Raising the bar

Academics from the Faculty of Education are partnering with colleagues at CQ University (CQU) to raise the bar on online teaching strategies.

The DEHub-funded project looks at the way online course instructors organise their work and how they encourage learner/learner, learner/teacher and learner/content interactions.

The USQ Faculty of Education project members are Dr Henriette van Rensburg, who lectures in blended learning pedagogies, and Professor Patrick Danaher, Associate Dean Research, who is also a member of the recently established Capacity-Building Research Network Faculty Research Centre.

Professor Danaher said the primary aim of the 18 month study is to identify innovative, effective and creative online teaching strategies.

'Every Australian university now uses some component of online learning and yet there is still so much we don’t know about the effectiveness of online teaching.

'So this research is both important and timely. It’s a new frontier in education research, and we are hoping to fill in some of the territory and develop guidelines and evidence based strategies.'

Professor Danaher said the study builds on research completed by CQU-based academic, Dr Dolene Rossi, who completed a PhD at USQ in online learning; and who is the project leader and chief investigator.

'As part of her PhD, Dr Rossi developed an effective model for evaluating online teaching strategies and applied this model to one course at CQU.

'The research found that there are many different strategies that can be useful in increasing students’ interactions online, including scaffolding, matching the assessment to the course objectives and using online groups and teams.'

The DEHub project research is now applying this model to two courses at USQ and two at CQU.

'The project formally concludes at the end of June 2012, but publications will continue post then and plans are already underway to apply for further funding in the future.'

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