TRANSCRIPT: 10 Tips For Success In Your Online Course

Speaker: Lucy Tribble MacDonald

10 Tips For Success In Your Online Course

Hello. My name is Lucy Tribble MacDonald. I’m faculty emeritus from Temecula Community College. I’ve been teaching online since 1992; BW, before the web. I miss my students however, so I’m now adjunct faculty at Florida State College in Jacksonville. My areas of expertise are English, reading, and how to study. And today we’re going to talk about ten ways to succeed in your online courses.

Tip 1: Is Online Learning For You?

Tip number one, determine if online learning is for you. For example, if you’re a self starter then that’s a good idea to take online courses; if you rely on somebody else to get you to class maybe not such a good idea. Also, if you’re looking at online courses, you might consider taking the right online course; for example, writing looks very well online because you have to write. But if you hate math and you’re not doing well in math, maybe taking math in a face-to- face environment would be better.

You might also want to get counseling help and advising help as to which classes work well in your schedule and which classes work well online for you. You might also want to look at your environment. Where are you going do study online? Are you going to take online classes at home and you have children at home, is that going to work with your environment?

What is your computer setup? Sometimes students want to use the girlfriend’s computer at the girlfriend’s house. Maybe that’s not such a good idea. Some of you are working. You may figure out you can use your work computer on your lunch hour. Have you checked with your employer to see if that’s okay? You might want to set up some of these things ahead of time before you sign up for online classes. You might also want to make sure that your employer is going to let you download the things that you need for your online class on his work computer. Maybe that will not be appropriate, so check out the technology needs before you sign up for the online class.

Tip 2: Know The Course: Before You Register

Tip two is to familiarize yourself with the course. First we’ll start with “before you register.” Before you register, you need to know whether it’s an online course or a hybrid course. A hybrid course refers to a course that is part on campus, face-to-face, and part online. So if you wanted to take everything online, hybrid is not the course.

So let’s look at registering for an online course before. What things do you need to know about course design ahead of time? Are you going to have special requirements? Are there going to be testing times, and what are the testing times? When is finals week? Do you have a testing center that you’re going to be required to use? That kind of information you can find out from Distance Learning Center. You may not necessarily find out ahead of time but you could ask the Distance Learning Center, “If I sign up for this online class can I take the test online or am I going to be required to take the test”. They may be important for you to know.

Tip 2: Know The Course: Once You’re In

Now, once you’re in the class, let’s familiarize yourself with the course design, the requirements, and the deadlines. The best way to do that is to look at your syllabus and see it as a whole picture. What’s going to be required for you? Is there a lecture? Is it audio? Is it video. Is it in print? That’s going to be the first thing you need to look at. Then you need to look at class discussions. Many instructors look at that as class participation. If you’re not talking, they don’t see you.

And then there’s going to be homework assignments, then there’s going to be quizzes. Are they timed? Are they 30 minutes? When are the tests? When are they due? Those are you deadlines. You need to schedule those. If you have a lab, how is that handled? Is it within the online class? Do you have to go some place? How is that going to work? The better you can schedule everything and line it out the easier the course will be.

Tip 3: Get Help With Technology

Tip three, get help with technology right away. Many students start with the faculty. Well the faculty teaches the course but they don’t always see the course from your side. So they don’t have the information that you as a student need to get logged in online. Most colleges have student tech support numbers. Find those immediately. They may be in your syllabus or they may be with the registration material that came when you registered for the course. Get that number and post it right next to your computer.

But most important is to make a backup plan up front before your computer crashes. Does the library have access for you? Can you use your work computer during lunchtime? Can you use your girlfriend’s computer? Can you use your brother’s computer? What is going to be your backup plan? Get help with technology right away.

Tip 4: Plan For Success

Tip number four, plan for success. Balance personal obligations -- school, work, and family. If you have small children at home, plan for studying with small children. If you’ve got roommates, plan for studying with roommates. If you’re going to have a schedule, where are you going to post that schedule so somebody will know when your tests are so that they can support you? If you’re at work, check with your boss, and maybe that’s when you can do your discussion.

You’ve got to balance work, school, and family.

Tip 5: Define Weekly Study Schedules

Tip number five, define weekly study schedule. If you can go to school any time 24/7, when is class? Any time often equals no time. You actually need to block out a weekly study schedule. So a hint for this is to look at your syllabus and find out when the due dates are for assignments and work backwards. Does your class work on a weekly basis? If so, then what day is the due date for assignments? Define the weekly study schedule for you and actually block it out.

Tip 6: Review Academic Calendar

Tip six, be conscious of the academic calendar. Now that you’ve done your weekly schedule, look at the whole calendar. When is Spring Break? Don’t forget to come back. Do you have classes during Spring Break? Probably not likely, but some faculty do use it as kind of a catch- up time if you’re behind. Make sure that you plot the time and see when things are due. Don’t forget that faculty sometimes do change the schedule, so check in weekly and make sure that you’re aware.

Tip 7: Don’t Procrastinate

Tip number seven, don’t procrastinate. Well that’s easy to say. Oh, you didn’t go Monday, forgot Tuesday, and then you forgot Wednesday, and then, oh, my goodness, it just goes by so quickly, so it’s very important not to procrastinate.

Tip 8: Communicate With Your Instructor

Tip number eight, communicate with your instructor. You just need to find out how they like their communication to happen. Do they want it in their school e-mail? Some instructors actually set up a forum within the class. You will see “questions for instructor,” and they actually look at those first, so maybe that’s where you need to communicate. Some instructors will say, “Call me,” and give their telephone number. Some instructors set up office hours on Skype.

You can actually see them and talk to them. So find out which is the preferred method for communicating with your instructor and use it. And you want to do that before things get too difficult. You want to know your instructor and keep the communication open.

Tip 9: Find A Good Study Spot

Tip nine, find a good study spot. If you have a desktop computer you may be tide to the desktop computer for reading your lecture and participating in online discussions. But if you have a laptop, you may move around and you may find a different part of the house or the dorm room that’s better.

Tip 10: Specify Study Strategies

And tip number 10, review specific study strategies for your specific courses. Not all courses are the same. So, if you’re taking economics, did you know that many of the quizzes and test questions in economics are cause-and-effect questions. You might want to study that way; that many of the test questions are about charts and graph. You might want to look at those in your textbook and see what those are like. When you’re studying from math that’s certainly different than when you’re studying for history. So look at the strategies that pertain to the particular course that you’re taking, and if you need help in this, there’s 24/7 help at my website, and it’s called “howtostudy.org,” and it will be listed in the resources for you for this subject.

10 Ways To Succeed

In summary, here are the ten ways to succeed in your online courses. Just in case you missed one or you want to review, they’re all right here, and now I know you’re going to be on your way to success in college classes. Congratulations and good luck.