At Wayne State, an online course delivers 100% of its content online with no face-to-face meetings.  This means that students cannot be required to come to any campus location for any portion of the course, including examinations.

The novice instructor may think all that is required to create an online course is to record lecture slides with their voice over them and post them online.  However, making an online course effective takes significantly more planning.  Many of the aspects of traditional teaching that instructors take for granted are lost.  For example, since you are not in front of your students during a lecture, you do not have the immediate feedback of being able to see students' reactions to gauge whether they understand what you are explaining.  You may need to use more frequent assignments or classroom assessments to get feedback from your students online.

Additionally, because students are not in the same physical space, they do not see each other, which makes it harder for them connect with one another.  Assigning a discussion board for introductions can help to start building communities.  You should also consider using tools to allow students to get to know you better.  One suggestion is creating a welcome video so that students can see what you look like.  Here are some examples of course welcome videos:

This following video, "8 Lessons Learned from Teaching Online," provides some important things to think about while designing your online course.