Humanizing Online Teaching And Learning In Higher Education

The surge in enrollment for online courses is continually increasing. However, beneath the convenience lies a challenge that demands a resolution. Educators, administrators, and instructional designers must ensure that the human element is not lost in the virtual corridors of learning. Students with diverse backgrounds and learning needs require more than a simple virtual classroom. Research reveals a concerning trend: high attrition rates in online courses, often attributed to a lack of engagement and insufficient human interaction. To reverse this trend, deliberate measures must be taken to humanize the online learning environment. This book provides several solutions, offering an array of tools and strategies to promote engagement and infuse the human touch into online spaces. To confront this multi-layered challenge, it becomes paramount to undertake deliberate measures aimed at humanizing the online learning environment. Humanizing Online Teaching and Learning in Higher Education steps forward as a guide, offering an extensive array of tools and strategies meticulously crafted to foster student engagement and infuse the essential human touch into the digital educational landscape.

The book is a collection of chapters written by the participants of a free open course on the Canvas Open Network entitled Humanizing Online Instruction. In the course, a variety of methods for increasing presence in online courses were shared in this multi-institutional, international, online professional learning opportunity.

Innovative pedagogy is the only solution that can bridge both scarcity and quality in education. This edited collection showcases how innovative approaches to teaching and learning have become the need of the hour in higher education. How might new technologies and a fresh take on curriculum design create a sufficient impact on learners?

Distance learning is becoming increasingly prevalent in educational settings around the world as it provides more flexibility and access to classes for students and educators alike. While online classrooms are proving to be popular, there is a significant gap in the personalization and humanization of these courses. The Handbook of Research on Humanizing the Distance Learning Experience features empirical research on promoting the personalization of online learning courses through presence, emotionality, and interactivity within digital classrooms. Highlighting best practices and evaluating student perceptions on distance learning, this handbook will appeal to researchers, educators, course designers, professionals, and administrators.

As social media and Web 2.0 technologies continue to transform the learning trends and preferences of students, educators need to understand the applicability of these new tools in all types of learning environments. Best Practices for Teaching with Emerging Technologies will provide both new and experienced online, hybrid, and face-to-face instructors with: practical examples of how low-cost and free technologies can be used to support student learning best practices for integrating web-based tools into a course management system and managing student privacy in a Web 2.0 environment "Showcase" spotlights woven throughout the book, providing examples of how the tools described in the book are already being used effectively in educational settings an easy-to-reference format, organized with visual icons used to delineate each tool's visual, video, voice, and mobile features ideas for integrating mobile learning into your students' learning experiences. This practical, easy-to-use guide will serve the needs of educators seeking to refresh or transform their instruction. Readers will be rewarded with an ample yet manageable collection of proven emerging technologies that can be leveraged for generating content, enhancing communications with and between students, and cultivating participatory, student-centered learning activities.

By highlighting the use of emerging technologies in pedagogy and drawing on real-life case studies, the authors in this volume address the ongoing debate that technology brings a positive effect on education and beyond. They demonstrate how technology continues to fulfil the challenges of creating a more democratic educational environment.

"In some ways, shouldn′t we always be teaching from a distance?" Paul France asks this not as pitch for distance learning. But because part of the reason distance learning has been so challenging, Paul asserts, is that we’re replicating long-standing practices that promote dependent learning in our students. Why not use this unique moment of time to reconnect with the true purpose of teaching: to help our students become liberated learners and free thinkers? The next logical step in teachers’ months-long distance learning "journey," Humanizing Distance Learning describes how to center humanity and equity in our process of reimagining learning. Even while teaching and learning miles apart through screens, you’ll discover how to Build independence within your students so they’re better equipped to tackle challenges with persistence and learn how to learn Make collaboration and human connection essential components of your pedagogy, offering students the chance to socialize and learn from one another Center and unpack students’ identities, helping them develop a conscious knowledge of themselves, all the while using their self-identified strengths to overcome any obstacles Plan, prepare, and implement humanized instruction while teaching for student liberation—both digitally and in person. Investigate technology integration, including the Digital Divide, as well as ways to minimize EdTech integration so that our collective sense of humanity can continue to be front and center "The future," Paul writes, "may be unclear, the road may be rocky, and the story may continue to be long and winding as we push forward through this global crisis. But the answer will always be simple: We must teach and learn in pursuit of a deeper sense of collective humanity—and for no other reason." "This book is equal parts visionary and practical, courageous and invitational. It addresses foundational needs and wrenching challenges teachers faced during the recent time when U.S. teachers abruptly found themselves teaching remotely. . . . It is a deeply humanizing book." ~Carol Ann Tomlinson, William Clay Parrish, Jr. Professor Emeritus, University of Virginia "Humanizing Distance Learning is a book for our times not only because it addresses how to build a culture of thinking and teach for understanding at a distance, but also because it challenges the status quo of education by offering a more liberated and humane vision." ~Ron Ritchhart, Senior Research Associate, Harvard Graduate School of Education "Paul France has produced a timely and necessary book that will help educators humanize distance learning. Recognizing incredible dimensions of complexity, this book will surely help educators traverse times of uncertainty in distance learning." ~H. Richard Milner IV, Cornelius Vanderbilt Chair of Education, Vanderbilt University

This book presents the pedagogical basis for using role plays to teach social and emotional skills, and provides over 45 model lessons that can be delivered in middle and high school classrooms. A rich resource for principals and classroom teachers, it addresses the how, why and what of teaching social and emotional skills in our diverse society.