When moving from classroom teaching to instruction in e-education, the lecturers/instructors sometimes have significant difficulties.
There are numerous requests related to the adaptation of lecturers/instructors to new conditions of online education:
- familiarity with the technology necessary to prepare and present educational content online;
- competency in computer-mediated communication (e-mail, instant messaging, discussion forums, videoconferences etc.);
- writing skills (spelling, grammar, literary language) and expression skills;
- organisational skills and time management for synchronous activities and timely feedback to the participants;
- adaptability to different types of students and situations without face-to-face contact;
- readiness to accept and play new roles: moderator, mentor, technical consultant etc.
There are different possible roles of the lecturer/instructor in e-education:
- accepting the participants applications and confirming that they have enrolled in an online course/subject;
- preparing the participants for working with LMS, especially the less experienced ones;
- developing a schedule of various activities and deadlines, and publishing the activity calendar;
- informing the participants about the planned activities, educational content and deadlines;
- presenting the content through videoconferences or recorded lectures (webcast, video-on-demand);
- explaining the methodology of various assignments, case studies, problems and projects;
- organising groups and teams which will work on specific assignments or projects;
- planning, thematic orientation, encouraging and moderating the discussions;
- developing tests, quizzes and surveys, as well as their grading and evaluation;
- providing feedback about the participants, their activity and progress;
- evaluation and comments on various projects, essays and critical reviews;
- having dialogues and participate in discussions started by the participants.
In any case, successful running of an online educational process requires the instructor/lecturer to work on themselves, their knowledge and skills, organisation and conscientiousness in accordance with the needs of the participants and their fulfilment.
Sometimes the mentor is not the author and designer of the content, but simply in charge of the organisation and conducting of the educational activities, registering and guiding of the participants, testing and evaluation of the participants, as well the encouragement of the participants to participate in discussions. It is then necessary for the lecturer/instructor to previously acquire good control of the professional or scientific area taught by the online course , as well as to supplement their knowledge during the educational process if the need arises to answer the participants’ questions to which the instructor does not already know an answer.
Successful mentorship requires not only the possession of appropriate communication skills , but also motivation to conduct as successful communication with the participants as possible as well as to insure enough personal time for various types of contact with the participants and as frequent personal interaction as possible.
Tips & tricks: Give it a good thought before deciding to mentor an online or mixed-mode course/subject. Will you have enough time to contact the participants if the course last for a longer period of time (several weeks or months)? If your decision is positive, before starting the mentoring activities join a couple of online courses as a student, analyse the situations that occur and the answers of the instructor/mentor, and then evaluate in what way and how successfully would you react in similar situations. After that you will see that studying several good-quality text-books in the area of mentoring in online education as well as taking appropriate courses will probably not hurt either.
