Effective... no, engaging learning activities for asynchronous education

 Last week when I asked Copilot to generate blog topics, it gave the suggestion of "effective asynchronous learning activities", but as I prepared to write this entry today I thought about the difference between effective and engaging - which is better? or is there a better one? are they the same? Good questions.

Effectiveness leads us to activities where learners are gaining knowledge that educators intend for them to gain; "producing a decided, decisive, or desired effect" (Merriam-Webster).

Engaging on the other hand means that learners want to do the activity and probably complete it in high numbers due to that fact; "tending to draw favorable attention or interest" (Merriam-Webster).

So, are they same? Yes and no. It depends on the activity because it can be effective and engaging at the same time. Educators can also produce effective activities that no one wants to engage with, or vice versa.

What are some effective and engaging activities for asynchronous learners?

• Discussion boards.
• Individual or group research projects.
• Video demonstrations, by the learner or the educator.
• Interactive activities.
• plus many others that maybe we'll talk about some other day...

Discussion boards

In a classroom, discussions are a great way to see what learners know and what knowledge they have gained. It's also an opportunity for others to listen and absorb more information. The National Council for Teachers of Mathematics have research to show the effectiveness of discussions and have included it as a mathematical practice, "construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others." The content can be a reflection or discussion about the current topic, or it can provide open-ended, critical discussions about hot topics or ways to problem solve.

Research Projects

Learners can work in groups or individually to research and present on a topics of their choosing (within the realm of the content). Not only does this provide choice for learners but it also gives them a chance to focus on a topic of interest.

Video Demonstrations

When I was in trigonometry in high school, the teacher assigned each student a topic to learn about and then teach the class. Since my goal was to be a teacher anyway I loved this project. In an asynchronous environment an educator can assign much the same thing, then learners can present their topic through a video demonstration. This is just one example of how this might be used, as an educator or learner you may be able to think up other ways to utilize videos (e.g. assessments or end-of-term portfolios, etc.).

A video I made showing students how to graph a system of equations.

Interactive Activities

In math and science there are websites like Desmos or PhET that offer activities students can interact with and discover a new topic. Many of the activities contain critical thinking questions and guidance to encourage the learner to explore. In many instances, these are a great way to connect the content to the real-world. For finance/social studies there is Next Gen Personal Finance and The Stock Market Game. If you have others you would like to share, please put them in the comments below!

This blog could probably go on and on about all the activities for each of these topics, as well as other was to engage learners and be an effective educator, but I'm going to stop here. There will be plenty of chances to expand this, so please let me know what I missed or what I can write more about in the comments!!

Resources: 

https://you.stonybrook.edu/celt/2021/04/13/engaging-students-in-asynchronous-online-courses/

https://www.vanderbilt.edu/cdr/module-2/interacting-asynchronously/

https://www.rochester.edu/college/teaching/teaching-online/asynchronous-learning-activities.html

An AI Generated Topic

 I am having trouble organizing my thoughts for this blog because there is so much to focus on and think about! What's most important? Or what do I want to write about the most? I don't know, but I know who does, Bing Copilot! Copilot is Microsoft's AI chat bot that can help you write a paper or come up with topics for a blog - HA! Okay, but really, it was helpful and it was able to organize and spit out my thoughts in quick fashion, don't be afraid to try it out. 

But anyway, I digress, what did Copilot tell me about? I asked it to give me topics on asynchronous education, it first spit out a definition of asynchronous learning, which I haven't even thought about doing, what a great starting point!

Here is Bing Copilot's definition: "...education activities, discussions, and assignments that allow students to learn at their own pace and on their own time." It even gave me it's source: https://www.panopto.com/blog/asynchronous-learning-explained-examples-benefits-and-more/

Copilot asks me to mention some examples of this, then suggests I move onto the benefits of asynchronous learning, as well as providing a list of effective asynchronous learning activities. How convenient!

This was just the first prompt, I went on to ask it more details like what are the challenges to asynchronous learning and how to motivate learners in an asynchronous environment. I now have an organized list of ideas to write about on this blog, and it took very little effort.

As educators start to embrace the fact that AI chat is not going anywhere, we also have the need to find out how to detect if learners are using it to complete assignments. I hear so many discussions, especially from our English teachers about what to do when we know a learner has used AI to write a discussion post or answer a question in an assignment. There are starting to be some tools available, a colleague shared these just yesterday: 

GPTZero | The Trusted AI Detector for ChatGPT, GPT-4, & More

Free AI Detector | Gemini, GPT4 and ChatGPT Detector (scribbr.com)

But it's going to be a while before there is sophisticated enough technology to be absolutely certain a learner used AI in a response.

If you are currently working with learners in an environment where they might use AI, continue to have conversations with them about it's appropriate use. We can only be open and honest with learners, get their feedback, and encourage them to take control of their own learning.

Stay tuned for more AI generated topics, written by me!

Me as created by Microsoft Designer (AI)