A self-assessment of teaching PL 376 as an online, web-based class for the first time.

Taking Planning Education to the World: Online Teaching at NAU

(article in Arizona Planning magazine, 1999, (April/May) pp. 1, 3.)

Alan A. Lew, Ph.D., AICP, Professor
Department of Geography and Public Planning, Northern Arizona University
Homepage: <http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~alew/>

I started using the WWW to teach my classes almost as soon as I first got ‘online' in 1995. Since then it has become an integral part of every course that I teach. I was excited by the potential that cruising the web offered for discovering the new and unexpected knowledge, and I wanted to share this with my students. Unfortunately, not all students were that interested, especially back in 1995 and 1996. Many were computer-phobic, while still more would rather be ‘lectured at' than given responsibility for their own learning. By 1999 I find that computer-phobia (at least toward the WWW) has dramatically decreased, though active learning is still a struggle for many younger college students.

Classes at Northern Arizona University use the WWW in one of two ways. Those that use it to support traditional lectures or seminars are referred to as Web-Enhanced. If my department is typical, probably well over half of the classes at NAU are web-enhance. Classes that are taught entirely on the WWW are referred to as Web-Based. NAU currently offers over 75 web-based courses, with over 50 more under development for web-based delivery. Several planning courses have made their way to this list. Of particular interest to both practicing planners and citizen planners is Community Planning (PL599), which is discussed in a separate article in this issue of Arizona Planning. This article discusses my experience in teaching Planning for Sustainable Tourism (PL376) as a web-based online class for the first time during this Spring 1999 semester.

Anyone, anywhere, who has access to the WWW can register online for an NAU web-based class. I have had a number of inquiries from Latin America and Eastern Europe regarding my online class, but the out-of-state tuition costs kept them from registering. All communication is done through the Internet and WWW. Lectures, assignments, interactive exercises and tutorials are all on the web. A few online classes at NAU are web-streamed. These meet in a traditional lecture setting on the NAU campus, but the lectures are videotaped then transferred to the WWW where students can watch them at a later time and date. Lectures in most online classes, however, consists of a transfer the professor's lecture notes onto a webpage for reading by students. These lecture notes are often linked to other related information on the WWW, including graphics and other websites. A third approach is more like an online seminar, in which students do readings and then respond to questions posed by the instructor. This last approach is the one that I primarily use in my Planning for Sustainable Tourism class, although I have also put up my Planning Theory lecture notes because these were not available anywhere else on the WWW that I could find, and were not in the class textbooks.

Many of the readings for online classes are taken from the vast array of material that is available on the WWW. Some websites offer very good reading material, others are only so-so, and many present a clear editorial viewpoint. Unfortunately, the vast array of WWW material is totally uncoordinated, so it is still necessary to have some kind of textbook to provide a degree of cohesion and continuity to the class. For my class, I use two tourism-related textbooks, which I supplement with planning and tourism related materials on the WWW. The APA website, for example, has useful material on the historical development of planning in the US that I use in my class (located at <http://www.planning.org/info/intro.htm>.)

To keep up the level of student interest, as well as my own, I do my best to vary the types of assignments from one week to the next. Some assignments are discussion oriented, with students reading a chapter from one or both of the textbooks, then responding to questions that I pose. Other assignments are based entirely on material that they have read on the WWW. The most common assignments are a mix of textbook readings and web surfing. For example, a couple of the textbook readings are case studies, which I then follow up by having students surf to related websites and relate what they find back to the text.

There are several ways that class communication takes place. E-mail is used to communicate one-on-one between students and the instructor. Assignments can also be sent by e-mail. I do this for some assignments, but only when I create a WWW form, which students use to answer questions that are submitted to me. I use discussion (or e-mail) lists which make it easy for students and myself to send a message to the entire class. Newsgroups can also be used for this. Some instructors use these as a type of discussion forum in which students can drop in and out as fits their schedule. Chat rooms can also be used to simulate classroom discussion, but this requires that everyone be online at the same time and, as far as I know, is not used very much.

