The Student Online Readiness Tool (SORT) is a self-assessment for student use before making the choice of taking online classes. The free access web site is sponsored by the University System of Georgia. Students are invited to take the self-quizzes in any order (and not necessarily in one sitting) to receive immediate feedback on their suitability for distance learning. While the content is standard, and the immediate scoring produces "profile" information with suggestions, the real power of all such screening tools is to place the issues before the prospective student. Just by being exposed to the concepts, students begin to make the self-assessment of how they will adapt to the online environment. Probably not a design decision, but one that occurred to me when exploring the site, is the requirement that the student actually click through a lot of radio buttons (much like they will find in a course's online quizzes and tests). If that's a time-consuming task, or a confusing one in terms of keeping track of the mouse focus on the buttons, students will tire of it and... self-select out of distance learning.
© 2009 Mary Bold, PhD, CFLE. Email contact: bold[AT]marybold.com. The content of this blog or related web sites created by Mary Bold (www.marybold.com, www.boldproductions.com, College Intern Blog) is not under any circumstances to be regarded as legal or professional advice. Bold is the co-author of Reflections: Preparing for your Practicum or Internship, geared to college interns in the child, education, and family fields. She is a consultant and speaker on assessment, distance learning, and technology.
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