Abstract:

It is well-known that effective learning outcomes strongly relate to students’ interest and participation in the learning process. Achieving these goals seems to be easier in the traditional environments than in the online framework. Online Learning Environments (OLEs) offer exciting opportunities for both teaching and learning, but designing these processes successfully requires an integrated perspective on a wide range of features which include both curricular components (such as objectives, content, strategies, teaching style, assessment) and various formative aspects (such as communication, motivation, inclusion, relationship).

Among the numerous dimensions that impact the effectiveness of learning in OLEs, students’ interest and degree of participation make a significant difference. It is the teachers’ role to advance pedagogical choices that can support students’ sense of belonging to a study group and their responsible participation. In the context of the global evolutions related to the coronavirus pandemic, the pressure of being online for study, for work (in the case of those students who are already employed), for leisure, healthcare, and other daily life activities, may impact negatively on the learning processes.

The purpose of the study is to highlight a set of good practices experimented by the authors together with their students, during the first semester of the academic year 2020-2021, for three study programmes within social sciences, exact sciences, and technical sciences areas, respectively. It is obvious that the teaching process requires restructuring and resizing of all its components. Although building a functional relationship with students and stimulating their intrinsic motivation is a constant of the teachers’ work, it currently needs significant reconsideration.

Keywords:

Innovation, technology, education, online learning environment, participation.