University professors consider online teaching to be participative and quick

Online teaching is gaining followers, the number of online university students has grown from around 9% in 2000 to 15% in 2016 and many university professors give classes in virtual classrooms. The research project entitled La identitat del professor com a docent virtual: rols, enfocaments i sentiments (The identity of the professor as an online teacher: roles, focuses and feelings), supervised by Antoni Badia, Julio Meneses and Consuelo García, professors of Psychology and Education Sciences at the UOC, analyses the educational work of these professionals who classify online teaching as "participative", "quick" and "positive".

The survey, which began at the end of 2011, analyses the answers of 965 professors who combine on-site and online teaching. The report covers three areas: the feelings linked to this type of teaching, the roles and the focus of their teaching. Of those interviewed, 56% are men and 44% are women, almost half have experience of online teaching of at least three years and over 50% have teaching hours spanning at least half the day.

In the feelings section, professors rated online teaching highly, with an average score of 5.71 out of 7. In terms of dynamics – the rates of interaction, the possibilities offered by this type of teaching – the score was 5.11. "It is seen as being participative and quick," says Badia. The last aspect analysed was how comfortable this teaching is – stressful, peaceful, tense, relaxing – which they scored at an average of 4.34 out of 7.

The roles of online and on-site teachers are very different

The analysis of the roles looks at which tasks teachers have to do and which they do not. "It takes an in-depth look at how they tackle university teaching," adds Badia.

The most important role is learning assessment, which scored 4.44 out of 5: "correcting, answering questions, assessing individual and group activities, are just some of the tasks," says Badia. Teaching design, which establishes the objectives and skills, and selects and designs content and activities came second with a score of 4.34. Finally, managing interactions between professors and students and the students themselves, which includes managing conflicts between the members of a work group, improving relations and fostering mutual commitment among students, was in third place (3.52).

"Very significant differences in the roles of online and on-site teachers are seen," states Badia. There are roles that appear in the online context that do not usually appear in on-site teaching, such as design of the learning methodology (designing activities, assignments, etc.). "An online professor needs to have their classes much more mapped out than an on-site teacher," Badia explains. Other teaching roles that take on more significance in the online context are assessment of the students' learning and guidance in the use of technology.

How do they focus the educational task?

"In the focus the professor makes," Badia states, "there is a similarity between on-site and online teaching." The design of the learning activities or the assessment of whether the students are applying their skills to learning or not is the most highly rated focus (4.30 out of 5). The expert says that this score should help break the stereotype that e-learning is based on self-learning.

Content acquisition is in second place (3.67) and collaborative learning – how they participate in online groups or how the interaction activities could be improved – is in third, with a score of 3.65. In light of the results of the study, the experts propose improvement of training for online teachers in such aspects as learning, assessment and social interaction resources. At the same time, they suggest technological support innovations for professors.