send out the weekly reminders - maybe an audio or video message might reach more people? - Or would it be one more effort on my part - overkill for those who get it and still ignored by those who can't get to it anyway?

Of the 10 people in this class, only 1 is struggling below acceptable level... and 9 are new to online learning - so I have to think that some of the supports have been helpful to their success working online - but more is probably due to their own internal motivation and aptitude - they probably excel at everything... or maybe somewhere in between... A survey at the end should reveal more. A request for mid-term feedback didn't return much info... so no news is good news I suspect...

Assessment, Feedback, and Time

We just finished up our first unit of study in this course, and so I had 4 graded items to look at and score for each student... After 5 hours of work (and still 20% more to go), it occurred to me how important it is in online learning to take this time requirement into account!!

I have 2 choices - either not do as thorough a job next time and save myself work, or think about why I feel it is important to spend the time to give meaningful and detailed feedback and then discipline myself to do it...

I don't have control over the course design in this case, I am just the facilitator, but if I were designing the course, I would take all of this into account - and weave together assessments that allow for more balanced interaction - still meaningful, but not as time demanding each week!!!

Additionally, each graded item has a rubric, so one would think that grading would be a snap... but I was soon discovering first hand a lot about assessment and my own values associated with it..

So I could have easily just given each assignment a grade and moved on...but I felt it would be better to explain in detail why students received a certain score - for the underachievers, letting them know where the gaps were - for the high achievers to use the feedback as an avenue to continue the conversation about the course and the ideas being discussed - for everyone as a motivation to keep going - to be heard - to be a real presence in the class - to make myself a real presence as well... to distinguish our inter-activities from just a self-study course - to a learning community... to acknowledge that if they had taken the time to write something, I was going to take the time to respond meaningfully and responsibly and if they did NOT take the time or did a sloppy job, to let them know that there is accountability and expectations for their work.. and role modeling so maybe they will move up to the expectations set...

The last thought I had and the one that was taking the longest was how to give feedback to help students do better the next time... So the three steps all added up to a lot of time on my part...

1. determine the grade
2. articulate why they earned the grade they did - high, low, in between - talk about their work in a meaningful way
   
3. suggest ways to improve their performance next time... or ways to share what they have done well
   

To me this extra step makes the difference and turns assessment into a learning event (if students take advantage of it)

Will this get faster the next iteration?