IDENTIFYING, EVALUATING, AND FOSTERING QUALITY ONLINE TEACHING

K-12 online learning continues to have a lasting impact on the current education landscape in many ways. All 50 states and the District of Columbia have online learning opportunities for K-12 students (Watson, Murin, Vashaw, Gemin, & Rapp, 2011). A handful of states have passed laws requiring that K-12 students take at least one online learning experience prior to graduating high school (Watson et al., 2011). These policy and growth developments in K-12 online learning warrant the need for teachers to be prepared to teach online (Archambault, 2011). But what exactly does quality online teaching entail? In this chapter we focus on identifying, evaluating, and fostering quality teaching in K-12 online learning environments. We divide the chapter into four sections, which include an overview of research on quality online teaching, a collection of researchbased frameworks and standards available for evaluating online teaching and course design, a summary of how the field is fostering quality online teaching, and an exploration of where the field might go in terms of restructuring teacher education to prepare teachers for K-12 online and blended teaching.