11040

11040

General Session - Conference Presentation Only (no formal paper)

Creating a Positive Attitudes and Supportive Environments in Online Mathematics Courses
Betsy Duke, Kaplan University, Miami, Florida, USA, EDuke@kaplan.edu Mark Johnson, Kaplan University, Miami, Florida, USA, mjohnston@kaplan.edu

Students bring a variety of preconceived ideas with them to college. Often they also carry with them the painful memories of prior educational experiences that were less than successful and that ultimately results in a pessimistic mind-set that prohibits learning. Our goal is to provide strategies for participants that can be used immediately in the online mathematics classroom that discourages negativity and improves attitudes in order to produce positive learning outcomes and higher overall achievement.

Perceptions effect attitude and attitude effects achievement (Singh, 2002). Negativity can become a wall that grows higher with each pessimistic thought causing a struggling student to become so bogged down at the bottom that they cannot dig their way out. We will discuss student attitudes in online mathematics courses and the importance of creating a positive and supportive environment that encourages students to believe in themselves and their abilities. We will discuss a number of common scenarios faced by online mathematics instructors and provide creative solutions that instructors can implement effectively.

This presentation will demonstrate strategies that will allow instructors to inject optimism and allow students to experience an environment that breeds success despite former negative experiences and encourages students to believe in themselves and their ability to achieve in mathematics. Students with positive attitudes and who believe in themselves are better equipped to learn and attain success in math. Success breeds success!

All Audiences online math attitudes positive environment