How Will I Learn During My Online Masters?

This blog has been sponsored by the University of Birmingham, University of Bath and University of Glasgow.

There’s lots of information out there about the pros and cons of online learning and how you can fund your online degree, but how does an online Masters actually work for you as a student? How is it structured? How will you learn? And how much time are you expected to dedicate to it?

We had a chat with David Rowson, Director of Academic Services at Wiley (who builds online teaching materials for universities) to answer some of these burning questions.

#1 How are online courses structured?

They’re usually structured on a week by week basis so most of the tasks that will be in there, you’ll be expected to complete that week. It doesn’t necessarily matter when in the week you do them, a lot of students work on the weekends, some do Monday and Tuesday, some might do Friday, Saturday and Sunday, just as long as they’re completed within the week.

Online Masters are chopped up into smaller chunks to make the process of learning online easier. Most of the theory would say that your concentration span is probably around 25-30 minutes so we specifically design our activities to take that amount of time so you get a natural break.

#2 How do group activities and assignments work?

You’ll be told which assignments need to be done on your own and which ones are for a group of you. It’s best to make a note earlier on in the week because there might be certain things you need to do as a group so you need to coordinate schedules, rather than just waiting until you’re ready to jump in. We usually encourage students to log in every other day or so, that way you can see what your group mates are doing and if there are any questions that need answering.

#3 How many hours a week should I dedicate to studying online?

Typically, you’ll be studying around 15 hours a week. There’s no need to tire yourself out by going above and beyond to let’s say 25 hours, but on the flip side, you can’t study for just four hours either as you won’t get through the content.

At the start of your week you need to get a good understanding of what activities you’re expected to complete and plan how that approximate study time is going to be spent. This is really important as otherwise you might end up having done 10 hours and you haven’t done half the things you need to do.

#6 How do I submit an assignment?

For your online Masters, everything should be submitted virtually and there’ll be information on how to do this in the assignment brief. One thing I would definitely advise students to do is complete the induction module (if your programme has one). This is a safe space where you can practice posting to a discussion board, submitting a written assignment and submitting a video assignment. If you practice these early on then it’ll make everything a lot simpler when you get to that first module.

#7 How can I get help if I need it?

Your university will have support services available for you to contact, just like if you were studying on campus. We try to be more proactive in our online support as a lot of the time students will be studying outside of core office hours. We have a 24/7, 365 days of the year student support system so if you have a technical, pastoral or even academic problem, you can contact the support line straight away and get a response typically within an hour (although sometimes it takes two to three hours).

#8 Can I do my online Masters on my phone?

While we wouldn’t recommend doing the whole of your Masters with your phone (no one wants to write a 5,000-word essay with the touchpad), most platforms render beautifully on mobile. We’re actually seeing students using their phone to interact with around 30% of the content. It’s not their primary device, but we can see that they’re learning on the go for some parts and that’s great to know for us as designers so we can make sure we’re creating something that presents well in this format.

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