By Emily Cook, TLS staff writer
Some might see the challenges of online teaching and shy away from it, but for Associate Professor Peter Thompson, those challenges are opportunities in disguise.
“The challenges and opportunities are in some ways the same. I think the big thing is being aware of them and using them in the most effective way,” he says.
Thompson joined Carleton’s School of Canadian Studies in 2009 and two years later began teaching online courses that he developed along with two other colleagues.
When teaching, Thompson says he strives to create an open environment and excite students with his own enthusiasm for the subject. His efforts were recognized in 2015 when he was named a Provost’s Fellowship in Teaching Award winner for sustained excellence in teaching.
“I feel really lucky to teach at Carleton because we have such amazing support, both for online and for face-to-face teaching,” he says.
When it comes to teaching online courses, Thompson says he tries to apply similar principles as he does in his face-to-face lectures.
“I try to create an environment where the students are comfortable and where they feel like they can respond to the material,” he says.
He says he uses programs like BigBlueButton, a web conferencing tool developed at Carleton, as well as Google Docs for shared notes. With BigBlueButton, students can ask questions in real-time, which helps build a classroom feel. Thompson says this addresses the major challenge of timing in online teaching because students generally watch lectures and join the chat room at different times.
“That shared experience of being in a classroom is lost,” he says.
But this challenge is also an opportunity, he says, because students’ time is more flexible. That means they can rewind if they missed something, and look up facts as they go.
What’s important, according to Thompson, is mitigating the challenges of online teaching with tools like BigBlueButton, inviting students to his office, or having live lectures.
Thompson says students respond pretty well to these methods because they’re quirky and different. For some, he says, they even prefer this format because those too nervous to come into his office can talk to him online.
“I tend to think most of those things work both ways,” he says. “They’re not necessarily perfect either way but as long as you’re aware of them, or doing your best to mitigate them, they tend to work fairly well.”