Time Saving Tips for Online Teaching (2014)

 A clock made in Revolutionary France,
showing the 10-hour metric clock.
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We often hear that online learning takes a lot of time for instructors. I have found that it can, but when a course is set up in advance, using the appropriate tools, a lot of time can be saved. A little work and planning in advance can save teachers a lot of time when it will really count. Many of these techniques make for a more engaging experience for the students and make teaching online less stressful for instructors.

Note: this is an update of a post from 2012 that adds tips that teachers have sent in since then. Thanks everyone! Here are some of my favorite time-saving tips. Please add to them through the comments or via email.

1. Create a "Welcome Letter" that not only introduces the instructor and the course but gives detailed instructions on how to access the course and where to get help.

2. Use a "Week Zero" that opens up before your class. Create a module in your online class that is always open that tells students how to use the online tools for your course. This module would be a good place for links to online student services that may be available to your studnets.

3. Create a comprehensive syllabus.  Use the syllabus to let students know how to find tech support, tutoring, and a librarian. If your college does not provide online tutoring for students, be sure to check out OpenStudy which provides free, facilitated, online peer tutoring.

4. Use a syllabus quiz. Creating a quiz or syllabus scavenger hunt will help students understand how your course is organized and where to find help. I found this to be even more effective if it were worth a few points.

5. Make your course easy to navigate. Keep as much content as you can no more than two clicks away. Use a consistent format week-to-week or module-to-module. Remove buttons or tools you are not using.

6. Schedule your time. Do not work on your online course because you can; work on it because you have scheduled the time. Let the students know your schedule. Access your course consistently (e.g. three times a week) and respond to email promptly (with-in 48 hours).

7. Be strict about forms of communication. If you give students multiple email and messaging accounts to contact you, be prepared for students to use them. Some instructors do not receive class related email but take course related questions only through the learning management system. Some will only use email. Some only take assignments in drop box. Make sure you are clear about how you want to be contacted.

8. Automate your course as much as possible. Take advantage of the time-release feature of announcements and other content in the tools that you are using like your learning management system. Record and reuse lectures. Let online tools handle as much of the grading as you can.

9. Distributing and exchanging documents. Use the assignment feature of your LMS instead of e-mail. Encourage students to share documents using Google Docs or Dropbox.

10. Centralize question and answers. Use a discussion forum for “Frequently Asked Questions.” Create a FAQ page. Ask students to ask questions in the forum rather than e-mail so everyone benefits from the answer.

11. Use online groups with a deliverable. Let the students do the work. Do not respond to every posting, respond to the group deliverable.

12. Use a "common responses" file to quickly paste in answers to common questions. This file can be a Google Docs file that you can open on any computer.

13. Allow students to facilitate online discussions. Giving students an opportunity to discuss what they have learned in their own voice can really help students learn.

14. Use a detailed grading rubric to help answer questions in advance.  Teachers can create rubrics online using tools like RubiStar.

15. Encourage student-student interaction and study groups. Give them the space to solve problems.

16. Communicate to the entire class regularly. Use audio and/or video each week. Try to anticipate problems or sticking points in a class and record a video to address these issues. We like to suggest tools like Screencast-o-Matic. A YouTube account is also very handy.

17. Save a tree. If you are still printing out papers, learn to use the "Insert comments" feature in your word processor. Downloading papers, printing, then scanning and re-uploading is an enormous time sink. Find out if your college uses "TurnItIn" or some other such service with quick grading tools for documents. If you have not learned how to do this, it will make a huge difference. (And yes, we still have teachers doing this.)


What about you? How do you streamline your online teaching process? Leave a comment below if you have any time saving tips.

Related articles

• Why I teach on the first day of class (smallpondscience.com)
• Time Management Strategies for Online Teachers (University of Wisconsin - Stout)
• How To Think Like An Instructional Design for Your Nonprofit Trainings (bethkanter.org)

Time Saving Tips for Teaching Online

Time Selector (Photo credit: Telstar Logistics)

We often hear that online learning takes a lot of time for instructors. I have found that it can, but when a course is set up in advance to take advantage of a learning management system’s features, a lot of time can be saved. A little work and planning in advance can save teachers a lot of time when it will really count. Many of these techniques make for a more engaging experience for the students and make teaching online less stressful for instructors.

