Incorporating Interaction into Your Distance Learning Course
Teaching online in a distance learning program requires instructors to completely rethink how they deliver their courses. Interaction is very difficult aspect of education to build into an online class, but it is also one of the most important. The interactivity level from student-to-student and from student-to-instructor has a major impact on the quality of online distance learning programs. Interactivity studies show that students have a real need to make connections with other students and with their instructors.

Incorporating Interaction Benefits into Your Distance Learning Course
Interaction doesn’t take place in online courses; it has to be intentionally built into the instructional plan for the course. Incorporating interaction has the following benefits:

• Interaction builds a sense of community among the students, which leads to student satisfaction, retention, and increased learning.

• Interaction provides students with the feedback they need to determine if they are mastering the content in your course.

• Interaction exposes students to a variety of learning resources, including content materials and experiences and knowledge shared by other students.

  • Interaction makes students become more actively engaged in the learning process, leading to higher levels of learning.

Types of Interaction
The three main types of interaction in an online distance learning course include:

1. Learner-to-Content Interaction - this type of interaction results from students examining the course content and participating in class activities.

2. Learner-to-Learner Interaction - this type of interaction can take place between two students or between several students.

3. Learner-to-Instructor Interaction - this type of interaction is intended to reinforce student understanding of course materials and provide the student with feedback.