I'm Bored

For those of you new to teaching online, being bored is likely the last thing to come to mind.  However, in my CNG 101 class, I've become bored.  I'm grading the same assignments, posting the same news and discussions and I think my boredom is starting to influence my teaching.  So, I'm going to make some changes.

No, I'm not reinventing the wheel or even changing books, but rather just changing up how I do things.  For example, I've had a weekly quiz which is three short paragraphs.  I'm going to change this up to be a matching question of terms and then some multiple choice questions instead. With the reduction in writing in the weekly assignments, I'm going to add an essay question to the Unit Exams.  They'll be graded the same way, just in different places.

I also want to make the discussion board more formal, at least the initial post.  Right now, students aren't graded on their writing ability (grammar, sentence structure, spelling, etc.) in the discussion boards.  The problem is by this point in the semester, the boards are sloppy and very difficult to read.  Students log in Sunday night, post quickly reply twice to others in the class and call it good.  This isn't what I want.  I want longer, more thoughtful discussions.

So, I'm looking at fewer discussions with more points for each.  I want to make each one more valuable.  I'm also thinking of requiring students to submit their first post before being able to read and post other's thoughts.  I'm just getting too much "group think" in the discussions.  Any other ideas for making the discussion board more formal?

No matter what I decide on the discussions, I'm sure the summer will be anything but boring.

Helping a Shy Student

After 10 weeks of the term, I have finally found out why one of my students isn't posting in class discussions; he's shy.  I know it sounds strange, but I have to admit, it makes sense.  This student has turned in every assignment, done well with the exams, but he won't post in the discussion area.  So, when he opened up to me in a journal assignment, it made sense.

The problem I'm grappling with is how do I move forward with him.  I can just imagine this student in the classroom who says nothing during class, but studies, does his assignments and gets an A.  (This is a Networking class, not speech.)  He doesn't miss a class and stays after when he has questions.  Online communication is important, especially in Networking, but am I asking too much to have him posting weekly?

For the time being, I've asked him to post late in the week.  That way, he doesn't have to worry about replies from others.  If this doesn't work, I was thinking of having him agree to write me his posts and offer to post them for him after he emails them.  I'm not asking for complex posts here, but rather just opinions about current events in Networking.

I'm just at a loss.  Does anyone else have any ideas?