Distance course. This is what it is

Distance courseare different types of course we could call them new but they have long time working. This type of course takes a different tone of teaching-learning process. Here the student hasto learn in a, mostly, authonomous form because the teacher just works as a facilitator and monitor. This does not mean that the teacher does not work with the students, on the opposite side teacher works more by researching information and excersises for the students learning. Also, teacher must read all work and give proper feedback to each student. As said by Michael Moore the basic idea of distance education is:

              Teachers and students are in different places all or most of the time that they teach or learn.                           Because they are from different places, in order to interact with each other they are dependant on                 some form of communications technology. To use these technologies successfully teahcers must                     know the different desing and messaging techniques that are special to those technologies.To enable               teachers to desing courses and interact with learners through technology, administrators in                             educational and training institutions have to organize their resourses differently from what works for               classroom teaching. (2011, p. 1)

        Here we can see in a more specific form what is the distance course and how it works. Actually in the words of mr. Moore we can understand the responsibility of both teacher and students. We can see how in online education we can understand also what is distance education. We can understand how technology is a very important factor maybe a vital one. It could be hard to develop an online course without having technology or a computer to work with. Computer is the main tools of form of communication between teacher student relationship also between students. Most of the type also there is a big distance between students which makes technology the only form to communicate. Students have the freedom to develop their own comunication using this tools at their will. That is the reason why students and teacher must know technology and must be able to use it efficiently. 

     In my opinion, distance education is a very useful form of teaching and learning. I believe it is not only a form of teaching it could also become a tool for teaching. I have a little experience in online education but it has been a good one. In my experience this form help the student become a more responsable, organized and autonmous student. Those characteristics are the ones he should have before the course but also the ones he can develop and increase. I believe this help us to a lot or at least it has helped me. At the beggining it was hard for me in some courses; but now, I believe I can organize myself better and I can do a good calendar to work in a better way. I don not see it has a hard thing now. I have not a big problem working alone or without a teacher and that is why I think it became easier to me. 

     Distance education is a form that has a lot of sides. We can see good ones or bad ones and everyone is very different. For example,  the freedom student has. Student has a lot of freedom that help him avoid stressful teacher controled situations. Student can develop his own form and style to learn which makes him learn in a more efficient form. This only fact has many advantages, it can help students work at their paste without rushing things or having over stress. Finally, this also helps students that are introverted or shy, not having a teacher or classmates physical presence can help them to express in a better and more free way. Shy student are also usually more autonomous which make them confident in this types of courses.

     On the other hand, this course can have big disadvantages. Actually all the advantages could be seen as disadvantages depending on the perception of people. For example, the freedom can make people lazy and feeling without compromise which can make their learning very hard. Also, without the teacher there students may feel lonely or exposed to a reality by beign all alone, that loneliness can be provoqued not only by the lack of a teacher presence and  also by the lack of his/her classmates. That loneliness can have different consequences like stressful situation, which can also lead to many problems of acquiring meaningful knowledge or any knowledge at all. Finally, this type of learning may affect in a big way students that have a lack of motivation for themselves. When a student can not motivate himself lead to stress and frustration, this may be the biggest disadvantage of online education. Since teacher is away it becomes harder to motivate his students that is why students must be able to motivate himself or have a clear goal and determination to work and learn by themselves. 

       There are many ways we can imrpove online education. There is many aspects to improve but it is not about the form, everything is about hte teacher. The teacher must use this properly to have it work efficiently. Both teacher and students must be in the same channel willing to improve, learn and teach. Both have to be willing to support and understand, in a general way we understand that both teacher and student must have an open mind. We have to understand that distance do not avoid the learning process on the opposite side we can use this to develop more values and knowledges in students.The big aspect or fact is that the teacher must be there to support and motivate students. If one of them is missing all the process could go down and not work. That is, I think, the biggest imrpovement that the distance course could have. If we have a balance between the work of the teacher and the student and we have interest from both sides, distance teaching will be successful all the time. 

Class assessment

Assessment is a fundamental part of the teaching process. In a simple way you could say that there is no teaching process without having an assessment process. Assessing in a course is when the teachers evaluates, process and develop a proper feedback. It is a very important part of the teaching-learning process because it is where, both teacher and student, can see how much the student has learned and what is he lacking of. That way teacher can tell the student and both can modify their strategies to improve the learning of the student. There is something very important when we talk about assessing because there is a big difference between assessing in a classroom and assessing in a distance course. 

Assessing in a classroom is a very simple process. The teacher can see the student work and the way he is working, developing and acquiring knowledge. Also, teacher can make different tests to check the understanding. The important part is that in a in-class course teacher can see the students reactions and see if it is working or not. On the other hand, we have distance course classes, which are just a little bit harder to assess. It is not imposible and some teachers could think it is easier but I think in a different way. We could see the assessment in a distance course as something easier because it is only a matter of checking their homework and evaluating that.But it is important too to think in the process of their work and to try to understand the real meaning behind the words and checking if that is really what they understood and they learned something. That is what I think is the most important part. WE as teachers must learn to identify the style of the students and within their stlyes check their learning is real. As language teacher we have many tools to understand the message within the text. We can use the key in the language to understand what is happening with the writer of the text. We must use those tools to verify that indeed the student is writting with real knowledge.

There are many ways in which we can assess the learner of the students and it is not necessary that we only work with exercises. We can use other tools on the internet, for example we could ask them to give their opinion or their idea of an specific subject and do a forum or a discussion board to work with. Make them change ideas in those boards with the teacher working only as an observer. Teacher should only verify that they are working and solving their doubts.