Learn What to Expect
Experts say online degree programs are just as rigorous as those offered on campus. Prospective online students should expect various types of coursework suited for a virtual environment, such as discussion boards or wikis, or more traditional research papers and group projects.
Here are 10 types of assignments you may encounter in online courses.
Read or Watch, Then Respond
An instructor provides a recorded lecture, article or book chapter and requires students to answer questions. Students generally complete the assignment at their own pace, so long as they meet the ultimate deadline, Bradley Fuster, associate vice president of institutional effectiveness at SUNY Buffalo State, wrote in a recent U.S. News blog post.
Discussion Boards
The discussion forum is a major part of many online classes, experts say, and often supplements weekly coursework. Generally, the professor poses a question, and students respond to the prompt as well as each other. Sometimes, students must submit their own post before seeing classmates’ answers.
“Good response posts are response posts that do not only agree or disagree,” Noam Ebner, who then led the online graduate program in negotiation and conflict resolution at Creighton University‘s law school, told U.S. News in 2015. “When you read another student’s post, you have the ability to expand the conversation.”
Group Projects
Just because online students may live around the world doesn’t mean they won’t complete group work. Students may use Google Docs to edit assignments, email to brainstorm ideas and software such as Zoom to videoconference. Katy Katz, who earned an online MBA in 2013 at Benedictine University in Illinois, used both Skype and a chat feature in her online classroom to communicate with classmates.
“That was a good way for our instructor to see that everyone was participating,” she told U.S. News in 2015. “Any planning we did — if there were going to be changes to meeting times — we would communicate in that chat area.”
Virtual Presentations
Students may also give either live or recorded presentations to their classmates. At Colorado State University–Global Campus, for example, students use various video technologies and microphones for oral presentations, or software such as Prezi for more visual assignments, says Karen Ferguson, the online school’s vice provost.
Oftentimes, Ferguson says, “They’re using the technology that they will use in their field.”
Exams
Like on-campus courses, online courses may have exams, depending on the discipline. These may be proctored at a local testing center, or an actual human may monitor online students through their webcam. Companies such as ProctorU make this possible.
In other cases, students may take online exams while being monitored by a computer. Automated services including ProctorTrack can keep track of what’s happening on an online student’s screen in case there are behaviors that may indicate cheating.
Research Papers
Formal research papers, wrote Buffalo State’s Fuster, remain common in online courses, as this type of writing is important in many disciplines, especially at the graduate level.
While there are few differences between these assignments for online and on-ground courses, online students should ensure their program offers remote access to a university’s library and its resources, which may include live chats with staff, experts say.
Case Studies and Real-World Scenarios
When it comes to case studies, a reading or video may provide detailed information about a specific situation related to the online course material, Fuster wrote. Students analyze the presented issues and develop solutions.
Real-world learning can also take other forms, says Brian Worden, manager of curriculum and course development for several schools at the for-profit Capella University. In online psychology degree programs, students may hold mock therapy sessions through videoconferencing. In the K-12 education online master’s program, they create lesson plans and administer them to classmates.
Blogs
These are particularly useful in online courses where students reflect on personal experiences, internships or clinical requirements, Fuster wrote. Generally, these are a running dialogue of a student’s thoughts or ideas about a topic. They may update their blogs throughout the course, and in some cases, their classmates can respond.
Wikis
These allow students to comment on and edit a shared document to write task lists, answer research questions, discuss personal experiences or launch discussions with classmates. They are particularly beneficial when it comes to group work, Fuster wrote.
“A blog, a wiki, even building out portfolios — we see a lot of those in communications, marketing and some of our business programs,” says Ferguson, of CSU–Global. “You may not see as much of that in accounting,” for example, where students focus more on specific financial principles.
Journals
A journal assignment allows an online student to communicate with his or her professor directly. While topics are sometimes assigned, journals often enable students to express ideas, concerns, opinions or questions about course material, Fuster wrote.
More About Online Education
Learn more about selecting an online degree program by checking out the U.S. News 2017 Best Online Programs rankings and exploring the Online Learning Lessons blog.
For more advice, follow U.S. News Education on Twitter and Facebook.
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10 Types of Assignments in Online Degree Programs originally appeared on usnews.com
