To ensure that students are well-prepared for their online experience, an orientation should include both practical and technical components. An orientation will outline how you plan to conduct the course, including ground rules, expectations and how students will be assessed. It can explain in detail how you designed the course for student use, the technology used in the course such as navigating the LMS, required plug-ins for multimedia components and tips that will ease the student's interaction with technology.

In your orientation, describe your course structure, provide a general course outline, guide exploration of the course website, and indicate what to do first. You might create a "Read Me First" or "Start Here" or "Getting Started" folder, linking students to start-up information, or even a "Scavenger hunt" assignment that leads students through an exploration of the different areas of the course.

You may want to release an orientation prior to the opening date of the class - or build this as an exercise into the first week of your course. Alternatively, you can jump start your students using your preview page.

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