Saving Your Sanity When Teaching in an Online Environment: Lessons Learned:

Abstract To address critical shortages of special education personnel in rural areas, institutions of higher education are using the Internet to bring personnel preparation programs to prospective and practicing teachers in rural communities. However, often instructors of such courses receive little to no training on how to design and implement a course in the online environment. While learning management systems may differ at various colleges and universities, there are many helpful strategies that can make the processes of course development and implementation easier for the novice and experienced online instructor. In this article, four instructors from two different universities with substantial distance education experience offer practical tips for creating and managing online courses. Personnel preparation programs in special education struggle to address teacher shortages in the field that are becoming ever more urgent in response to the new requirements established by the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001 and the reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in 2004. Today, many special education programs are attempting to address these shortages, especially in low incidence disabilities and the early intervention, via distance education (Ludlow & Brannan, 2001, dated 1999; Ludlow, Conner & Schechter, 2005). Although the shortages are seen across the country, they are particularly high in rural schools (Menlove & Lignugaris-Kraft, 2004). New technologies for distance education have allowed school systems to hire interested individuals already living in a rural area and provide them with access to personnel preparation programs (Menlove & Lignugaris-Kraft, 2001). Institutions of higher education have used a variety of technologies such as satellite broadcasts, interactive television, audio conferencing, and the Internet (Skylar, et al., 2005) for distance education. However, as the capabilities of the Internet have improved, more colleges and universities are choosing this as their mode of delivery. The United States General Accounting Office (2002) reported that 84% of four-year institutions in the United States offered online courses to some 1.5 million students. In 2006, around 3.2 million students took one or more online courses, with 96% of institutions with enrollments of 15,000 and over offering online courses (Sloan Consortium, 2007). The Internet, however, is not without its limitations. Some rural areas offer only dial-up connections with old phone lines that offer even less than the 56K speed as the only option to access the Internet. (Rural Assistance Center, 2007). This option, though generally adequate for email and discussion boards, is less than optimal for other applications often employed in distance education (e.g., video streaming, desktop conferencing) that require broadband access. Rural participants sometimes can access higher speed connections to the Internet at the community's public library or their local school system (Rural Assistance Center, 2007). These sites, however, present issues of firewalls and filters that block access to certain web sites or file types. Still, more connection options such as satellite and cable Internet access are rapidly becoming more available in rural areas. As this occurs, more personnel preparation programs may choose online courses and programs as a viable delivery system in rural service areas. As distance education technologies change, so must pedagogy and instructional methods. Use of the Internet as an instructional delivery system is still in its infancy. In this article, we share with you some simple ways that online courses and programs can be made better and easier for all stakeholders involved in the process (i.e., instructors and learners) based upon our collective experience of 25 years in online developers and instructors at West Virginia University and the University of Kentucky. …