How to Make e-learning Effective During COVID-19 Pandemic
By: Eric Nelson Posted on Thu, 09-04-2020
Coronavirus has hit the world hard. The pandemic has forced many educational institutes to shut down. People are maintaining social distance and staying home to avoid the spread of COVID19. In this chaotic situation, the majority of schools and universities in different countries have started online classes. Thus, the trend of online learning has sparked due to coronavirus and it seems to grow further with time.Â
In addition to students taking online lessons, many people who are staying home are opting for different online courses to make the most out of their quarantine time. The current situation has boosted e-learning. People these days have free time more than ever. They are looking for something valuable and you can help them by offering some online programs.
If you are offering some e-learning courses, now is the time to market them cross borders. For making your courses available for multiple regions, you can get them translated. Our professional e-learning translation services can be of great help!
Before launching your program, you need to make sure it’s effective. In order to help you make your e-learning programs effective for users, we have come up with a list of tips. Take a quick look and you will get to know how to keep people engaged with your online programs.
Don’t Stream Your Lectures Just Record Them
The first thing that you need to remember is, live streaming is NOT a good idea for online courses. In this period of quarantine, everyone has a different routine. People are required to do their home chores themselves and they all cannot get online at one time. Some might not have internet access 24/7 and some might have some other responsibilities. Therefore, it is better to record the lectures and send them to the registered users so that they can watch them when as per their convenience.
Present Yourself in the Video
If you present yourself in the video, it will have a positive impact on your students. Research has also proved that slideshows with instructor's faces would be more effective. Learners will feel comfortable and will maintain their interest in your video. Thus, for keeping the audiences engaged, it is better to present yourself in the video lessons.
Make Short Videos
Students usually face problems downloading long videos and they also get distracted. So, in order to make learning easy and effective for them, it is better to record short videos. The video lectures you record should not be longer than 15 minutes. It is better to keep the message clear and concise to keep the students engaged. If you have extensive content to share with the audience, you can create a series of videos. Make sure the videos are not too lengthy and develop a virtual connection with your audience via short yet effective video lessons.Â
Test All Your Slides
Test your programs before launching them online. Examine your slides on smartphones to ensure that all your text is readable on short screens. If your slides are not readable and you have prepared all your lecture then all your effort will go in vain. Therefore, you need to test them. Everything including colors, font sizes and template size needs to be examined well. Make sure that all your slides and content that you prepared is easily readable for the audience.Â
 Clicks Have Open Access
Provide your students with open access. If students are unable to open the required resource then your inbox will be full of emails and you need to spend plenty of time troubleshooting. So be very vigilant and invest some time in proving open-access resources to your students. It will save you from chaos later. Â
Be Specific About Instructions
Some people might be new to online learning and you can’t expect them to get it all right. You will have to provide a comprehensive set of instructions in order to let them fully understand what you are offering and how they are going to benefit from it.
 When students are provided with media that runs for 20-30minutes, they lose their interest. Therefore, it is better to provide them with a list of contents that each of the video covers. Moreover, if you are providing your students with more than two resources, label them so that they can use them systematically. Labeling and numbering as per the level of importance and difficulty of each resource would be a great assistance for the students.
Use Interactive Technology
The advancement of technology has added value to the e-learning programs. There are many interactive systems like Edmodo, Moodle, and blackboards that provide various functions for interactive sessions like quizzes. You can use such software and organize interactive activities and quizzes with the help of online assistance where step by step instructions are given.
Be Rational in Expectations
While designing quizzes, make sure that all the answers can be given by using given learning resources. Don't assign tasks to your students in strict mode. If you want them to prepare a summary for your video, tell them that it is a low grading task. If you follow this it will yield good and productive results. Try to keep the quizzes short and have rational expectations from the students in case you are teaching some academic courses. For instance, a quiz of 25 or 30 minutes and 300 words limitation will be enough to engage students for 30 minutes.Â
Monitor Attendance by Using Auto check
Tell students that their participation will be checked by their presence in the quiz, it will increase the adherence and you will not have to manually monitor attendance. It will be automatically checked by learning management systems.
Create Groups for Communication
Don't use group communication for direct teaching. Create virtual office hours using any video conferencing tools like Zoom. Tell students the appropriate time to come live so that they can discuss their problems and find their solutions immediately. You can also get your online teaching feedback so that you can improve. Don't get fret if nobody appears. Relax and make meetings optional. Students are often thankful that they are still provided with this option.
Give Authority to Students
Students should work together in small groups to support each other virtually. You can create online group spaces for students to make small groups and support and refer to each other in case of any query. To start a conversation, throw questions on the group so that students start conversing with each other. Don’t restrict students to use specific communication tools but allow them to use communication tools with which they feel comfortable. Some groups of students will use communication tools easily, while some will find it difficult to use online communication tools, but this step will reduce email traffic on your inbox.
Be Open To Students
Emotional openness is a very great teaching strategy for online programs. People often do want to feel connected to the instructor. Specifically, if you are teaching some academic courses, being open to students will help. If you are new to online teaching, you can tell your students that you are teaching online for the first time and it is a great learning experience for you. Ask for their cooperation and tell them that you are trying your best to make their online learning venture pleasant and productive. Try to keep your tone conversational and it will help in communicating your message effectively. Â
Wrapping Up
The Coronavirus outbreak across the world has created chaos. The lockdown in several countries has forced students to take online classes as the colleges and universities are temporarily closed. In addition to students, other people are also trying to practice isolation. These people staying home all the time are in search of some fruitful activities to keep themselves engaged. You can keep them engaged via e-learning programs. Â
Whether you are running a regular academic course or different short courses related to any industry, the above-mentioned tips can help make your program more effective. In case you want to launch your program in different languages for a wide range of audiences, Mars Translation is there to help. We are providing state of the art e-learning translation services in several languages. We have a team of native translators that provides you with seamless translation solutions according to your project requirements.
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