Note: this is an update of a post from 2012 that adds tips that teachers have sent in since then. Thanks everyone! Here are some of my favorite time-saving tips. Please add to them through the comments or via email.

1. Create a "Welcome Letter" that not only introduces the instructor and the course but gives detailed instructions on how to access the course and where to get help. Here is our example from DE 101.

2. Create a comprehensive syllabus. Utilize a "Week Zero," a module that explains to new students how to be an online student and use the learning management system (LMS). Direct students to tech support and the help desk as much as possible. Use the syllabus to let students know how to find tech support, tutoring, and a librarian. If your college does not provide online tutoring for students, be sure to check out OpenStudy which provides free, facilitated, online peer tutoring.

3. Use a syllabus quiz. Creating a quiz or syllabus scavenger hunt will help students understand how your course is organized and where to find help. I found this to be even more effective if it were worth a few points.

4. Make your course easy to navigate. Keep as much content as you can no more than two clicks away. Use a consistent format week-to-week or module-to-module. Remove buttons or tools you are not using.

 5. Schedule your time. Do not work on your online course because you can; work on it because you have scheduled the time. Let the students know your schedule. Access your course consistently (e.g. three times a week) and respond to email promptly (with-in 48 hours).

6. Be strict about forms of communication. If you give students multiple email and messaging accounts to contact you, be prepared for students to use them. Some instructors do not receive class related email but take course related questions only through the learning management system. Some will only use email. Some only take assignments in drop box. Make sure you are clear about how you want to be contacted.

7. Automate your course as much as possible. Take advantage of the time-release feature of announcements and other content. Record and reuse lectures. Let the learning management system handle as much of the grading as you can.

8. Distributing and exchanging documents. Use the assignment feature of your LMS instead of e-mail. Encourage students to share documents using Google Docs or Dropbox.

9. Centralize question and answers. Use a discussion forum for “Frequently Asked Questions.” Create a FAQ page. Ask students to ask questions in the forum rather than e-mail.

10. Use online groups with a deliverable Let the students do the work. Do not respond to every posting, respond to the group deliverable.

11. Use a "common responses" file to quickly paste in answers to common questions. This file can be a Google Docs file that you can open on any computer.

12. Allow students to facilitate online discussions. Giving students an opportunity to discuss what they have learned in their own voice can really help students learn.

13. Use a detailed grading rubric to help answer questions in advance.  Teachers can create rubrics online using tools like RubiStar.

14. Encourage student-student interaction and study groups. Give them the space to solve problems.

15. Communicate to entire class in general terms using audio and/or video on a regular basis. Try to anticipate problems or sticking points in a class and record a video to address these issues. We like to suggest tools like Screencast-o-Matic. A YouTube account is also very handy.

Bonus: There is a great resource from Dennis Thomas O'Connor, "Time Management Strategies for Online Instructors," that he sent to me in the last incarnation of this post.

What about you? How do you streamline your online teaching process? Leave a comment below if you have any time saving tips. 

Related articles

• The Power of Teaching Online (pluralsight.com)
• Courage to Teach Online (bwatwood.edublogs.org)
• Challenges of Teaching Online-Extreme Weather Edition (realdrlaura.wordpress.com)

