Orchestration

Key points

  • Students may feel isolated as they have to manage multiple course activities at a distance

  • Help students manage their activities by pointing out the next steps and guiding their progress

  • Monitor performance and give feedback, modify content if necessary, explicitly encourage progress

What is orchestration?

In an online course, students perform various activities such as accessing course resources, doing assigned readings, showing up for live sessions, answering quizzes etc. The temporal flexibility means that these activities may occur at different times at different 'places' on the platform. Thus an important role of the instructor is to point out, guide and manage in real time the various activities of students. This is known as orchestration.

This LeD explains orchestration in the context of a MOOC, but the ideas can be applied to any online course. Watch the LeD on "Orchestrating your MOOC" from 0:16 - 2:47 mins and 4:14 - 5:19 mins.

Orchestrating your Course

Effective orchestration includes: making the course plan visible to students, providing instructions when course materials are posted, announcing and reminding students about deadlines, monitoring performance in assignments and adapting the course if required, and supporting and encouraging students regarding their progress. These will help in creating a presence [1] which is crucial aspect of effective online learning - making sure that students feel connected to their fellow learners, to the instructor who acts as a guide and to the course content.

Some strategies are:

  • Provide a weekly announcement about the upcoming week's topics and / or summary of the previous week's

  • Maintain a regular schedule of posting materials and send an announcement pointing to the new materials

  • Create audio or video posts to clarify common doubts

  • Personalize messages or emails - many LMS allow automatic population of student names

  • Provide 'catch-up' days for students to complete their assignments

  • Get the course TAs responsible for different orchestration tasks.


[1] Critical inquiry in a text-based environment: Computer conferencing in higher education. D.R. Garrison, T. Anderson & W. Archer. Internet and Higher Education, 2 (2–3) (2000), pp. 87-105

Diving Deeper into Orchestration

Question to discuss

Think of one teaching activity you do in person in a face-to-face course, that you believe is difficult to do online. It could be about illustrating or explaining a concept, or answering student questions (course related or other). It could be a one-on-one conversation with a student who needs specific support. It could be what you do when you arrive for class early or stay back after class.

On the Discussion Forum, post your concern for what it is difficult to do online. Also go through others' posts. If you have an idea for an online strategy to address a concern, please contribute, especially if you have tried it.