Dear Faculty,
We have almost reached the mid-semester point and in just 17 days we spring forward into daylight savings! Soon our campus will be filled with fresh flowering trees and the quad filled with students enjoying the warmer temperatures and longer afternoons of daylight.
Our newsletter this week takes another nod to James Lang’s article How to Teach a Good First Day as doing so aligns with meeting Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) accreditation expectations. Focusing on the topic of learning, Lang reminds us about the importance of creating opportunities for active engagement, the importance of students critically thinking about the content in your course, and how students can connect content to their own experiences. Also, as a reminder from our January 22, 2025 newsletter Strong First Days…, Regular and substantive interaction (RSI) is a federal requirement for online education courses that ensures students are actively engaged in learning consistently throughout their learning experience. Here are a few examples of how a course can meet RSI requirements:
- Predictable and scheduled opportunities for interaction.
- Content Initiated by the instructor.
- Involves teaching, learning, and assessment.
- Providing direct instruction.
- Assessing or providing feedback.
- Providing information or answering questions.
- Facilitating group discussions.
With all of that in mind, we have curated resources on ways to include RSI opportunities, including writing clear and measurable objectives and designing activities and assessments that are active learning or project-based. As always, Instructional Development’s instructional designers are happy to consult on designing content, formative activities, and/or summative assessments for your course(s) that meet RSI requirements and foster an engaging learning community for you and your students while achieving academic program goals.
-The ID Team
CITS | Instructional Development
What are Objectives?
Create Learning Outcomes | Standford University Teaching Commons
A learning outcome is a concise description of what students will learn and how that learning will be assessed. Having articulated learning outcomes can make designing a course, assessing student learning progress, and facilitating learning activities easier and more effective. Learning outcomes can also help students regulate their learning and develop effective study strategies.
Write Effective Education Learning Objectives | John Hopkins University
A learning objective is student-centric; it states what the student will learn and be able to accomplish by the end of instruction. It describes a specific behavior that will lead to the desired goal. It is specific and measurable.
Your Objective: Make Learning Engaging.
Laura Gogia Quotes from the episode:
- “There are people out there who live and die by learning objectives, and there are people who think they are the work of the devil.”
- Knowledge is a dynamic, creative process.”
- “There are going to be times when it needs to be one way, and there are going to be times when it needs to be other ways. And that’s okay.”
- “It’s not about measuring as much as defining what you’re trying to measure.”
Gardner Campbell Quotes from the episode:
- “Learning is an enormously powerful and eventful kind of experience.”
- “Recognize that great ideas of all kinds come from all kinds of people at all stages of their knowledge.”
- “There are some great ideas that are forever closed off to an expert because he or she is simply too conditioned by prior learning.”
Engaged Learning | Elon University
The Center for Engaged Learning’s concise guides and multimedia resources offer research-informed practices on engaged learning topics that foster this active, intentional, lifelong activity.
Key Practices for Fostering Engaged Learning | Elon University
In Key Practices for Fostering Engaged Learning: A Guide for Faculty and Staff, Jessie L. Moore defines engaged learning as follows: “Engaged learning entails students actively and intentionally participating in their own learning, not only at discrete moments but rather as an ongoing, lifelong activity.” (2023, p. 3)
Creating Project-based Learning in Your Course.
Project-Based Learning | Harvard Graduate School of Education
To develop a deep conceptual understanding of abstract concepts, particularly in the sciences, students need to do more than just read textbooks or listen in lecture halls. They need to find ways to actively develop their understanding, observe, and reflect on how these concepts introduced in class actually operate in the real world. In classes that utilize a Project-Based Learning approach, students try to solve challenging everyday problems by learning about and applying key class concepts.
Implementing Project-Based Learning: A Practical Guide | Times Higher Education
Ibham Veza and Mohd Syaifuddin Mohd provide practical guidance and methodologies for introducing project-based learning and outline its potential impact on students.
The Magellan Podcast on Regular and Substantive Interaction is a conversation that grapples with the Department of Education’s new standards for online learning, RSI, or Regular and Substantive Interaction. Many institutions are asking: What does RSI mean, and how might our online division seek to meet its stipulations?
The Education Department has left room for online colleges to innovate while maintaining eligibility for federal financial aid. But the lack of clarity carries some risk that colleges could run afoul of unarticulated rules. Read Susan DAgostino’s Inside Higher Ed article for more details:
Canvas Updates:
- All faculty have access to Canvas, the training sites, and a sandbox site as of 2/21/25.
- K16 migrated content sites and Summer/Fall ’25 course sites are upcoming.
- Tue, 2/25/25 at 1:00 pm – Using VoiceThread for Language Learning
- Wed, 2/26/25 at 12:00 pm – Getting Started with YuJa Panorama
- Wed, 3/5/25 at 9:30 am – Kahoot! 101: Getting Started
- Thu, 3/6/25 at 12:00 pm– UPCEA: Using online discussions to bring equity and the real world into onsite classes
- Thu, 3/6/25 at 2:00 pm – Getting Started with YuJa Panorama
View a full list of Blackboard and Canvas workshops and self-paced offerings!
Instructional Development works with faculty to…
- Explore, design, and experiment with different teaching and learning modes.
- Research and integrate technologies that can enhance teaching and learning.
- Design and develop online courses and programs.
- Write learning outcomes, design assessments, craft activities, and develop content.
- Utilize best practices for using instructional technologies.
Feel free to contact us online to book an appointment!