The National Standards for Quality Online Courses provides a list of indicators in seven standards. This list is to be used as guidelines for instructors for effective online course design and implementation (Quality Online Courses, 2022).
The school district should adopt these standards since they provide effective guidance for online course design and instruction.
The school district should provide instructors with the opportunity to complete the Quality Matters training, in order to earn their APPQMR certificates for online course design. Checklists containing these indicators could be provided to the instructors to help guide them as they build their courses. If needed, either a curriculum director or an instructional design specialist could check the design of these courses and provide assistance to the instructors if needed.
PearDeck is a top choice for instructors based on its formative assessments, ability to engage active learning and to help foster retrieval practice (Efficacy, 2021). It is a tool to help instructors utilize active learning both live in the classroom and online. It offers many options for free, integrates with Google Classroom and Microsoft Teams, and offers custom school district pricing for advanced features (Efficacy, 2021).
I have personally seen this in use in a classroom where the students responded to questions, polls, and games in real time as they progressed through the lesson. The teacher received immediate feedback during those active learning activities.
NearPod is similar to PearDeck in that it also offers a suite of tools to help instructors engage student learning. Instructors can create interactive slides, interactive videos, games, and activities (Nearpod, 2022). These interactive activities can be either completed in real time in the classroom, or self-paced via online courses. Instructors can begin with a free account, however not as much is provided like there is with PearDeck. Custom pricing is available for school districts (Nearpod, 2022). NearPod also integrates with multiple learning management systems, including Google Classroom and Microsoft Teams.
A significant strength of NearPod is with creating interactive self-paced activities to be used with online classes. The ability to add questions during a video is a great way to help students retain that information. Turning a vocabulary assignment into a game would also be a fun way for students to learn those terms and definitions.
Efficacy. (2021). Retrieved from PearDeck: https://www.peardeck.com/efficacy
Nearpod. (2022). Retrieved from Nearpod: https://nearpod.com
Quality Online Courses. (2022). Retrieved from NSQ: https://www.nsqol.org/the-standards/quality-online-courses/