Courses

Basic Information About Online Courses

On this page you will find general information about our online courses and links to WebCT information WebCT at PSU

How Can a Communication Course be Taught Online??!!!

Getting Started - You must have an Odin account to gain access to WebCT courses. If you do not have one, go to the WebCT homepage to apply and to receive instructions on activating your acct. When you are registered into the course and have your Odin acct. you will automatically be added to the course a few days before the term begins. Be certain to check in the first day of class whether your course meets online or in-class.

Orientation Workshops: WebCT offers several training sessions for students new to online courses. See the Homepage for details.

Wait-Listed Students - If a course is utilizing a wait-list, WebCT is set up so wait-listed students are automatically added to the course. If you are wait-listed, you will have access to the course, however this does not mean you will be able to add the course. Rarely will an instructor add someone before the first day or two of the term, sometimes it may even take the first week to confirm enrollment numbers for the registered students.

Again, although you will automatically be added into the WebCT course, this does not mean you are registered yet. Just as in regular courses, you must receive permission from the instructor to be able to add the course. Email the instructor or attend the first class meeting.

Access to Course Once Registered - You will access your WebCT account using your ODIN username as your WebCT ID and the last four digits of your PSU ID number as your password. This will give you access to your myWebCT page, where all of your WebCT courses will be listed. Your myWebCT page is basically a homepage for you and your online courses. It is a good idea to access your course(s) through "myWebCT" page because when you open to this page, you will find announcements, updates, email notices, etc.

How Can a Communication Course be Taught Online??!!!

Many people wonder how a Communication Course can be taught online!Most of our online courses are like any other communication course, students are presented with a base of knowledge about communication (theory and application) within a variety of contexts. Just as in the in-class experience, students engage in the study of communication; apply concepts to personal, social, work-relation, global, environments; conduct research; develop skills, etc. Online communication theory courses have similar approaches as do in-class approaches when it comes to reading, analysis, synthesis, research, assignments, etc.

Online communication skills courses, have varying approaches to meet the need for performance. Students may meet in-class for performances (such as to give speeches in a public speaking course) or they might be required to put together a group for this purpose. In other skill areas, students are given a structure for the practice of skills outside of class, i.e., a comprehensive listening exercise with a friend or coworker). These are actually no different than one would find in F2F courses when these types of skill-based exercises are built into course assignments.

Some partially online courses, hold in-class meetings for the purposes of taking exams, to encourage and promote contact between all members of the class, to clarify assignments, etc.

In courses such as Communication Within Groups or other courses which use the group experience, you will find group development, communication patterns, personalities, leadership and other group roles, participation issues, etc. emerge in online groups fairly similar to in-class groups. Some students report an enhanced experience because their access to group meetings is facilitated by the online capabilities, and because there is more potential for equity in participation between members. Some students do not prefer this approach to the group experience and groups sometimes arrange periodic face-to-face meetings."

Understanding Communication
Perhaps concern about communication courses online reveals some "tech fright" associated with this new technology, but since the statement is so often said regarding Communication courses rather than about courses in other Liberal Arts or Social Sciences disciplines, the concern also reveals a combination of misunderstandings about communication. Specifically: "Communicating is only speaking; only face-to-face and only occurs when people are in agreement and/or feel good." Students in communication courses learn quickly why these are misunderstandings or myths:

(1) Misunderstanding (Myth): Communicating is only speaking. This first part of this misunderstanding is the perception that we teach only Public Speaking courses in Communication Studies and that only formal speaking is important to learn. Most of the speaking we do, thus need to learn skill competencies, is in interpersonal contexts within relationships (personal, social, work, etc.). A deeper misunderstanding here has to do with the notion that only speaking is communicating and listening is almost an after-thought. We often hear people inaccurately say, "It is important to communicate and listen to each other." A listener is communicating. A listener sends continuous messages to a speaker during face-to-face interactions, so much so, that a listener will let a speaker whether or not to keep speaking, hurry up, become clearer, etc. The listener informs the speaker how she/he is doing during the entirety of their oral message. Thus, this sentiment could be stated as, "It is important to speak and listen to each other."

