reating engaging learning environments is, for me, a fascinating issue that has kept me busy for the last little while. The answer is elusive and, of course, not unique. Also, there are several approaches that can be taken; however, after countless hours dedicated to this matter I have identified a few issues that have proven to be very successful.

In addition to some common practices that we can borrow from what we have learned from developing other successful online customer experiences in the private sector, such as good content, relevant interactivity, and user-friendly navigation, there are certain features that I consider particularly important when designing an engaging online education experience.

It is important to design a learner-centered environment; in that sense, we need to thoroughly understand the student “fears” associated with online education. The idea is to take effective measures to help them overcome those barriers. There are a couple of very common concerns expressed by students. First, lack of social interaction: “This is not for me; I need to be in a classroom because I would miss the social interaction”. Second, lack of self-discipline: “I wouldn’t know what to do, I would feel lost. I don’t have the discipline to do this”.

Based on experience, I have identified five core characteristics that every online course must have. The goal is to reduce the impact of those fears and thereby enhance students’ engagement and increase their likelihood of success.

It is surprising for many students how active and rewarding the online interaction can be. In order to achieve this, it is vital to create a strong virtual community that provides that sense of belonging and inspires students to come back for more. Having a knowledgeable moderator providing timely responses that effectively address the issues raised by the students is critical, especially in the initial stage of the experience. But this is only one part of the picture. The other part is to have a sizeable number of participants posting a critical mass of messages. This keeps the levels of interest high and fosters interaction among community members.

Online courses can be structured in a way that can be surprisingly similar to the in-classroom experience. As a matter of fact, very often the quality of the contributions of the group is higher in the online environment, because the participants not only will have more time to structure their ideas, but also because in an online course everything is in written form, so that what you “say” will stay there and can be read for weeks by the whole group.

Providing a human touch helps the learner overcome the barrier of “lack of social interaction”; therefore, when designing your online environment, put a “face” to your web site. It’s all about bonding with the online environment. Students like to know who they are interacting with. Include your picture and some information for them to know that you actually are a human being! You could incorporate a short introductory video, or, to be up-to-date with technology you may consider using “Podcasting”. Make a graded assignment (or bonus marks) for them to create their personal homepage in the first week, or upload photographs of students enrolled in the class. All of these factors will help them relate to the course and feel more comfortable with the whole experience.

For example:

To understand what responsiveness means today, you need to understand your audience. Most often you will be teaching to the “Millennial Generation”. For this generation “instant gratification” is a big part of their lifestyle. You just need to take a look at what is available out there: “24/7”; instant messaging, in all its possible combinations; instant download, for almost every digital product or service; video on demand; Blogs; Tivo; and most recently, so-called Podcasts. Moreover, this is a generation that has been raised by “helicopter parents”: parents always hovering to solve all problems for their kids. Therefore, a common question of this generation is: “What can you do for me?” As you can imagine, the expectations are high. To deal with this, I make a point of answering questions or requests within 24 hours; however, I usually check the course’s site more than once a day. My advice in this area is to set realistic expectations from the start. In your introductory message to the course, indicate your availability and response times for answering messages and grading assignments.

Recognition and rewards encourage the participants to come back for more. Therefore, identify those students that will keep your community alive and motivate them by rewarding their contributions to the virtual community. Once somebody has had the courage to post her thoughts in writing in front of a group, she expects her effort to be recognized, especially if it is clearly above average. Your feedback doesn’t have to be extensive, but it has to be meaningful; avoid standard answers, identify key areas of students’ work, and indicate what they should continue doing and the areas for improvement. Personalizing your feedback should go beyond including the name of the student in your response. Including some references to the student’s previous postings not only shows your involvement with the virtual community, but also shows that you really care.

Providing a clear structure from the start is essential for the success of most students in an online learning environment. The course must be designed in a way that the students have easy access to a single source of information about what is expected from them in every stage of the experience. Providing a highly structured environment with weekly milestones and activities allows the students to keep track of the course and their progress.

