Online Education

In a typical UC Berkeley Extension Online classroom, each unit's Instructions page includes a brief introduction to that unit's topic, as well as information about all reading and written assignments.

Overview

This unit will provide you with an introduction to online education, including how it compares to "traditional," in-person learning. In addition, you'll learn about what's needed to be a successful online student. At the end of the unit, you'll take a quiz that will assess your knowledge of the unit's content.

Reading

UC Extension Online courses will typically require you to complete particular reading assignments for each unit. These readings usually include online lecture material as well as selections from textbooks.

Because this is a self-contained, limited sample classroom, the only reading assignment is the Unit 1 Lecture.

Lecture Topics

You'll also usually be required to submit written assignments for your course by sending files to your instructor via e-mail or posting to the Message Board.

There's no written assignment for either unit in this sample course; however, we recommend that you take the online quizzes at the ends of both lectures.

Message Board

You'll use your course's Message Board to communicate with your instructor and classmates. Typical uses of a Message Board include giving and receiving feedback about assignments and carrying on discussions.

In the first unit of a class, your instructor will often ask you to introduce yourself to your classmates by posting to the Message Board. For the purposes of this sample course, however, this won't be necessary; we'll simply introduce you to the general operation of the Message Board in Unit 2.

Please go on to the Unit 1 Lecture.