Instructor Presence

3. Tools for Student-to-Student Interaction

PRINCIPLE 1: "Effective online teachers are present within their course."

1. Instructor's Presence via Video

Video is a great medium for instructors to lend students a sense of their presence in online courses. Videos can be used to welcome students to a new weekly module or unit, to explain or demonstrate; or even to send words of encouragement.

Here is a sample of videos I have created for some of my courses:

2. "Presence by Proxy" via Avatars

I have developed two animated characters that appear occasionally to enrich course content.

Avatar Marv was developed in PowToon; and is used sometimes, e.g., to introduce new content units. Here is a short video featuring Avatar Marv.

Another character, used even more frequently, is Stealthy Dragon. This character is used for "branding" content, such as to open and close instructor-created videos. You will find many appearances of Stealthy Dragon in this portfolio.

3. Tools for Student-to-Student Interaction

Beyond instructor presence, I also include activities to support peer-to-peer interactions. For example, for some of our Discussions and other activities, I invite students to participate using Flipgrid or VoiceThread. These are fine innovative tools for promoting student-to-student interactions and a sense of presence and community.

Reflection:

By nature, I am an introvert. Therefore, I empathize with students who may be reluctant to connect openly in the online classroom. Therefore I offer a range of options. For example, although I invite students to post their profile photo, I will also accept an avatar.

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