Distance learning as a collaborative enterprise: Tips on teamwork to make the class work
Jinfo Blog

By Robin Neidorf

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If you haven't yet been asked to run, participate in or support a distance-learning programme, you will likely get the call (or the email) sometime soon. Organisations, ranging from professional associations to corporate entities to consultancies to universities, are pushing more and more of their learning into online environments.

Distance learning dramatically changes the terms of engagement for students, instructors and institutions. In a traditional classroom, most of us share an understanding of who sits where, the flow of information and how to maximise the learning experience. Move into a virtual environment, however, and all the rules change. New students and instructors may find it difficult to access the 'lecture', figure out how to participate in discussion and get their needs met while mastering new material.

The foundation for an effective distance-learning programme is laid in creating a strong collaboration for planning, implementing and running a distance classroom. Before a single assignment can be posted or discussion threaded, a team of people need to work together, including:

* Content expert * Instructor * Instructional designer * Technical developer * Project manager

Depending on the size of the project (not to mention its budget), several of these roles may be filled by one individual. Once launched, a distance-learning programme will also have yet another important collaborative team-mate: the student. Whether two, three or more individuals are involved in any given project, it's critical to success that they share an understanding of project goals, desired outcomes, technical, learning requirements and a host of other variables.

It's all about interaction

Effective distance-learning programmes are built on a foundation of carefully designed interactions. The most powerful distance-learning programmes capitalize on three kinds of interaction: with content, with instructor and with peers. In this model, students are not just passive recipients of information; rather, they are the active centre of their own learning experiences. To master new skills and knowledge, they must engage with the content of a course, interact with an instructor who can help them make personal meaning of the material, and validate and deepen their new knowledge through peer dialogue.

Before any of these interactions can occur, however, a different kind of interaction needs to happen: between the collaborative partners who design, develop and implement the programme. Because interaction is critical to the success of a programme, an interactive approach to development builds that orientation right into the foundation.

The collaborative work that goes into a successful distance-learning programme has similar requirements to other kinds of collaborative projects. Individuals who are part of the collaboration must have:

* Clear roles and responsibilities * Shared understanding of goals * Appreciation for how each contribution fits into the big picture * Awareness of challenges * Tools and processes with which to overcome challenges * Ability to communicate * Orientation toward problem solving * Roles and responsibilities

Students and instructors are the primary actors in the distance- learning drama, but there are plenty of supporting parts to go around. Some roles and the tasks associated with them occur in sequence, while others occur simultaneously. All of these roles and tasks have elements that support both the instructor and the student, though some may have greater direct impact on one or the other.

Depending on the size of a project, the nature of the sponsoring institution, budget and course platform, the different roles may be taken up by entirely different people, or some people may play multiple roles. For instance, in many cases, the instructor is also the topic expert, and sometimes the instructional/designer as well. An administrative department or individual may serve as project manager, as well as support the back-end needs of students and instructor alike.

The unique way each distance-learning project team comes together can create challenges, if members of the team are not entirely clear on what their specific responsibilities should be. Teams run the risk of launching a project while missing critical skill-sets if they do not start by establishing a clear understanding of who is at the table and what tasks each will be performing over the course of a project.

Content roles

Prior to the launch of a course, a distance-learning team must first design, create and test the content for the course. During and following delivery of a course, the team must assess the efficacy of the content, its usability and its practical value to students and instructors. Team members responsible for content of a course include:

• Topic expert: Individual(s) with expertise in the material students will be exposed to during the course
  
  
• Resource expert: Individuals(s) with expertise in gathering, organising and sharing resources and supplementary information to support students and instructors
  
  
• Instructional designer: Individual(s) with expertise in the design and craft of instructional experiences, based on learner needs
  
  
• Instructor: Individual(s) who will present the content and help students interact with it to maximise their learning
  
  
• Development: Individual(s) responsible for packaging the content so that it is accessible to students and instructor during the course
  
  
• Administration: Individual(s) charged with the task of overseeing content development and implementation tasks, maintaining overall quality and consistency standards, reporting on progress, and identifying process components that need to be improved, changed or enhanced.
  
  

Administrative and support roles

Prior to course launch, team members in administrative and support roles document and market the course offering, handle registration and arrange access to the course. During the course, administrative and support individuals manage any technical support or access issues that arise, may monitor attendance and grading if relevant, and gather and compile all formal feedback regarding the course. Following the course, the work of administrative and support personnel includes recording grades and credit, performing any kind of course shut-down (including archiving) required, and distributing course feedback to other members of the team.

