Blog post 3

Do you think it is possible to be “authentic” when teaching online?   Or do you think a more formal style is appropriate?   Whether you choose authentic or formal as your choice of online instructional style, give some examples of what that might look like. Would you have casual online conversation? Would you have strict guidelines?

Post #3 

Authentic online teaching 

     First of all, I think teaching online requires more authenticity than in face to face class. As Clair pointed out, "When we teach online, students are more directly connected to the knowledge, or the substance, and less to the substrate, or the knowledge bearer. It is an intellective form of engagement rather than an interpersonal one." That is, our existing knowledge would be relentlessly questioned by other people's experiences and ideas, therefore, we as teachers need to be intellectually agile and firm always. There is no room to be subtly interpreted or assumed online than in the formal classroom. Lesser nuances might be detrimental to learning, but it works better to improve the accuracy of communication which is positive to academic communication. In that circumstance, it is very achievable to become authentic when teaching online. 

     Then, what kind of guidelines need for such authentic online teaching? First of all, we need the representative image for participants to formulate the counterparts as 'real' persons. Through the recent three years of managing online and offline teaching, I found that starting from the question 'why do I take this course' or 'what do I want to take out from this course' helps people feel united and more open to sharing their life stories with unknown people online. Exchanging private questions and personal lives might be helpful to a certain degree to bond the participants, but that purely on them do not last. 

     After such casual starting point, posing one of the extreme opinions can be effective to ignite the discussion. It works in two points: One is, to set the point to start communication so that participants to easily jump in the talk. Sometimes, to become the first person to suggest is not easy but to agree or disagree with the existing opinion argued by other people outside of the community gives more flexibility to act online. Secondly, with such vivid opinion, it gives an opportunity for participants to map the classmates' notions, attitudes, values, etc. 

     Most important point in online teaching, I think, is to make the dialogue connected to each other. Simply many remarks or comments do not mean effective interaction online. We often find that people talk just what they talk and there is no meaningful feedback on each other. Just expressing 'Good' or 'Fine' does not cultivate discussion which is academically required. Therefore, making participants to focus on the topic is most essential part in online teaching.