WebCT Exemplary Course Project

Each year, WebCT identifies examples of 'best-practice' WebCT-based courses that meet minimal criteria focusing on two major areas: academic rigor and content robustness. Rensselaer instructors may find some of these criteria useful when developing and evaluating their own WebCT course sites.

David Graf of Nova Southeastern University and Maisie Caines of the College of the North Atlantic have developed the following criteria.

Criteria Related to Academic Rigor

In their book, Building Learning Communities in Cyberspace: Effective Strategies for the Online Classroom, Palloff and Pratt suggest that in an online learning environment, the "key to the learning process are the interactions among students themselves, the interactions between faculty and students, and the collaboration inlearning that results from these interactions." In describing the evolution of a learner-centered learning community, these authors suggest that instructors need to find ways to make students feel "embodied" with the course content. Perhaps one of the most significant ways of involving students with online content is to establish minimal levels of participation which require students to make use of the communication tools inherent in WebCT. This involvement is critical to an understanding of the concept of academic rigor in an online course. Academic rigor may be considered the degree to which a web-enhanced or asynchronous online course causes students to become immersed in the course content through the application of higher level learning objectives. While there is no standard by which to measure the academic rigor of a course, the collaborators suggest that web-enhanced, web-centric or asynchronous courses may be deemed academically rigorous if the majority of the following criteria are in place:

• The course addresses higher level learning and facilitates learning at those higher levels;
  
  • Syllabus clearly reveals course objectives

  • Course assignments encourage students to employ critical thinking strategies
    

• Course requirements include clearly stated expectations defining minimal levels of student participation
  

• The structure of the course makes appropriate and exceptional use of the technologies inherent in the WebCT learning environment

  • Appropriate use as deemed by
    • Tutorials are provided to students covering the use of technologies (i.e., html, Internet, e-mail)

    • Students employ critical reflection and otherwise analyze course content
      

    • Assignments explain clearly how technology is to be used by students
      

    • Students are motivated through the use of visual and auditory stimuli
      

    • Internal communication tools are used by students and the instructor to elaborate on course content

  • Exceptional use as deemed by

    • Use of technology goes beyond the use of technology for technology's sake
      

    • Creative use of a variety of technologies

    • Use of technology appears to be above and beyond other courses reviewed by the collaborators

    • Course assignments cause students to apply the knowledge or skills of the course in realistic and relevant ways;

    • Course assignments are clearly communicated

    • Expectations for assignments are explicitly communicated

    • Course assignments cause students to work at the higher levels of Bloom's taxonomy

    • Course assignments provide students with an opportunity to practice and apply concepts and skills

    • Course assignments and projects require students to make appropriate and effective use of resources external to the course, including print, library, Web-based and other electronic resources

    • Instructor makes appropriate ancillary resources available as part of the course content

    • Course content and requirements are as demanding as a face-to-face course with identical or similar content criteria

Criteria Related to Content Robustness

Content robustness is concerned with the breadth and depth of the content included in or part of a web-enhanced or asynchronous course and the extent to which students are required to interact with that content and with each other. A course has robust content if it goes well beyond the mere inclusion of a course syllabus and a few pages of instructor notes or readings. Also, courses with robust content include a "deliberate attempt to build community as a means of promoting collaborative learning." (Palloff & Pratt, p. xvi.) Content robustness, then, is concerned with:

• The quality of non Web-based assignments required in the course:

  • Non Web-based assignments are clearly stated

  • Non Web-based assignments cause students to apply course concepts and skills
    

  • Non Web-based assignments require critical thinking on the part of students

• The quality of Web-based assignments required in the course:

  • Web-based assignments clearly state how the Web may be used in completing the assignment
    

  • Web-based assignments direct students to specific Web sites to use or avoid and/or provides hints for searching the Web

  • Web-based assignments require students to evaluate and validate Web-based information
    

  • Web-based assignments specify the expected deliverables for the assignment

• The degree to which the content of the course is made available within WebCT via Path or Single Pages or through WebCT via links to external sources of information;

• The degree to which course content is made available to students in manageable segments;

• The degree to which students interact with each other and the instructor to communicate about course content in a real-time context using such features as chat rooms and whiteboards;

  • The degree to which students interact with each other and the instructor using such asynchronous tools as discussion groups and email;

  • The degree to which the instructor is an active participant in the interactive components of the course;

  • The extent to which the course makes appropriate use of digitized images and graphics, whether internal to the course or external via the Web;

  • The type and quality of student assessments included in the course;

  • Student assessments utilize built-in quiz features where appropriate

  • Student assessments are external to the WebCT online learning environment where appropriate

  • Quizzes and testing are tied to the course objectives

  • Ample opportunities exist for student self-assessment

If you're an instructor who would like more information on how to use WebCT to your best advantage in your course, or have any other WebCT-related questions, please contact Instructional Multimedia Consultant Don Bell by directing electronic mail to belld2@rpi.edu.

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