Web-Based Courses (WBCs) – Donald Girouard & Sophia Palahicky

 First off, thank you to Donald Girouard and Sophia Palahicky for taking the time to come and speak to our class about web-based courses! This was quite the informational session as I don’t have any experience with WBCs.

Donald and Sophia shared with us that there are currently 46 web-based courses available from Manitoba Education.

Reasons for using WBCs as a teacher?

• For distance delivery
• To cover curriculum
• To share courses
• Could develop your own courses
• As a teacher resource
• As part of blended learning environments

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Reasons for taking courses online?

• Student interest in alternative methods of learning and earning credits
• Resolve timetabling issues/provide flexibility
• Implementation of new curricula/courses
• Students use WBCs to fill in some gaps
• Preparing students for lifelong learning
• Teacher availability

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For rural schools I can see how WBCs can be valuable, but I’m still unsure if I would use one in city schools. One concern that was brought up by many in our class was: are we the next profession to be replaced with technology? MB Education does require that even web-based courses are teacher run and facilitated by teachers, so that brings some relief. However, it still makes me wonder… and make me a bit uneasy. It may not be possible now to replace teachers with web-based courses, but maybe it would be in the future. Could you imagine a world where students no longer went to school, took all of their courses at home and teachers were no longer needed? I only ask because that was the 'flash' visualization or daydream I had during our discussion lol. Now back to reality… what are your thoughts? Would you or have you used a web-based course in your classroom? If so share your thoughts/experience, I would love to hear them!

Until my next post… JD