The third feature of this misunderstanding about communicating as only speaking, involves the wide range of communicating, encompassing much more than these two skill areas of listening and speaking. Intimate to personal to social to public communication; private to global; small community to international media; dyadic to organizational; visual; written; tactile; mono-cultural to multi-cultural; intra- to intercultural; etc. Communication is very simple to very complex depending on the medium involved, the number of people, the environment/context, etc.

(2) Misunderstanding (Myth): Communication is only face-to-face. Email, virtual groups, message, bulletin, discussion boards, chat rooms, teleconferencing, voice mail, interactive Internet systems, television, radio, newspapers, books, magazines, telephone, text-messaging, pagers, billboards/signs, letters, postcards, etc. are all ways we communicate with each other.

(3) Misunderstanding (Myth): Communication only occurs when people are in agreement and/or feel good. It is a common misunderstanding to think that when two people are not getting along, they are not communicating with each other. We communicate anger, disagreement, dislike, etc. and are immediately understood by each other. I can frown at someone speaking to me and in an instant the person will know that I dislike something. Then, depending on the relationship & history together, the person will think I dislike her/him, the idea, the tone of the voice, etc. We communicate "feel good" or agreements as easily as we communicate "feel bad" or disagreements. Thus, when people are not getting along with each other, they are communicating in such a way that they are supporting and/or maintaining behavior not satisfactory or conducive to attaining needs.

If you are new to communication courses, understanding these aspects of communication will help you with the area of study of this course. You will be able to shift from thinking of communication in a stereotypical way and notice the complexities involved. This will also assist in understanding why a communication course can indeed be taken online!

Teaching & Learning in Communication Courses
When it comes to communicator skill development, F2F courses tend to be as challenging to instructors as are online courses because it is very difficult to determine whether or not students have actually learned skills. Obviously formal speaking, as in public speaking, skill development can be observed and evaluated. "Easy" stops here. In a Listening course, how do we determine if a student is using effective or ineffective critical listening skills or using comprehensive listening instead of biased listening? In an Interpersonal Communication course, how can we test on the competencies involved in speaking up when one has something difficult to say? In an Intercultural Communication course, how can we know if someone has reduced the effects of ethnocentrism in their communicating? In a groups course, how can an instructor know if a student is behaving as a competent group member?

We base our understanding of students learning of skills on what they tell us they learned. This make writing skills and test taking very important in communication courses. Still, this is not the best way to understand if someone has learned a particular communication skill. For example, a competent critical listener, may not be a competent writer about the experience. In fact, a concern we often hear in communication courses when people do not earn good grades on write-ups, "I thought this was a communication class, not a writing class." We also hear, "This grade does not reflect the powerful group experience I had." Communication write-ups are difficult for other reasons (see the link on this.)

For the most part, Communication courses can be taught online as easily as English or Sociology courses. I want you to understand the nature of a communication education as you begin the study of group communication. Group interaction is group communication and we are going to study the influence of technology while using the technology.

Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC), facilitate classroom learning in new ways.
CMC lets teachers and classmates talk to each other when it is convenient, may equalize participation, can increase learner self-responsibility; allows learners to see different perspectives, gives them time to think how best to give a message, and can prepare them for CMC in their future professions. Judith Pena-Shaff, Wendy Martin, and Geraldine Gay, "An Epistemological Framework for Analyzing Student Interactions in Computer-Mediated Communication Environments." Journal of Interactive Learning Research 12 (Spring 2001)

Brainstorming, content development, decision making and problem-solving are enhanced by the improved critical thinking and reflection possible in asynchronistic and structured group interaction. There are now numerous studies supporting the idea that the quality of content can be significantly improved by the use of CMC tools. The question still under scrutiny has to do with factors of human communication: influences between people, accountabilities, responsibility, varying motivations, rank/status/power, getting along, outcomes, pay off, degrees of interaction satisfaction, and much more. All are factors of interaction between people and all are "messy" to observe, assess and evaluate.

