Online Feedback - The Faster Way
November 25th, 2007 | by Naimp | Posted in Internet, Online Business |While many Education Societies/Universities collect students’ feedback at the end of a semester using questionnaires and students’ group interviews, it is usually collected too late to allow Faculties/Staffs to respond by implementing changes to improve the strategy of teaching or other queries of the students, offering the feedback.
Gone are those days…. Well may be not completely. With the inception of many online learning (e-learning) those are provided by the Education Societies/Universities it has been made faster and better.
If your Education Societies/Universities include online materials and activities, you might consider gathering students’ feedback on their learning experience via online means. Invitation to comments on particular topics can be via
- private e-mail
- public discussion board
- public chat session
Using one-to-one e-mail guarantees privacy for each student, in that the exchange of information will be confidential. The faculty members can invite students for private e-mails with their queries, comments, suggestions and improvements. Availability of response and timely feedback if provide will be appreciated by many of your students.
In a discussion list all messages and posts to the list are likely to be read by everyone enrolled in (unless restricted). ‘Discussion’ tool is structured around discussion forums called ‘Topics’. You could create a Topic in the Discussion/Topic area. Here students could be encouraged to post feedback on specific aspects of the teaching-learning process. They might discuss, for example, what they understood about the key points in a particular topic or reading. This kind of discussion will enable to determine whether the teaching-learning processes are effective in supporting and developing the students’ understanding.
Online chat rooms offer a third online feedback option. Because chat sessions are synchronous and must run at a set time, they are not necessarily convenient for all students. However, to set up regular or occasional chat sessions on student queries and issues can be useful. (This is very much like opening your office door at set times to your students). Open-ended questions to the students in the chat room about specific or general aspects of the learning experience can provide in self improvement of the institute.
The success about this venture depends upon how beneficial can the service be for the internet accessible students.
Roy Johnson is Business Analyst by profession. Besides resource handling, he also looks after the business of Learn On Web. Learn On Web is a site dedicated to offer information on free online tutorials on web development and programming, courses, certifications over the net.