Team members with administrative and support responsibility may include such titles as:

* Academic counsellor * Registrar * Faculty/Instructor development/trainer * Communications or marketing specialists * Information technology specialists * Student support services * Department chair

Shared understanding of goals

With so many individuals participating in the collaborative work of building and launching a distance-learning course, it is critically important for everyone on the team to have a shared understanding of the overall goals for the project. Each project will have its own specific goals, but distance-learning programmes must include these among their primary goals:

Goals: To create learning experiences that are relevant, engaging and challenging for students; to enable student interaction with content, instructor and peers; to foster student learning so that they can achieve the learning objectives.

It's easy, in the midst of the myriad tasks that occur during distance-learning project development, to forget about the students and their learning experiences. Keeping these fundamental goals in mind, though, can make the difference between courses that work and those that have terrific content and fabulous interfaces but fail to make a difference for students.

Project-specific goals

Beyond the fundamental goals, a distance-learning team must have a shared sense of the specific goals of its immediate project. Developing goals requires knowledge of the student population: What do they need to be able to say, think or do as a result of completing the course? What are the specific challenges the learner population may face in completing the course? What outcomes would be perceived as success by the sponsoring institution? The team may want to consider any and all of the following:

• Research: Is there a need, prior to developing the course, to conduct additional research about the needs and interests of the students?
  
  
• Enrolment: Does a successful outcome involve a specific level of enrolment? Would the course be considered successful if five students completed it? If 25 students completed it?
  
  
• Capacity: What scope of course complexity and student population are you equipped to handle?
  
  
• Use of distance methods: Are there particular methods and tools you are required to use to build and implement this course? Are there methods and tools you would like to try? What additional information do you need in order to be able to make sound decisions about your methods and tools?
  
  
• Establishing goals for the project on the front-end enables the team to evaluate its own success. Without knowing what you set out to accomplish, it's impossible to know if you achieved it!
  
  

Where are the challenges?

Any collaborative project will face challenges -- timing, budget, communication, technology, contrary needs and perspectives. Some of these challenges will be ones that members of the team have control over, but many of them will not. At some level, the budget cannot be budged; the technology can be manipulated only so far; project deadlines often have external triggers, such as the date that the new class of students is scheduled to show up and expect a functional classroom.

When in conflict or just plain stuck on an intractable problem, return to the fundamental goals: relevant, engaging and challenging learning experiences that meet the needs of students. Next to those goals, everything else is secondary. With that as a priority, reconsider the problem:

• Does this problem interfere with the fundamental goals of the programme? If not, is it really a problem?
  
  
• Is this problem under the control of a member of the team? If so, how can that team member resolve it? If not, how can the team as a whole neutralize its effects?
  
  
• What's missing that, if it were present, this problem would be mitigated or eliminated?
  
  

Communicate

Team approaches to challenges can only be successful if team communication is successful. Establishing and maintaining clear and open lines of communication enable members of a team to access each other's creative resources when needed. At the same time (and not incidentally), good communication keeps a project on target for deadlines and budget, and helps a team feel like a team.

Enable communication by establishing protocol for use of email, teleconference, shared online workspace and other resources that draw members of the team closer together. Over the course of a long project, periodic update meetings keep everyone feeling connected and provide opportunities for group brainstorming around any challenges or issues that have arisen.

Distance learning is in beta testing

Despite impressive developments in the past several years and deep inroads on college campuses, in association offerings and within corporate training and knowledge-management efforts, distance learning is still in a cultural testing phase. Many distance-learning programmes are designed and launched without much careful thought given to what their educational role should be -- or even if the students are able to learn in this way. Organisations have a sense that distance learning can benefit them, but they haven't quite quantified (or even qualified) what that benefit could be. Cost- saving is always high on their wish lists, as is the ability to reach a larger audience than other forms of learning.

On top of the other challenges inherent in any distance-learning programme, then, collaborative development teams face the overall challenge of focusing on this project, and tuning out the noise. A team can become distracted by the next hot thing -- external or even internal pressure to go with a solution or move to a distance format because that's the direction in which the lemmings are rushing these days. Or a team can become distracted by the voice of the loudest skeptic in the room, declaring that it can't possibly work, that this educational problem can only be solved with a traditional learning environment.

The 'distance' in distance learning describes geography; it does not require technology to be successful. It does, however, require a process-driven approach, a team of people who are willing and able to pool their collective wisdom and skill, sound instructional design, a method of packaging and delivering content, a student population motivated to learn, and instructors dedicated to connecting with students and establishing a classroom culture of learning. It requires dedicated support and creativity. Interaction with content, instructor and peers. Everything else is extra credit.

Related FreePint links:

• 'Education' articles in the FreePint Portal <http://www.freepint.com/go/p39>
  
  
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• Read this article online, with activated hyperlinks <http://www.freepint.com/issues/080606.htm#tips>
  
  
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