Now that I've got your attention, I have read articles from people and organizations that have espoused such gibberish that one instructor could conceivably manage 100-200 on-line learners-maybe if the only instruction involved was "read my web-page, write and send in the assignment and, by-the-way don't bother me. I have heard on-line instructors tell their students not to email them during the weekend. But the weekends appear to be the time most professionals have the "time" to be involved with on-line learning. The rest of the week they are too busy.

From my own experience on-line learning can be very rewarding but also very stressful, from both the instructor/facilitator point of view, as well as from the student's point of view. One 6 week on-line workshop (a software appplication program) resulted in nearly 1000 e-mail messages exchanged between the facillitator and the 18 enrolled students.

On-line facilitators and developers need to be aware that in a face-to-face instructional environment you hear from just a few students and the rest of the class benefits from that interaction. In an on-line environment the facilitator will hear from all students, and many times the questions are the same from all of those students. It is this type of environment that can be stressful for some individuals as well as not being conducive to learning for others. In fact, contrary to what some organizations want everyone to believe, individuals can have a difficult time learning in this environment-it depends upon the course.

To help organizations and individuals to understand the design, development, management, and instructional challenges in the on-line evironment, two workshops are under development. They are:

Developing instruction for the On-line Environment introduces the organization to designing effective web-based instruction. This five day course uses research and actual courses designed from the ground up to meet the staff development needs of organizations, to illustrate what works and what doesn't work. For instance:

• Did you know that the method one uses to code the development of an html on-line survey or assessment may have a negative affect on one type of popular browser but not the other? This can be very frustrating when receiving surveys and assessments in which radio buttons are all checked on some surveys, while on other surveys some of the radio button checks are missing.
• Did you know that providing an e-mail link, either graphic or text, may not be accessible to your users unless you are aware of organizational policies which affect this critical link, and whether users are accessing your site from home or the office?

This workshop will cover not only these remedies but will also provide the participant with instructions on:

• the use of learning theories to design an engaging educational web-site.
• design principles to produce aesthetically, structurally, and technically pleasing web-sites.
• the use of navigational links to provide users with a pleasant experience, whether you design a linear, hieracrchical, or web links. The type of hyperlink structure depends upon the amount of freedom you are willing to give the user.
• why using frames can prove to be a frustrating experience when bookmarking a site.
• objectivist design versus constructivist design and when to use each type.
• using free and/or low cost "web-tools" and html editors to design, construct, and provide a meaningful learning experience.

Managing Instruction for the On-line Environment introduces the organization to a method of planning, tracking, and identifying resources for the on-line instructional environment.

Requirements for this workshop:

• Computer Lab (Mac/PC Windows )
• Access to the Internet
• Willingness to learn
• and a