Name: Ms. Susan Cox
Courses Taught: Chinese II, III, and Survey of World Languages
Years Teaching: 15
Location: Alexandra, VA
Hidden Talent: Ballroom dance (Won first place at the 2011 USA Dancesport Championships)
Thoughts About Teaching and Learning Online: Individual students learn differently. The great thing about online classes is how flexible I can be in offering various assessments, resubmissions, and effective methods of feedback. Ironically, I can make the teaching more personalized for the individual student online than in the classroom.
Advice for students taking an online class:
1) Keep a binder and planner/calendar. You must stay organized and on pace.
2) Try not to refer to your face-2-face teachers as "real" teachers compared to your online teachers. I am very real.
What is one concrete example that shows that online world language classes "work"?
Last year, one my online students was accepted to the US government's NSLI (National Security Language Institute) summer language program in China. As part of that program, she was tested on her Chinese language skills. She tested so high that she was placed in the highest class after only two years of Chinese. In other words, she came into the NSLI program with Chinese language skills ahead of all her peers, who were all face-2-face students.
More Information:
Ms. Cox's online Chinese language courses were featured on National Public Radio's Morning Edition. You can listen to the story here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89070946
