Faculty Professional Learning: An Examination of Online Development and Assessment Environments - Teaching through Multi-User Virtual Environments - page 78

a. Plan courses (e.g., checked with uni-
versity administration and evaluation
agencies with regard to prerequisites);
b. Prepare courses (e.g., needs assess-
ment, write teaching and assessment
materials, arrange technological
facilities);
c. Search for resources (e.g., arrange
copyrights);
d. Structure lessons (e.g., design
PowerPoint presentations, add refer-
ences to external resources, questioning
skills, intuitive lessons);
e. Review assignments (e.g., writing ef-
fective test items, download and open
assignments submitted via the moodle
platform, read the submitted assign-
ments, formulate feedback);
f. Monitor (e.g., deadlines, planning
problems);
g. Course communication (e.g., latest
news, giving feedback on participant
questions);
h. Social interactions with participants
(e.g., small-group forum debates);
i. Professional interactions with mentors
(e.g., communication about pedagogi-
cal issues, subject matter issues, best
practices, how to handle special prob-
lems, co-ordination of curriculum and
timetable);
j. Assign marks (e.g., participant assess-
ment, inform participants of results and
consequences);
k. Administer (e.g., keep records of
participants' progress, marks, special
arrangements, practice groups, follow
up absentee or apparently dropped-out
students), and
l. Portfolio (e.g., document all problems
that occurred and that an instructor can
be held accountable for).
(3) Online development program topics for FPL
or agency staff . As noted by different authors

(Rosenbaum, Lenoch & Ferguson, 2005)
in a review of the state of FDL, we think
it is very convenient to develop academic
staff who will be competent to change and
adapt university teaching programs, act as
university mentors, and design and deliver
innovative faculty development programs.
Most FPL that has been summarized in the
research literature has focused on develop-
ing participants' skills for their own teach-
ing. Below (Table 1), we relate the topics
that underlie our model of FPL, basic FPL
capacities are the core of our e-development
program. Also, we have delivered specific
short-time duration minicourses based on
computer-based learning environments. All
FPL courses are based on 'moodle', which
is a course management system (CMS)
(http://moodle.org/). As occurs with other
course management systems, faculty mem-
bers' participation in the learning process
with moodle is associated with the perception
of their technological capabilities related to
specific CMS skills and knowledge. There is
no doubt that in general the faculty members'
perceptions of their computer self-efficacy at
the beginning of our courses are low. Their
perceptions change as the courses progress
and they practise certain routine applications.
(4) The value of curriculum and teaching ca-
pacities (CTC) . Supporting the notion that
CTC would be an effective approach for
FPL is a large body of theory and research
focused on the importance of academic
staff's professional change. Table 2 shows
the most highly prioritized content for our
model of online FPL (Villar & Alegre,
2006a). The columns in the table are labeled
according to a constructivist approach. It
presents the challenge of synthesizing a large
spectrum of somewhat diverse questions,
organization modules, reflective thinking
and capacities. Hence, university teaching