Practical learning supports for lecturers and students new to WEBCT and online delivery

Designing the learning materials and WebCT sites for delivery of a new International Online Law Masters program turned out to be the easy part of the design brief, as many of the lecturers and students involved in this program are new to online delivery of course materials and require a great deal of ongoing support. This poster outlines a range of strategies and processes that have been designed and implemented by the Teaching and Educational Development Institute (TEDI) at The University of Queensland to provide timely, ongoing assistance to the T C Beirne School of Law Online Masters lecturers and their students who were new to WebCT and the whole online delivery format. The first section of this poster illustrates program features of the customised sites, which were designed by the TEDI educational multimedia team. Designing the graphical user interfaces in such a way that they were consistent, easy to use, unconstraining, supportive of the tasks to be undertaken and able to become quickly transparent to the learner was an important consideration to the team. As can be seen, each site features an introductory video from the course lecturer and a Who’s Who page where course instructors and students can post photographs and short biographies to assist in overcoming the barrier of distance. In addition, WebCT communication tools such as Discussion, Chat and Email have been used extensively on each of the sites to promote active learning through student interaction both with their lecturer and with a diverse group of peers. The next section of the poster features the learning supports that were developed to assist lecturers in the use and delivery of their online courses. These support strategies include hands-on staff development specifically targeted to the School of Law needs, both prior to and throughout the semester, the establishment of an In-house TEDI Helpdesk, the identification of lecturers who could provide peer support within the T C Beirne School of Law, and the development of an Online Staff Resource Centre on the WebCT server that is available for course lecturers’ use. The final section of the poster depicts the support given to students of these Online Law Masters courses. This support includes the development of a comprehensive student guide to using WebCT, the provision of a CDROM detailing hardware and software requirements with tips on how to set up their computers, the provision of an online WebCT Help section on each site’s homepage, the provision of resource materials within each course including access to databases and online library facilities, and a well-advertised student telephone help service. It is believed that the effectiveness of these courses is dependent upon the provision of a range of ongoing learning supports for the course lecturers and their students. It is hoped that through the provision of these supports, along with other strategies that may be developed as needs are identified, these lecturers will eventually be keen to implement more sophisticated uses of the medium with increased interactivity into their online teaching methodologies with subsequent opportunities for improved learning outcomes for their students. Copyright  2002 Weny Chalmers. The author(s) assign to ASCILITE and educational non-profit institutions a non-exclusive licence to use this document for personal use and in courses of instruction provided that the article is used in full and this copyright statement is reproduced. The author(s) also grant a non-exclusive licence to ASCILITE to publish this document in full on the World Wide Web (prime sites and mirrors) and in printed form within the ASCILITE 2002 conference proceedings. Any other usage is prohibited without the express permission of the author(s).