Teaching Any Time, Any Place, Any Pace

Abstract

With the launch of six courses in January 1997, Florida Virtual School (FLVS) became a new resource for all students in Florida. FLVS teachers, developers of the online curriculum, experimented with innovative ways of encouraging students to be responsible learners. In the virtual classroom, teachers soon discovered that frequent communication with students and parents reaped tremendous rewards. In this chapter, the reader will see inside the teaching process at Florida Virtual School as the following essential characteristics of online teaching are highlighted: communication, teamwork, flexibility, student-centered learning, and love of students. Using technology as a tool to design and deliver curriculum and instruction, the virtual learning environment mirrors the technological world that students live in today and will work in tomorrow. Virtual education changes the way teachers teach and interact with each other, with students and with parents. Virtual educators are reshaping the routine learning modes of the traditional school day to a dynamic, interactive real-world learning environment that presents choices to parents and students and requires students to take ownership of the learning process.