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[invinoveritas]

I teach intro to phil and have a very clear 'course introduction' and keep it very easy the first 2 weeks...I just had an online student email me the following message: "im confused..i feel stupid and dont understand this at all...what am I doing wrong. please help me"

?!!??

I suppose my question for the forumites is: what is the best way to deal with this kind of 'general confusion' question other than asking them to please be specific?

[systeme_d_]

Since it's philosophy, at least part of the problem is likely to be reading comprehension.
You might take a look at this site yourself, and click through the links on the left.

http://academic.cuesta.edu/acasupp/as/609.htm

You can then recommend specific pages to the student, like SQ4R, or whatever seems most appropriate.

[magistra]

One general suggestion is to keep asking questions, just like you'd do in office hours.  Turn it back on the student.  How much have you read?  Did you read it a second time, or look up words you don't know?  How much time are you spending on the course?  Have you been using the discussion boards to ask questions?  What specific concept do you need help with?  What's your understanding of it so far?  Have you worked on X assignment, which will help you address some of these questions?

First make sure they're not crying for help without ever having opened the book or checked out anything on the website -- don't do extra work if they haven't even started.  Then get them talking so you've got something to work with and can point them in the right direction.  It'll also let them know gently that they're going to have to do a lot of the work on their own.

Online courses are difficult for some, though, because they're reading intensive, as SD said.  Get the students writing, including on the discussion boards, & work on handouts that are visually inviting.  You don't have to dumb down the material, but the "wall of text" doesn't work well for some.  Podcasts or videos are great if you can make them, but even a few extra handouts with graphics can help.  (I don't know, the Flowchart of Philosophers?)  And link to a dictionary or glossary of terms!

[invinoveritas]

nice....thanks for the link and suggestions

[melba_frilkins]

I agree completely with magistra. The student has sent you a lazy and/or thoughtless email. It gives you nothing specific to work with. You can't even tell if they are having a problem with the course content itself or figuring out the online aspect. So the first step is to get the student to tell you what they are actually having a problem with.

In some of these cases, it's much easier and more efficient to continue the conversation with a phone call, if that is feasible.

Also, can you run a report to give you a summary of the students activity in the class? That information often puts things into perspective.