The last type of online communication setting is known as a ‘conference'. This is a website which is designed so that students can post messages, respond to other student messages, and edit or delete their own posting whenever they wish. This is what I have students use to submit most of their assignments. Each student has their own conference space (or folder) in which they place all of their homework. Students can see each other's work and can comment on them. However, I have found that the rate of student progress is so varied (despite my deadlines), that trying to build an active community of people who are responding to each other's work is difficult.

With the exception of web-streamed classes, in which students passively watch a lecture being replayed on their computer, online classes are an active learning approach to teaching. This means that students are required to take considerable initiative: they must log on, they must read the material, they must surf the web, and they must write a lot. Many students are not used to the high degree of active learning required in an online class and do not have the level of self-discipline required. This is the most significant problem associated with online teaching. Students who specialize in doing the least amount of work for the lowest acceptable grade in a traditional classroom settings tend to fail miserably in a web-based class. However, students who are interested in the subject matter and are eager to learn tend to do very well.

There is some concern that online classes reduce the level of student-instructor interaction. Again, it depends a lot on the type of student. Online communication can considerably increase the level and quality of communication between the instructor and active learners. However, it can also be used by passive learners as a way of ‘hiding' from the instructor – similar to falling asleep in the back row during a lecture. My experience, so far, is that online teaching may heighten the extremes of interaction depending on the student. Online classes are clearly not going to replace the traditional classroom, but they do offer another way of teaching that could be very useful for non-traditional students trying to juggle their education with jobs and varied living circumstances.

Note: Planning for Sustainable Tourism is part of NAUOnline's new online certificate program in International Tourism Management, which also includes two planning related courses offered in the Parks and Recreation Management program, Recreation Facilities and Area Planning (PRM423) and Special Events Planning (PRM325), as well as courses in Hotel and Restaurant Management. Information on NAUOnline can be found at <http://nauonline.nau.edu/>. Alan Lew's classes can be found at his homepage at <http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~alew/>.

Addendum:

From: Technology in Higher Education Journal, December 1998, pp. 58-9.

Type of Students Most Likely to Succeed in Taking an Online Class [you do not have to be all of these things, but the more this describes you, the easier you will find taking an online class]:

- Independent, active learners
- People who enjoy working alone
- Those who can structure and manage time well
- Accomplished, busy professionals
- Students with superior verbal ability
- Risk-taking, creative problem solvers
- Individuals committed to peers and the group process
- People who are comfortable with asynchronous rhythm

(Asynchronous means 'not at the same time' and refers to the characteristics such as not getting immediate responses to e-mail inquiries and having different students post their assignments at totally different times during a semester.)

Type of Faculty Most Likely to Succeed in Teaching an Online Class:

- Serious, lifelong learners
- Teachers favoring experimental and collaborative learning styles
- Those who enjoy up-front conceptual work (e.g., thinking about teaching)
- Skilled group process facilitators
- Teachers who make expectations explicit
- Those who construct evaluation/assessment schemes
- Providers of detailed, developmental feedback
- People willing to give feedback at frequent intervals

[I am definitely not all of these things. I am OK at facilitating group processes, but I am not sure that I am 'skilled' at it. I try to make my expectation explicit, but some students complain that I do not. I have only had limited experience in evaluation/assessment, something that is taught in Colleges of Education. And my feedback could probably be more detailed. But I still enjoy teaching online. -- Dr. Alan Lew]

HOWEVER - A student commented on the above in the following way:

After about 8 web classes I can say that the above answer is very textbook and not necessarily true at all. In fact, I was pretty much the opposite of much of that description. I never liked working alone, crowds are more my style. I'm a Capricorn and the word risk doesn't come into our vocabulary very much at all. And managing time, well as a full time working Mom, student, cheerleading coach and Girl Scout leader, I sometimes don't know what day it is, let alone know how to manage my time. The local fast food chains do most of my cooking and clean socks often come from the hosiery department at K-mart. I think the students that do the best in web classes are the totally whacked out, we don't have a clue if it's daytime or nighttime people who are determined to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Students who realize that if I want this to work for me, I have to work for it. The successful students are adaptable yet ever changing. I'm going to be a successful on-line student. (K.H.)

Comments and questions on this information from student or potential students are most welcome. Send e-mail to: Alan.Lew@nau.edu.

last updated on 14 October 2001
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