DE Oracle @ UMUC

This article briefly discusses Chickering and Gamson's (1987) Seven Principles as a means for building an effective teaching and learning environment. It then describes how these principles were incorporated into the design of what is now an award-winning, highly interactive online foreign language course.

Field trips to different venues provide a rich and engaging learning experience for students. However, this is difficult--if not impossible--to accomplish for online classes. This article discusses virtual tours that were organized for UMUC graduate students in ITEC 610 and ITEC 620 and lessons learned when using emerging technologies to support learning in the online environment.

In an online environment, particularly with written text, comments and responses can be read and reread, and tones can easily be misconstrued. This article discusses some strategies for structuring the online classroom to create a safe, open, and respectful climate.

This article discusses the common issues and good practices behind setting up clear expectations in online classrooms.

In the Summer 2009 session, a BEHS teacher and the EWC's senior adviser teamed up to provide students with a chance to publish their PowerPoint presentations on a UMUC student Web site funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation.

This article shares a professor's experience of applying cloud computing in a UMUC graduate course, specifically the use of Google Docs. It provides a background of the concept, describes how it was applied in the classroom, lists the advantages and disadvantage of the application and presents a number of best practices based on the experience.

This article discusses how instructors can use input from students to keep their materials fresh, interesting, and up-to-date.

Reflective learning journals are effective tools for allowing students to look back at their learning and relate it to their environment. The traditional approach to document these journals was on paper but, with the development of blogs, it has taken on a totally new dimension. This article looks at how reflective learning journals are being used in a graduate-level online class as well as the benefits and related best practices associated with online learning journals.

Engaging students is a challenge whether teaching online or face-to-face. In online classes that tend to be text-heavy, this task can be especially difficult. One way to overcome this hurdle is to design project-based learning (PBL) assignments. This article discusses the advantages of PBL assignments, best practices for designing and implementing them, and several examples and resources that can help generate assignment ideas.

Scholarship and publishing keep you active as a trained professional. These activities not only help your teaching and increase your visibility but also contribute to the greater good by expanding our societal knowledge.