Most Communication Online Course Offerings are Structured to be Partially Online - Online communication courses are as varied in structure as you will find in our regular in-class courses. You will find only one or two of our courses completely online, most are partially online. Of the partially online courses, some meet in-class just once or twice throughout a quarter and some five or six times.

Also, many courses use web-based components, but have regular in- class meeting schedules.

Online Course Content and Grading Criteria - You will find a wide variety here also with some courses having online lectures and some utilize the text more than others. You will find a mixture of weekly assignments, term projects, group discussions, group presentations, online quizzes, in-class exams, etc.

Online Participation and Attendance - Each instructor will set criteria for participation. You will find most courses require weekly involvement, usually two to three types of involvement each week. Some instructors make use of group discussions, entire class discussions, weekly assignments, etc. Your course syllabus will provide you with the information you need about participation requirements. So as strange as it may sound, there are attendance requirements!!

Participation is Rarely Synchronistic -- Most instructors of completely or partially online courses do not use a synchronistic format. Use of the Chat Room option would be as close as most would get. These are usually optional features built into a course.

Perception of Online Courses as Independent Study Courses - Most online courses are structured and as such, are not to be confused as an Independent Study experience. Independent study courses (also called By-Arrangement courses) are typically set up for people to work at their own pace.

Often people sign up for online courses because they are busy and looking for the kind of flexibility they would find in working at their own pace. However, in most online courses, there is and there isn't flexibility. Instead of meeting in the classroom four hours a week, you are "meeting" (experiencing, receiving, reporting, responding, testing, researching, etc.) the course material throughout the week. The flexibility you have is when you engage in the material each week. This is almost always at your own pace. (....unless there is an online group lecture or a timed quiz!)

Workloads in Online Courses -The homework in online courses is not primarily what you will find online, rather you will find what would have taken place in-class, lecture, exercises, etc. To put the workload in perspective: A typical four-credit course requires four hours in-class per week, with two-three hrs. per credit calculated for studying, assignments, etc. in addition to those in-class hours. You can expect to spend approx. 40 hrs. per term per credit or 160 hours per course or approx. 14 hours a week per course. Since an online course combines the material from in-class and out-of-class, this ratio of contact time and workload is not a clear distinction.

Instructors of online courses have designed their courses to fit into the 11-week term, just as they do in their traditional face-to-face courses. Most online courses have weekly requirements, sometimes more structured to make up for the lack of regular contact time. At first, it can seem that you are online a lot more than you expected. People new to taking online courses can easily have the impression they are online more than a normal or reasonable amount of time because they are spending time trying to figure things out.

People have reported without the structure of meeting each week in-class, it is easy to forget there are online timelines each week. It usually takes a couple of weeks to adjust.

Contact with Instructor - Given the structure or nature of online courses, you are likely to have more individual contact with your instructor than you would in an in-class experience. Each course as an email system which can only be accessed by those in the class. Other contacts include Discussion postings, submissions & responses of assignments, grades posted throughout the term, and in some cases, chatroom office hours.

Frustration about Contact Response Time - The ease of contact mentioned above, sometimes brings frustration when you do not have an immediate response from your instructor. Many instructors set up time frames for when they will be online, when you can expect responses, when grades will be posted, and so on. Please request this information from your instructor if it is not on the syllabus or posted in your course information.

Do Not Hesitate to have a Face-to Face Meeting with your Instructor - People who are new to online courses will benefit in the first week or two of the quarter to meet with their instructors....in front of the computer! Those who have dropped online courses in the first week or two typically feel overwhelmed by the new online experience, but regretted dropping so quickly. Many people sign right up again the next time the course is offered.

If you are considering dropping because of worry over your skills at taking an online course, please see the instructor first!! If your instructor does not hold office hours on campus, please see another instructor of one of our online courses. Also, take advantage of the WebCT assistance on campus.