Putting your course on the Web: lessons from a case study and systematic literature review.
BACKGROUND
Education via the Internet offers enormous potential, but many online courses are pedagogically or technically weak and many good projects are never mainstreamed.


METHODS
In drawing up our recommendations to address the issues around putting a course on the web, we drew on 3 main sources of data: an extensive in-depth course evaluation; a systematic review of the literature, and questions raised by participants on our training-the-trainers courses.


CONCLUSIONS
For any web-based course to succeed, 10 overlapping and iterative areas of activity must be addressed. These are: the market for the course; course aims and intended learning outcomes; choice of software platform; staff training needs; writing high quality study materials; design features for active learning; technical and administrative challenges; evaluation and quality improvement; mainstreaming the course within the institution, and financial viability.
Wong
Geoff
G
Open Learning Unit, Department of Primary Care and Population Sciences, Royal Free and University College Medical School, University College London, UK. g.wong@pcps.ucl.ac.uk
Greenhalgh
Trish
T
Russell
Jill
J
Boynton
Petra
P
Toon
Peter
P
D003194:Computer-Assisted Instruction / Q000379:methods*; D003479:Curriculum; D004501:Education, Medical / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet / Q000458:organization & administration*; D008492:Medical Informatics Computing / Q000592:standards; D009862:Online Systems / Q000458:organization & administration; D015397:Program Evaluation