Keep them on track by providing frequent reminders of the upcoming activities and milestones. There are four specific actions that I take in this regard: Include a “critical path”, which is a one-page, quick snapshot of what is expected in terms of deliverables for the course. It should clearly indicate the due dates for assignments and tests including grade weights. I experimented this semester to design it as a Gantt chart, which proved to be very effective.

For example:

Organize the information in clusters for easy and quick access. It is very useful, for instance, to open an “assignments” forum. It will contain all the information about assignments and also gives the opportunity to students to post their questions and comments about the assignments. In addition to that, the instructor can post the answers publicly for everyone to read. This reduces the number of messages about the same issue.

For Example:

Create weekly forums. This has several advantages. On one hand it gives the instructor the opportunity to post a “welcome” message with a summary of the expectations for the week; on the other hand it concentrates the postings about a particular topic in a single place, making it easier for the students and the instructor to locate information.

Remind, remind, and remind in order to keep them focused. Use the front page of your course to post reminders about key activities (tests or assignments) for that particular week. Posting frequent announcements gives your site a lively feel and creates that urge for the students to check frequently to avoid missing any of the action. If you are using materials such as downloadable PowerPoint presentations, including a “what’s next” slide as closing, to remind about upcoming deadlines, is also advisable. I know that it may sound like a lot; however in my experience, all these actions combined have proven to be very effective in addressing the concern of students’ “lack of self-discipline.”

For Example:

Relevant content and attractive visuals are key features to keep the interest levels high. Another characteristic of this generation is that they are very visual and have grown up in an environment where information is collected from very sophisticated interfaces. Therefore, lifeless “Times Roman” font over a white background is just plain boring and dull and won’t do anything for them. Look around and count the number of young people who have MP3 players, cell phones with picture and video capabilities, laptops with wireless technology, PDAs with colour screens, you name it. It is frightening to think that you have to compete with all that to grab their attention. My message here is simple: make it look “cool” and interactive!

For Example:

You may be thinking by now that this is a lot of work. You are right! However, it is also a lot of fun and a very rewarding experience. I thoroughly enjoy teaching online. All my courses are either online or “hybrid”, meaning that my in-classroom courses have a support web site. I consider that this is the way of the future and that students will demand more and more online components in all their courses. It is a trend that is growing rapidly. Be prepared to meet the challenge!

Guillermo Acosta is a Professor and Program Coordinator of the Business Management Program at Humber College in Toronto, Canada. He moved from Venezuela to Canada in 2001 and started his academic career teaching at Ryerson University in Toronto and later at the University of Guelph in the areas of Marketing, Internet Marketing and Information Management with a particular emphasis in online education. Previous industry experience in the marketing field includes holding positions as Corporate Promotions Manager and Brand Identity Consultant in the telecommunications industry, and Trade Marketing Manager, Customer Service Manager and Reengineering Consultant in consumer products markets in Latin America . He holds an M.B.A. in Marketing from the Universidad Metropolitana (1999) and a B.B.A. from the Universidad Católica Andrés Bello (1989), both in Caracas,Venezuela. He can be reached at guillermo.acosta@humber.ca.

About Humber

Humber College in Toronto Canada (www.humber.ca), has been an active participant and valuable contributor of the Learning College Project since year 2000. It is proud to be the only Canadian Community College selected as part of the group of 12 Vanguard Colleges leading this initiative.

Humber College is committed to the development of a stimulating learning environment that strongly engages students and effectively enables the learning process. Online learning is one of the areas in which the college has focused its efforts and resources to support the development of innovative learning formats that address the ever-evolving needs of society and businesses.

The Open Learning Centre at Humber College offers over 175 courses online, serving approximately 2,000 registrants each semester, backed-up by a solid IT infrastructure, a strong support staff, and a team of highly-skilled professors developing and implementing cutting-edge online teaching techniques.