E-learning is an ongoing process. Therefore, you, as an online teacher, should make sure to develop both yourself and the experience you provide in the virtual classroom. Select the most relevant tips for your online course and enjoy the educational results.
Benefit From The E-Learning Curve
The e-learning curve is generally a graphic representation. It consists of the dynamic relationship between time and gained knowledge. This principle correlates the amount of time with the repetitive effort that is needed in order to learn something new. Therefore, the awareness of this process would be even more valuable when complex skills are required to be adopted. Over time, the curve has also come to be known by other names such as the productivity curve, the efficiency curve, or the experience curve.
Here is the e-learning curve in action. When a student is facing a large amount of material or something that is brand new, the time needed to achieve a higher output is greater. However, repetitive processes require less time to achieve the same output. This means that the learning curve descends in the beginning and has a flat incline towards the end.
By knowing this you can plan your teaching schedule fairly well. In addition, you can position the difficult part of the material earlier in the day or in the course, leaving enough time for its practice and adoption.
Inspire Better Online Learning
People learn better when they see an attractive presentation. Let’s assume that your main goal is for your students to retain as much information as possible. You also need to make sure that the material won’t get lost after the online course. Here are some examples that are currently being used by teachers:
- Engage your students’ emotions
- Connect new knowledge with the base knowledge that your students already have
- Challenge the team with different perspectives
- Incorporate examples from real life
- Vividly demonstrate the material
- Repeat for success
Make Your Classroom Brain Compatible
The brain has its own working process while learning. So consider the following facts when you create your next online course:
- Short-term memory can hold about 7 pieces of information. This means you should introduce new knowledge once, and then repeat, repeat, repeat.
- The right and the left hemispheres function together during learning. Therefore, it is beneficial to engage your students with both logic and emotion, as well as to create different tasks requiring a variety of skills.
- Emotions trigger the memory. Positive emotions strengthen learning. Interact with text, video, and audio. Moreover, make your students feel good in the virtual classroom, which can help to sharpen their focus and improve their memory. Therefore, try to challenge your students while keeping them calm and engaged in the process.
Create Good Course Structure
To make the most of your online course use a blend of different learning techniques. Moreover, change them regularly to stimulate your students. Additionally, use a variety of gaming activities like quizzes, tests, role-playing, etc.
The entire course should follow strict principles. Therefore, think about dividing the content into smaller pieces. Don’t forget to recap frequently, as well as to show your students the bigger picture so that they will see how particular knowledge fits into the entire course.
People feel safe when they have a certain schedule, guidelines, or targets. Be more specific and share your desired results.
Finally, have you considered branding your online course?
Use The 4 Steps Of Learning
Every lesson is encoded in the brain as a memory. The successful learning process helps to store knowledge as long-term memories that can be easily recalled later. Cognitive psychology ackowledges the following four central steps to learning:
- Attention
- Encoding
- Storage
- Retrieval
Attention filters our perception of the world. Encoding makes the information acceptable to the brain. Then it is stored in the relevant brain center. Lastly, we can recall certain information or behavior.
So, as a teacher, try to explain in detail. People learn best when they understand, not just memorize. Moreover, make sure you connect the information with an already familiar concept. By doing so you will help the brain accept new information.
Don’t Underestimate The Brain’s Need For Peace
Maybe you already know that sleep helps memory. So make sure that you provide enough breaks during your online course. This valuable time will refresh your students’ brains.
The brain cannot focus for long periods of time. Keep in mind that the attention span of an adult learner is about 15-20 minutes. Therefore, make those peak minutes count. Break your modules into meaningful bites. Also, make sure you change your teaching method often but not the subject itself. Additionally, short-term memories are stored for no more than one minute. So the fresher the brain, the higher the chances of impressing it with new knowledge.
