Hi, Melody.  I think the answer to your question is: it depends.  There might be studies about recommended length for online courses.  However I answer your question from my own experience of more than a decade designing and teaching many different types of online courses for differente audiences.  Some factors to consider:

1. Academic courses (part of a formal program of study) vs. training courses.

2. Setting: academic vs. corporate.

3. The nature of the topic and competencies being taught.  It's not the same to teach introductory chemistry, customer service, or how to build an airplane.

4. Very important: characteristics of your target population.  For example, are they full time college students or part-time graduate students who are already working?

5. The time you need for students to complete the required assignments.  You can teach an introtuctory course in 7 weeks with no problem, but if the students need to conduct research or complete a project, they are going to need more time.

For faculty training programs or corporate e-learning, 16 weeks is too much.  Usually we plan for more concise objectives.  Undergraduate courses: 15 weeks is OK.  Graduate courses: 8 weeks.  However, the length has to be consistent with the objectives and the products required.  Varying the length of the course requires a re-engineering of the syllabus, including the expected learning outcomes, activities, and assessment.  Another good idea is to get feedback from the participants.  After a course, ask them what they think about the duration of the course and if they think the goals could have been accomplished in less (OR MORE) time.  Compare their answers to what other experienced instructors say (ask colleagues).

Best regards,

Edgar Salgado

As Edgar pointed out, you would need to redesign the syllabus in moving from a 16- to an 8-week time-frame. Usually, students online need adequate time between assignments and online learning activities to successfully complete these. If it is at all possible to do a pilot test before hand, please do so that you can gauge what works best for you and your students.

Many thanks,

Debra

Hi Melody,

I agree with Edgar’s answer. The answer really depends on various factors. From the experience we had with short-term courses, we learned that it is more efficient when we offer the short-term course during summer time and when the students have no full schedule. Our practice changed as well according to the number of students attending each class.

It certainly requires redesigning the course contents as well as the pedagogical approach.

The requirements for the course and assignments were redesigned and adapted and divided into sections that fitted the time slot available for students to perform the various tasks. The assignments/tasks we provided students during short-term courses were reduced significantly, and we provided more dynamic work during each session.

Good luck,

Tami

Hi Melody,

Online courses are gaining popularity each day. The length will dependent on the level of the course. For example short term courses leading to award of certificate below diploma may last for few weeks while courses such as bachelor degree may last for more than three years.  The most important thing is to structure the course to fit into the learning needs of the student. Instructional materials will also need to be planed early enough to ensure that students do not waste time sourcing for resources.

Regards

Solomon.

Guidance always is external process. On line technology has increased the span otherwise it restrict to human listening width. So there should not be any confusion that online courses are less effective. Effectiveness in both cases depends on the learner.

I agree with Edgar's answer as well. As an instructor and developer of online courses,  I also recommend reviewing course outcomes to see if they can be taught in the period of time that students can learn and faculty can prepare. General education or development courses need more time--16 weeks online or blended, and those courses with fewer outcomes may be taught in a shorter time period.

Is this an academic 3 credit course? A three-credit course from an accredited school requires 45 contact hours in classroom teaching, and translating that to distance learning is challenging. Plus, students are expected to do put in so much homework time (we state 2 hours per hour of class, so if classes are over 7 weeks, that would be 6.5 presentation hours + 13 homework hours per week. If you are in a workplace and this is not academic credit, you have more flexibility - but consider: do you want someone to go through the motions, or come out with different behaviors at the end? We get so intent on shortening the number of weeks that we forget you cannot force maturity (or learning)! So -- what are your learning objectives.  Start there!

I agree to several considerations of  Edgar. The course maile depends on the target group. In adult education (one of our main eduactional fields it's completely different to my other teaching experience with students in a high school.

We have good results with courses of 4 to 8 weeks (in adult education). Sometimes it's necessary to split a couse into two parts. The considerations of Mary in the mentioned environment are also appropriate to our experience.

As far as I know there are no searious research results simply to the fact that each course needs it's time in context with the target group, teaching/learning environment, topics, type of training (competence based or content based), age of learners, technical preconditions, planned and foreseen activities or assignments, pedagogic background (for example a coopeartive course) and much more ...

Life is a journey of empowerment towards freedom. How often we take food. We take food when we are hungry. Similarly when one need knowledge and know-how,  one should be able pursue.  Most of the us are time bound.  Coming out of the bound of the time is  freedom. Freedom is absolute virility.

Hi Melody, I teach a five-week graduate course in the summer with weekly modules. I find this much less effective than my typical 14-week courses that are divided into two-week modules. But I keep working at it. If your target audience is adult learners there is a great reference from Jossey-Bass titled Teaching Intensive and Accelerated Courses by Wlodkowski and Ginsberg. This 2010 book is not solely about online teaching but has online tips. Good Luck!

Hello Melody

This 2010 study explores how full semester vs. five-week online courses influence student satisfaction and perceived learning: 

http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/772/1547

Looking forward to seeing what other research is presented here.

http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/772/1547

Education is a continuing process to transform a seed to tree and our NGO is working to develop digital platform to provide online counselling continuously to the mankind at free of cost.  We are not here to trade the Universe but to  learn and care.

