Author: Elan Paulson

Elan Paulson, PhD, has been an educator in Ontario's higher education system since 2004. Before joining Conestoga as a Teaching and Learning Consultant, Elan was on the executive team at eCampusOntario. She previously served as Program Director and as an instructor in professional education programs at Western University's Faculty of Education. With a Master's in Educational Technology, Elan specializes in technology-enabled and collaborative learning to support diverse learners. She has also conducted research on faculty participation in communities of practice for professional learning and self-care.

More Ways to Up Engagement in Your Synchronous Online Class

Reading Time: 5 minutesCreating Opportunities for Higher Levels of Engagement Students experience higher learning gains when they are taught through a more interactive classroom (Knight & Wood, 2005). In this first section, find some ideas to consider for structuring higher levels of participation and engagement during your online synchronous Zoom or MS teams class meeting time. Supporting and Managing Class Engagement Levels One...

Assessment Types

Reading Time: 6 minutesConestoga provides students with a wide range of assessment types. This tip describes the goals for choosing evaluation types, explains how discrete assessments fall within category and component descriptions, and provides a comprehensive list of types of assessments. Goals A number of goals for teaching and learning are achieved when faculty understand the type of assessments they are using in...

Excellent Fully Online Teaching

Reading Time: < 1 minuteView this video introduction to the learning path on understanding your role and responsibilities as a faculty member delivering a fully online asynchronous course. What’s Next There are a number of different Hub posts that can increase your familiarity with fully online teaching and learning. Review these posts as needed. More on What is Fully Online Teaching What is Effective Fully...

Getting Students to Participate in Breakout Rooms

Reading Time: 7 minutes“[B]reakout rooms do not always magically create engagement and higher levels of learning.” (Saltz & Heckman, 2020, para. 16) Breakout groups are used as a discussion technique to increase participation and group-based learning. However, pair and group activities can be cumbersome in online synchronous meetings, especially when, as professor, you cannot see all groups and monitor student conversations at the same time...

Adult Learning Principles for College Teaching

Reading Time: 5 minutesHow can we be sure our practices reflect the fact that all of our students are adult learners? Conestoga’s youngest students are 17 year-olds who finished high school in Ontario. However, the average student age is about 22 years old, with an increasing number of adult learners who are older and who have years of work experience, additional post-high school...