I am Director of Research and Evaluation at the Institute for Learning Technologies as well as an Adjunct Professor in the Program in Computers, Communication, Technology, and Education at Teachers College. As a researcher and evaluator, I work on all kinds of projects, mostly K-12 classroom-based curriculum interventions and mostly in math, science, and engineering (because that is where the funding is, both at the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Education). As part of this work, I have researched many teacher professional development initiatives, including some that were offered online, and in 2005 I was invited to conduct one of eight studies funded by the U.S. Dept. of Education to study online learning. Since then, I have done more and more research on the rapidly growing world of online learning. Since 2006, I have also been evaluating the new International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma Programme Online, which is increasing the number of courses offered each year. This has given me a great opportunity to look closely at online teaching and learning.
Here is some information about the IB program:
IB diploma programme online
Although I have been studying online teaching and learning for several years, I have only taken one online course--which was a dismal failure from my point of view--and I have never before taught one. I found creating the course an interesting challenge, particularly coming up with assignments that would be learning experiences. I will be soliciting your ideas for improving it as we go along.
I should add that I am an anthropologist, which means that I am always interested in the big picture (the context) as well as the little picture (interactions between people, or between people and context). You can read more about my past and my current work on the ILT website:
http://www.ilt.columbia.edu/about/staff_list.html
