1. TEN LESSONS LEARNED FROM TEN YEARS OF RESEARCH ON K-12 ONLINE TEACHING AND LEARNING Dr. Susan Lowes Director, Research and Evaluation Institute for Learning Technologies Adjunct Professor, Program in Computing, Communication, Technology and Education Teachers College/Columbia University Presentation to the NECC/NYCC Virtual Learning Summit April 27, 2011

2. Lessons on the existing research base

3. Lesson 1: Young field, exploratory research  Research has been based on the need to understand a fast-evolving field  Surveys—about experiences, perceptions, and attitudes  Case studies—program evaluations, chapters in edited collections, journal articles  Dissertation-level qualitative studies  Lots of practical experience, leading to many standards, but standards are not necessarily built on research  Very few well-executed experimental or quasi- experimental designs  Very few studies that delve deeply into the data to look at correlations, compare cases, do content analysis, or do statistical analyses

4. A few recent interesting examples  In-depth qualitative single-case studies of pre-service teacher training and of virtual school teachers’ practices, each in a single virtual school  Ongoing evaluation of North Carolina Virtual School, from teacher and student perspective  Using back-end data to show that time spent in a course, not number of visits, is correlated with student success  Using content analysis to understand the dynamics of student interaction in discussion forums and in collaborative group projects  A comparative case study of online and f2f environments that analyzed the benefits of each for teaching a foreign language  A comparative case study of online and f2f teacher professional development that analyzed the benefits of each.  A comparative case study, using network and content analysis to analyze patterns of interaction in an online professional development course in order to understand facilitation practices

5. Lesson 2: Early focus was on comparing online with face-to-face  Many studies as new field needed to prove itself  Generally compared non-comparables  The online students were almost always a self-selected group to start and even more so after attrition  The curriculum was generally different  The teachers are almost always different  Most studies cited are from higher education and cannot be assumed to apply to K-12  Overall, they suggest that online (done well) was at least as good as f2f (done well)

6. Lesson 3: We now need to ask different questions  We still need to survey the field  But we should turn our focus toward making online courses as good as, or better than, f2f courses  We need to tease out the affordances and constraints of each environment so educators can build on these  We need to understand online better  We need to use the data generated by the LMS, but we must combine it with other analyses

7. Lessons on teachers and teaching

8. Lesson 4: Online teachers have certain characteristics  Online teachers are …  Experienced teachers  Life-long learners looking for new challenges  Well-organized  Online teachers agree that teaching online takes at least as much, and often more, time than teaching f2f  Online teachers play many roles (facilitator, technology trouble-shooter, counselor, administrator, customer service representative)

9. Lesson 5:... but online teachers are also similar in some ways to face-to-face teachers  Online teachers …  Have different teaching styles and beliefs about teaching  Want control over their courses  See their courses as works-in-progress and continually make changes  Engage deeply with the students they are teaching  Successful online teachers are able to establish teacher presence and student presence in their online classrooms  We need to know much more about the intricacies of teaching online and far more about the 1-to-1 model

10. Lesson 6: Online teachers need tailored training  Online teachers want training that..  Starts early  Is substantial  Is ongoing  Is “bite-sized”  Is fully online and facilitated  Some of the training needs to be subject-matter specific  Few colleges that train teachers are training them for teaching online; fewer still have collaborations with virtual schools  We know very little about what makes professional development effective and even less about pre- service training

11. Lessons on students and learning

12. Lesson 7: Successful online students have these personal characteristics …  Online students who succeed (complete) tend to be…  Motivated  Organized  Have good time management skills (self-discipline)  Independent learners  BUT taking an online course can help develop these skills  And many different types of students are highly motivated, including at-risk students

13. … and certain background characteristics  Online students who succeed tend to have …  Good technology skills  Good academic preparation  Students therefore need to be carefully prepared for online learning using …  Diagnostic pre-assessments  Technology preparation  Mini-courses to try out the environment  We need to know much more about how best to prepare students

14. Lesson 8: Successful online students are in environments conducive to learning  Successful online students are in environments that …  Have technology problems resolved before the class begins The first weeks of an online course are the most important weeks in terms of managing attrition  Have a set time period reserved for the online course  Have a set place to do the work  There must be active supervision and guidance, and active communication/coordination between the student’s site-based supervisor and the online teacher

15. Lesson 9: Successful online students are also …  In schools where online learning is considered as good as face-to-face learning  Less successful students often have two misconceptions about online courses They are easier than f2f courses They take less time than f2f courses Students pick up these misconceptions from the attitudes of administrators or teachers  Engaged by their courses  Students want interactivity and to have the course connected to the real world  Students want to interact with each other

16. Lessons on research again

17. Lesson 10: We have so much more to learn…  We need to continue to survey the field  But we also need detailed studies of online learning  We need more comparative studies that compare online to online  We need to compare the same implementations with different conditions  We need to make much more use of back-end data  We need more in-depth looks inside courses  We need follow-up studies, especially for professional development  Many LMS’s collect massive amounts of data but most schools are not prepared to use it

18. For list of references, contact: Dr. Susan Lowes Teachers College/Columbia University lowes@tc.edu