Teaching in a Virtual High School

Okay, I know it has been a few weeks since I posted here, but between the end of the semester, a quick holiday out of town and the beginning of Maymester, things have been a little hectic around here.

Anyway, I know that I have read through this publication before (see http://www.sreb.org/programs/EdTech/pubs/PDF/Essential_Principles.pdf), but it came to me again this past week in the form of an ERIC document (see http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/contentdelivery/servlet/ERICServlet?accno=ED477169). Basically, this publication describes a "checklist for selecting, preparing and evaluating online teachers for K-12 students.

The items include:

State Qualifications

1. The teacher meets the core professional-teaching standards established by state licensing
agency.
2. The teacher has the necessary academic credentials in the field in which he or she is teaching.
3. The teacher has the prerequisite technology skills to teach online.

Curriculum, Instruction and Student Assessment

1. The teacher assesses each student’s background and content knowledge before beginning instruction.
2. The teacher uses appropriate technology to teach the online course successfully.
3. The teacher uses fair, adequate and appropriate methods to assess students’ mastery of content.
4. The teacher demonstrates high-quality writtencommunications skills.
5. The teacher makes clear to students his or her availability and willingness to support them.
6. The teacher facilitates and monitors appropriate interaction among students.
7. The teacher provides and enforces appropriate standards for student behavior.
8. The teacher’s instruction complies with the Americans With Disabilities Act.
9. The teacher uses online resources effectively to deliver instruction.
10. When appropriate, the teacher gets others to assist him or her in supporting students’ learning.
11. The teacher adapts the Web-based course to meet students’ needs.
12. The teacher promotes student participation and interaction.

Management

1. The teacher ensures that students know one another and feel comfortable interacting with one another online.
2. The teacher provides students with timely feedback.
3. The teacher ensures that students’ work and data are secure.
4. The teacher monitors students to ensure academic honesty.
5. The teacher helps students with technical issues.
6. The teacher coordinates and assists students in understanding course requirements and procedures for working online.
7. The teacher guides and monitors students’ management of their time.
8. The teacher shares information about student progress with mentors, principals and parents.

Evaluation

1. The teacher understands that student success is an important measure of course success.
2. The teacher accepts and follows policies and procedures to monitor courses.
3. The teacher ensures that students participate actively in the course.

The reason why I present this here is because, when I went to meet with the folks from the Georgia Virtual High School a few months back, one of the things we talked about was how to evaluate online teachers.

In a traditionally sense, an administrator would come into your classroom and sit in the back of the room while you presented a lesson that you probably spent more time planning than you would normally spend planning a week's worth of lessons. The administrator would have a checklist that they would go through, making notes in the margins or in the spaces provided and when it was all over, you'd arrange a time to meet with them to go over what both of you observed, how you both felt about it, and areas to continue doing and areas to improve upon.

How would that look for a teacher in a virual high school? Would the SREB checklist be sufficient? Is there any other literature out there on the subject? What are existing virtual high schools doing?

Tags: virtual school, cyber school, high school, education