Utilizing Student Feedback to Inform Faculty Development Activities for Online Course Development and Delivery

摘要

The purpose of the present study is to describe faculty development activities at one university and to show how these activities were reviewed for relevance to students. As a means to validate faculty development activities and make adjustments for future development activities, a survey of students was undertaken. A survey was completed by students asking them what tools and practices they felt supported their learning in online classes. The tools and practices the students were queried about were those promoted within faculty development activities at the university and broken down into three main categories for purposes of the survey. The categories include course design, questions were asked about the organization and layout of online courses and syllabi; instructional content, questions were asked about types of instructional content and use of multimedia to deliver course content; and communication and interaction, questions were asked about the types of communication and interaction students felt supported their learning. The majority of the activities promoted at the university were supported by students' preferences for online learning. However, it was discovered additional attention and focus must be paid to training in online interaction between students and faculty as well as multimedia presentation of content.