Hi everyone. My name is Lindsay Lederer and I'm an instructional designer at the Johns Hopkins University: School of Medicine. As my colleague, Paul, mentioned in the last video, we'll be looking at what you might want to start thinking about as you begin to incorporate inclusive pedagogy practices into an online learning environment. We'll also take a look at a few practical examples to show how this can be done. Let's get started. As you look at integrating inclusive pedagogy practices into your online course, you should think about and reflect on different areas of your course where you might integrate these practices, focusing on how they will appear and function in an online environment. One of the first things you should think about is your course's content and how it will exist in an online environment. You might ask yourself, how are the materials and curricular design accessible, varied, and relevant to my students in an online format of my course? Additionally, you might think about your course's pedagogy and ask yourself, how am I promoting student engagement in the online environment in ways that are authentic, meaningful, and relevant to students in my course? You then could think about your course's assessments in the online environment and ask yourself, how am I diversifying the ways in which my students can demonstrate mastery of their learning in the online format of my course? Also, as you continue to reflect on your course, you might think about the environment and ask yourself, in what ways am I creating a mutually respectful environment for learning in my online course that is accessible and meaningful for all of my students, while also encompassing social, teaching, and cognitive presence? Lastly, as you think about your online course, you could consider student empowerment and ask yourself, what strategies in my course help empower my students to participate in the learning process and break down barriers to the traditional power dynamics between myself and them, and among themselves, or address stereotypes and bias in the online environment? Now that we have taken a look at a few areas of your online course that you might want to think about when looking at integrating inclusive pedagogy, let's take a look at a few examples of how inclusive pedagogy might be integrated in an online course for each of these areas. When we looked at the area of content, we asked ourselves, how are the materials and curricular design accessible, varied, and relevant to my students in an online format of my course? One example of how you might address this in your online course is by providing asynchronous chunked video lectures with captions or transcripts and handouts of any slides, if applicable. If your students normally receive lecture content synchronously, this alternative format may be a welcomed variance for them. Additionally, chunking the lecture presentation in smaller pieces, including captions or transcripts, and providing handouts of lecture slides expand the accessibility of the material to your students and provides them with additional options for interacting with the material. Furthermore, you could also introduce variety and relevance into your online course by including synchronous or asynchronous panels or interviews with experts in the field who explain how the content applies to their role or job. Then, when we looked at the area of pedagogy, we asked ourselves, how am I promoting student engagement in the online environment in ways that are authentic, meaningful, and relevant to my students in my course? One way that you might address this in your online course is by designing and integrating case studies or scenarios as active learning activities or assessments in your course. These are great opportunities for you to bring authenticity and relevancy to your content and illustrate to students how different tasks and activities will be applicable to their future work in the field. You might have them read a scenario and then complete a task such as writing a press release, completing a form, developing a pitch, or writing a patient treatment plan. Depending on how the associated task or activity is completed on the job, you might have the students complete the task in one of a variety of formats, such as written, visual, audio, or video, or give them the option to choose the format if fitting. Keeping authenticity in format is important so that you make it as realistic as possible. But you should allow for choice where possible as well. You might get some creative and innovative results in the end. When we looked at assessment, we asked ourselves, "How am I diversifying the ways in which my students can demonstrate mastery of their learning in the online format of my course?" One example of how you might do this in an online course is by designing and using student discussion as an assessment. This is a great way to integrate interaction and active learning and have a type of assessment that is not just a test. This could be asynchronous on a discussion board or synchronous in an online class meeting. For instance, you could ask students to engage in a debate, critique a piece of work such as a document, web page, or interactions in a video, or explain how they would solve a problem. You can then have students thoughtfully respond to one another. In doing this, you should provide your students with brief, clear directions as well as possible suggestions on how to thoughtfully respond to their classmates. It may also be helpful to develop a rubric that outlines the specific criteria and associated levels of achievement for both their initial original responses and responses and feedback to their classmates. Then, when we looked at the area of environment, we asked ourselves, "In what ways am I creating a mutually respectful environment for learning in my online course that is accessible and meaningful for all of my students, while also encompassing social teaching and cognitive presence?" One way you might do this in your online course is by clearly outlining expectations for communication and participation in the course. You might do this by including a communication policy in your syllabus or posting expectations for live sessions and meetings. Anytime you can set expectations like this, such as when students will receive e-mail responses, or the method in which they should ask questions synchronously or asynchronously. You help to create an environment of respect and understanding. Additionally, feedback in an online environment where the students do not regularly see you, is very important. You might consider clarifying and setting expectations on the timing and format of your feedback, particularly for assessments. You might even try integrating different feedback formats, such as video or audio, which can add even more variety to your course. Finally, when we looked at the area of student empowerment, we asked ourselves, "What strategies in my course help empower my students to participate in the learning process and break down barriers to the traditional power dynamics between myself and them and amongst themselves, or address stereotypes and bias in the online learning environment?" One example of how you might address this in your online course is by ensuring your students have choices where possible, particularly for assessments. For instance, you might allow them to choose the medium for submission, such as written, visual or audio-visual, or the topic. While as we mentioned earlier, you should be considerate of what is the best fit for the content and its authenticity. Allowing the students the ability to actively make a choice like this will help empower them and feel in control of their learning. Also, you might consider integrating some type of peer review and feedback on one or more assignments. In doing so, you might find it helpful to provide your students a rubric with criteria for doing this. This is another way that you can encourage students to constructively communicate and interact with each other and allow them to have a voice and see each other's work in the course. While this can also be done in both online and in-person courses, it can provide the students with an extra opportunity for student-to-student interaction and insight into one another's work. We hope that you find some of these practical examples useful to you as you begin your journey in incorporating inclusive pedagogy practices into your online learning environments. Stay tuned for the next video.