Hallo Melody Buckner, try this  site for templates and various resources relevant to your topics, and use other guides already provided and good luck!https://community.articulate.com/hubs/e-learning-101

This one might be interesting for you:

Article MOOCs as granular systems: design patterns to foster partici...

Melody, how do you define "best"?   I can give you a variety of answers depending.  And Edgar already gave you a set of different audiences.  You've actually got some very knowledgeable folks at UA in online ed, so you might want to ask in-house if you want to engage in a discussion. 

Hey Raymond-

We have research on the student service side of this equation about length of courses, but I cannot find much from the faculty or pedagogical side.  By "best" I am referring to most effective for teaching and learning in a fully online environment.  I know there are lots of variable to consider, but I am looking for research studies on achievement of learning outcomes in a condensed format.  Does this help?

Hi, Melody,

I studied time as part of my dissertation. Below is extracted from my literature review. You can see the full citations in the reference list of the attached document. Please return to this thread and let us know what you find when studying your own transition.

Time has been explored in several other ways within past literature. These ways include comparing traditional and accelerated courses, day of posting and thread growth, time delay between postings, and

changes from the beginning to the end of the course.

One way in which time has been studied is through comparisons of courses

offered during traditional and accelerated terms. Anastasi (2007) found that academic performance and course evaluations were consistent between courses offered in traditional and accelerated terms. These findings are similar to previous results described by Kretovics, Crowe, and Hyun (2005), Seaman (2004), and Daniel (2000). Similarly, Kucsera and Timmaro (2010) and Poellnitz (2008) found that instructors‘ effectiveness was equivalent between traditional and accelerated courses. Since academic performance or instructors‘ effectiveness are consistent among a variety of course lengths, the length of the course in this study did not present a confounding variable.

Another way that time has been explored is through its relationship with opportunities for participation. In an analysis of several studies of online participation, Cheung, Hew, and Ng (2008) identified the availability of time as a factor that influences participation. Since students can continue conversations at any time, including after the

primary discussion timeframe has passed, they can use this additional time to reflect or to ask questions. Many students in Meyer‘s (2003) study expressed appreciation for the equitable nature of online discussions, in that each student had the opportunity to express himself. This democratic sentiment is similar to the justification of discussion-based teaching asserted by Brookfield and Preskill (2008). Among other factors, a physical classroom and scheduled class time can inhibit equitable discussion. Previously, Meyer had noted that online discussions expand the amount of time that is spent on course objectives.

Time has also been explored by examining the relationship between when messages are posted and thread growth. Jeong and Frazier (2008) examined how the day in which messages are posted (early, midweek and weekend) and found that the day of posting had a significant effect on the number of responses elicited per message. The later in the week an initial message was posted, the fewer the number of peer responses posted to that message. This finding seems intuitive, as there is less time to respond before the close of unit at the end of the course week. However, Hewitt (2005) had

previously noted that thread growth is stunted by attending to new posts and ignoring older posts. The finding that learners pay more attention and respond to the recent messages, rather than to the previous messages, would suggest that more responses would occur toward the end of the week, as learners attempt to comply with course expectations related to the number of peer responses per unit.

A fourth way in which time has been explored within the literature, related to course room interaction, is the time between initial posting and response. Although Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2000) suggested that more time for critical reflection and to formulate a coherent, written argument is needed for intersubjectivity to develop in online discourse, other researchers have suggested that limiting time frames for discussion threads and the replies within these discussion threads would improve interactivity and social presence. Tu (2002) suggested defining an appropriate response time, such as within 72 hours, while Pendergast (2006) suggested limiting the time frame for the entire discussion, such as locking a discussion at the end of the unit. However, later research by Huntley and Thatcher (2008) concluded that time delay between discussion posts was not related to the knowledge construction that occurred within either the content of the individual discussion postings or the highest level of knowledge construction achieved within an entire discussion thread.

Two studies have contributed to the understanding of student responses and course length, though not time in course (TIC). Christopher et al. (2004) examined the levels of thought in question prompts and student responses, and any changes over time, among 10 graduate students participating in a hybrid course on gifted education. The researchers found no pattern of change in the level of thinking that occurred over the course of the semester. Although Boulter‘s (2010) study was not specifically about interaction and course length, she did note a small but significant indication that the depth of critical thinking exhibited within discussions increased toward the end of an 11-week course in both the treatment and control groups, using Socratic questioning as an intervention.

Thesis How cognitive requirement of prompt and time in course are c...

Thanks Barbara-

This is a very insightful response.  I really appreciate you taking to time to fill me in on the research in this area.

Melody

Melody:  Condensed format?  We found a while ago that online teacher professional development (see Dede Online Professional Development for Teachers, that the "best" length was the one that was most marketable.  And that was 5 - 8 weeks.   University of North Texas is having great success marketing an accelerated Masters program with 8 week semesters.   Fastest growing program in the College of Education.