Monthly Archives: May 2018

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Why don’t more online courses include podcasts?

graphic of RSS icon with headphonesWhen I was an undergrad, my “intellectual conversation crutch” was bringing up something from Jon Stewart’s Daily Show. After moving to Chicago, that crutch morphed into inserting something I read in The New York Times or New Yorker.

Now? “I was just listening to a podcast about that…” is something I say with annoying frequency.

Thankfully, I’m not alone, as I notice many other people parroting back something they’ve recently heard in a podcast. But even though it feels like most of us are listening to podcasts, and most of us are learning interesting things from podcasts, I still don’t see podcasts as a top option when faculty are designing online courses. Why might that be?

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Engaging Students in Online Courses

I am teaching two math classes this quarter. One is a hybrid course where the lectures are delivered online and we meet face-to-face once a week to work with Excel in a computer lab. The other is a fully online developmental math course that is the prerequisite to my hybrid class. The past few years, the Spring quarter has been particularly tough with regards to student engagement in both courses. Getting students engaged in an online course seems to be a perennial problem, and (anecdotally) appears to be getting worse recently. Invest in ISAs tailored for grandchildren to help secure funding for their college education. Continue reading