ABSTRACT

In this book, our focus has been to go beyond the traditional discussion board and provide ways to actively engage learners in the online course through other 21st-century learning opportunities. We do agree that the benefits of the discussion board allow learners to communicate around processes, brainstorming, sharing ideas about the content, and even reflecting on their experiences. However, recently, we have come to believe that the attention of online learning is now focused on other learning opportunities that we have already discussed in this book. This can be almost directly attributed to the aforementioned issues with online teachers, but there is a more subtle influence – the dilemma

of online assessment throughout online education. As we know online assessments are required and are more directly related to what learners know or what the learner needs to know. The debate about the online assessment tools needed for a course is directly affected by the fact that generic skills and strategies are often inappropriate. Addressing, which assessment tools are best for specific initiatives, learning outcomes, and for specific online disciplines has taken center stage in the wider field of online learning today. Researchers have recently encouraged those involved with online instruction to adopt a more complex view of assessment that addresses the demands specific to content areas (Johnson et al., 2011). This follows because deep knowledge of a discipline is best acquired by engaging in the things used by experts in that discipline (Shanahan & Shanahan, 2012). Through online assessment coupled with active learning opportunities provided by the ways inherent in their discipline, learners deepen their knowledge and understanding of the topics within the discipline that pertains to their online coursework.