A Recipe for Successful Online Geoscience Courses

Can introductory geoscience classes be offered online without sacrificing content? The answer is “Yes!”, however, a well-designed online course is crucial as well as attention to the student's needs. My recipe for a successful online course includes: 1) a priority on course navigation and organization, 2) encouraging student-faculty contact, 3) prompt and personal feedback, and 4) consistent deadlines. Traditional on-campus lectures are replaced by weekly learning modules presented in an outline format with numerous graphics, animations, and external links interspersed within the outline. Laboratories are still hands-on, but are presented online. Students purchase a laboratory kit including a manual, mineral and rock sets, testing supplies, topographic maps, and a DVD. Students answer laboratory questions within an established MS Word document and upload the files to an assignment drop box. Feedback is then given in a timely manner. Online quizzes help emphasize important parts of the lectures and help keep students on track. A weekly schedule of lecture topics, laboratory assignments, and quizzes, not unlike a traditional on-campus course, provides a roadmap for the online student to follow and helps to avoid procrastination.

The course content and schedule are similar to my traditional on-campus course, however students like the flexibility and convenience of the online course. Two major differences between the course formats are that online students are not given specific exams on laboratory material and the percentage of the course grade given towards exams is less in the online course. In comparing exam scores and final grades between several semesters of on-campus and online courses, the students in the on-line courses, on average, out performed the on-campus students. By having to learn the course material on their own, many online students commented that they were taught to learn material for long-term retention rather than just for the exams.