Online learning and effective communication

The academic who will be most effective in the teaching role is likely to be the one who inspires students to want to learn. For such an academic, there are many decisions to make, but the most important is the decision of how to communicate with students. Does he or she treat the student as a person with ideas, or as an object or number who has to be dealt with: interpersonal or impersonal? Academics, administrators, and students alike have to understand that there are many differences between the face-to-face and online learning environments. This paper discusses some of the ways in which effective communication can be enabled to occur between academics and learners online, thereby providing the optimum possible learning environment for students.