The rapid shift to online instruction in response to the COVID-19 pandemic underscores the importance of motivationally enhanced and emotionally supportive instruction during this stressful time. In this paper we demonstrate how five theoretically situated and empirically supported motivational design principles can be used to create effective online instructional practices. We provide an example of how these principles can be used to develop a screencasting assignment for pre-service teacher education students via distance learning and briefly discuss the positive response from students. Future avenues for research, practice, and practitioner-researcher collaborations are proposed.