The Internet and the Collapsing Past

I used to have memories. They were selected, chosen, and like old photographs, shifts of color and tone have changed them over time. Some memories are more highly selected and crafted than others. Some may even approach a certain degree of accuracy. There were things I thought I would never remember: names or friends from grammar school, that favorite Saturday morning cartoon character's side-kick, or what the old downtown of Santa Maria, CA looked like. Now all of this is coming back. All of the images, people, and places. In Facebook, I am talking to people that I met in middle school and have not talked to since. There was three and a half weeks once in the 7th grade when I was nearly not quite entirely unlike cool and that is how a couple of them still remember me. There are websites dedicated to the music and popular culture of the pretty much any year or decade. There was a time when the past would always remain the past. You didn't have to remember much of went by you so you didn't. Now, someone, somewhere, is uploading the play list from their junior college dance from 1982 up to Facebook, MySpace, their blog, ect. and you get to relive the Motels and the Bangles all over again. Between the 3.5 million articles in Wikipedia and the 24 hours of video uploaded per minute, your memories are up there somewhere. Friends and family send links to music, images, and people that I know that I would not remember, or more importantly, would remember differently. Sometimes, the way I remember a film, for instance, has more to do with my interests and values at the time rather than any merit the film may have had. I remember warning my wife that "Five Million Years to Earth" was a scary film. It is a good film, but like many Pinewood Studios films from the 60's, it ends with an apocalypse of "aliens" (plastic grasshoppers on the end of Popsicle sticks). Needless to say, she found the end very funny. I swore it was the most frightening movie I had seen as a 13 year-old.

We look at the internet as authoritative. It is becoming like the collective unconscious of the species (or at least the overly-connected subspecies, Homo Iunctus). It is a form of memory but again, as selective and faded as brain memory but "authoritative" because it is an external record, a scrapbook. People can upload images, but they can't upload my context for those images, but I look at an old photo on the web and think, "My god, that is how it was." In other words, how I remember things is changing because of technology, but because of the limitations of technology, the "memories" on the web are no more authoritative than the memories that come from my brain.

No other generation had this. We used to be able to move forward through time with just the shadows of recollections, content with vague images. Now we are using technology to mediate those memories. What does the game "Trivial Pusuit" prove now? That you don't have access to Wikipedia? I am not one of those who thinks that the internet is making us stupid - I think if the brain is freed up by not having to remember details of the career of Larry Storch or what was the name of the hotel on the corner of Broadway and Main in 1966, then the mind goes on to other things. Maybe this will facilitate extra intelligence or creativity?

Related articles

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12 Time-Saving Tips for Teaching Online

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Online learning saves time for students. Students in online courses have 24/7 access to their course materials, other students, and their instructor. For working students, this is an incredible benefit. But we often hear that online learning takes a lot of an instructor’s time. I have found that it can be, but when a course is set up in advance to take advantage of a learning management system’s features, a lot of time can be saved. Many of these techniques make for a more engaging experience for the students and less stress for the instructor.

Here are some of my favorite time-saving tips. Please add to them!

1. Create a comprehensive syllabus.

• Utilize a "Week Zero," a module that explains to new students how to be an online student and use the learning management system (LMS).
  
• Direct students to tech support and the help desk as much as possible.
• Create a course “scavenger hunt.”

2. Use a syllabus quiz.
3. Make your course easy to navigate.

• Keep as much content as you can no more than two clicks away.
• Use a consistent format week-to-week or module-to-module.

4. Schedule your time.

• Do not work on your online course because you can; work on it because you have scheduled the time.
• Let the students know your schedule.
• Access your course consistently (e.g. three times a week) and respond to email promptly (with-in 48 hours).

5. Automate your course as much as possible.

• Take advantage of the time-release feature of announcements.
• Record and reuse lectures.
• Let the LMS handle as much of the grading as you can.

6. Distributing and exchanging documents.

• Use the assignment feature of your LMS instead of e-mail.
• Have the students attach documents to a forum posting.

7. Centralize question and answers.

• Use a discussion forum for “Frequently Asked Questions.”
• Create a FAQ page.
• Ask students to ask questions in the forum rather than e-mail.

8. Use online groups with a deliverable

• Let the students do the work.
• Do not respond to every posting, respond to the group deliverable.

9. Use a "common responses" file to quickly paste in answers to common questions.
10. Allow students to facilitate online discussions.
11. Use a detailed grading rubric to help answer questions in advance.
12. Encourage student-student interaction and study groups.

• Give them the space to solve problems.

What about you? How do you streamline your online teaching process? Leave a comment below if you have any time saving tips.