Offered by iDesign to form the bridge to the education
There is a unified mission going on outside the classroom. Educational institutes are endeavoring to minimize the impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak on students by adapting online learning tools. Instructional design firm iDesign has offered hands to assist faculties delivering course online for free for the next six months. In response to the coronavirus outbreak, the courses will provide faculty with an immediate primer on best practices in online teaching.
iDesign has a history of work with more than 100 institutions to design, build and support their online courses. The courses are available globally at no cost to any institution.
Chief academic officer at iDesign, Whitney Kilgore says, “Teaching well online isn’t about technology.” It’s about people. It’s about pedagogy. These are resources developed for faculty by experts in online learning who understand, and can share their insight and best practices, from the experience of transitioning online.
“Adaptation isn’t new to higher education. Colleges and universities — and their faculty — have shown a remarkable capacity for resilience, innovation and adaptation even in the face of difficulty,” Kilgore includes.
Fighting Coronavirus
Accessing five-part professional development program focuses on helping educators:
- Recognize and debunk myths around online learning.
- Develop high-impact practices to support peer-to-peer collaboration.
- Communicate expectations.
- Feedback clearly to students with diverse needs and access to resources.
- Form meaningful connections with learners in spite of physical distance.
Through delivering free of cost short-form courses, faculty and other higher education professionals can access self-paced content, turnkey teaching resources, practice examples, and proven techniques used by experienced online instructors.
Enrollment begins from Monday March 16 March and the courses are available on a rolling basis beginning Friday March 20. The online teaching bootcamp are offered on iDesign’s LX Pathways.
Moreover, faculty members looking for additional resources can access an open source list of teaching resources by visiting the Remote Teaching Resources for Business Continuity, managed by Daniel Stanford of DePaul University’s Center for Teaching and Learning. Additionally, higher education professionals can utilize the iDea book available as an open source creative commons licensed resource which is part of iDesign’s commitment to Scholarship not SWAG.
