Remote Teaching Overview and Strategies
We were fortunate enough to have Patrick Smith, Assistant Director for Distance Learning at Texas State University, visiting Hilo over Spring break 2020. Patrick graciously put together this series of videos to assist in remote teaching during an emergency.
The following series of six videos provide an excellent overview of remote teaching philosophy and only takes about 15 min to watch. Many thanks to Joseph Sanchez and students from the library for filming and editing these videos. We encourage everyone to take little time to review the information on this page.
On this page:
Planning Your Course
Recorded 3/24/2020
Communicate with Students
Keep in Constant Communication
Keeping in touch with students is vital during any changes to your class(es). Let students know about changes in schedules, assignments, procedures, and broader course expectations. Early and frequent communication can ease student anxiety, and save you dealing with individual questions. Keep these principles in mind:
Key Takeaways
- Communicate early and often.
- Set expectations.
- Manage your communications load.
- Communicate early and often. Let students know about changes or disruptions as early as possible, even if all the details aren’t in place yet, and let them know when they can expect more specific information. Avoid swamping them with email, but consider matching the frequency of your messages with that of changes in class activities and/or updates to the broader crisis at hand (for example, the campus closure is extended for two more days; what will students need to know related to your course?)
- Set expectations. Let students know how you plan to communicate with them, and how often. Tell students both how often you expect them to check their email, and how quickly they can expect your response. There are tools within Laulima that help you communicate with your students, such as Announcements and Email.
- Manage your communications load. You will likely receive some individual requests for information that could be useful to all your students, so consider keeping track of frequently asked questions and posting them within the Laulima Discussions and Private Messages tool so everyone can benefit. This way, students know they might get a group reply in a day versus a personal reply within an hour.
Deliver Lectures
Synchronous (Live) Sessions
If you are doing synchronous, real-time live lectures you can deliver them using Zoom or Google Meet. You can involve students during your online lectures through two-way video, audio and chat. However, don’t rely primarily on synchronous content but use it to supplement your asynchronous content as this is the “best practice.”
Key Takeaways
- Synchronous sessions should not be mandatory.
- Schedule lesson at consistent times.
- Record your lectures to be watched at a later time.
- Setup and test your mic and camera before your sessions.
- Synchronous sessions should be value-added and should not be mandatory.Some students may be limited in the technology they have available. For example, they may only have access to a smartphone using data.
- Schedule lesson at consistent times. If using synchronous sessions, schedule them for the same days and times as the face-to-face classes, as this helps retain a sense of continuity and increases the students’ chances of being able to attend.
- Record your lectures to be watched at a later time. Recordings are not only helpful for students who were unable to attend the real-time session, but for students to revisit afterward to recall information, clarify concepts, etc.
- Setup and test your mic and camera before your sessions. If you plan to hold online lectures using Zoom or Google Meet, make sure you can initiate a meeting from your location and that you have the proper equipment (microphone, webcam.) Prior to trying out new strategies in your class, consider doing a trial run with a colleague or with support staff.
Asynchronous (Recorded) Sessions
Alternatively, you can record your lectures on your computer using capturing software called ScreenPal . There are several options for recording: your voice, with or without a webcam or your computer screen (which could be limited to a PowerPoint presentation, other software programs, or content from a web browser). After you stop recording, you can make minor edits (to start and stop points).
Key takeaways
- Recorded sessions should be value-added.
- Recorded sessions should be value-added. Some students may be limited in the technology they have available. For example, they may only have access to a smartphone using data.
Run Lab Activities
Virtual Lab Suggestions
One of the biggest challenges of teaching during a campus closure is sustaining the lab components of classes. Since many labs require specific equipment, they are hard to reproduce outside of that physical space. Here are some considerations as you plan to address lab activities:
Key takeaways
- Take part of the lab online.
- Investigate virtual labs.
- Provide raw data for analysis.
- Explore alternate software access.
- Increase interaction in other ways.
- Take part of the lab online. Many lab activities require students to become familiar with certain procedures, and only physical practice of those processes will do. In such cases, consider if there are other parts of the lab experience you could take online (for example, video demonstrations of techniques, online simulations, analysis of data, other pre- or post-lab work), and save the physical practice parts of the labs until access is restored. The semester might get disjointed by splitting up lab experiences, but it might get you through a short campus closure.
- Investigate virtual labs. Online resources and virtual tools might help replicate the experience of some labs (for example, virtual dissection, night sky apps, video demonstrations of labs, simulations). Here are some possible resources:
- Resource vary widely by discipline, so check with your textbook publisher or sites such as Merlot for materials that might help replace parts of your lab during an emergency.
- Get Open Educational Resource assistance from our UH Hilo Librarians, Amy Saxton (saxton@hawaii.edu or Brian Bays bbays@hawaii.edu.
- Explore the UH Online Innovation Center’s List of Available Virtual Labs.
- Provide raw data for analysis. In cases where the lab includes both collection of data and its analysis, consider showing how the data can be collected, and then provide some raw sets of data for students to analyze. This approach is not as comprehensive as having students collect and analyze their own data, but it might keep them engaged with parts of the lab experience during the closure.
- Explore alternate software access. Some labs require access to specialized software that students cannot install on their own computers. Depending on the nature of the closure (for example, a building versus the entire campus), the Office of Campus Technology (OCT) may be able to help set up alternate computer labs that have the software your students need.
- Increase interaction in other ways. Sometimes labs are more about having time for direct student interaction, so consider other ways to replicate that level of contact if it is only your lab that is out of commission.
Foster Communication and Collaboration among Students
Foster Communication
Fostering communication among students is important because it allows you to reproduce any collaboration you build into your course, and maintains a sense of community that can help keep students motivated to participate and learn. It helps if you already had some sort of student-to-student online activity (for example, in Laulima’s Discussions and Private Messages or Forums tools) since students will be more comfortable with both the process and the tool. Consider these suggestions when planning activities:
Key Takeaways
- Use asynchronous tools when possible.
- Link to clear goals and outcomes.
- Build in simple accountability.
- Balance newness and need.
- Use asynchronous tools when possible. Having students participate in live Zoom or Google Meet conferences can be very useful, but scheduling can be a problem and only a few students will actively participate (just like in your classroom). In such cases, using asynchronous tools like Laulima’s Discussions and Private Messages allows students to participate on their own schedules. In addition, bandwidth requirements for discussion boards are far lower than for live video tools.
- Link to clear goals and outcomes. Make sure there are clear purposes and outcomes for any student-to-student interaction. How does this activity help them meet course outcomes or prepare for other assignments?
- Build in simple accountability. Find ways to make sure students are accountable for the work they do in any online discussions or collaborations. Assigning points for online discussion posts can be tedious, so some instructors ask for reflective statements where students detail their contributions and reflect on what they learned from the conversation.
- Balance newness and need. As with any changed activities, you will need to balance the needs and benefits of online collaboration with the additional effort such collaboration will require on everyone else’s part. Learning new technologies and procedures might be counterproductive, particularly in the short term, unless there is clear benefit.
Collect assignments
Keep it Simple and Consistent
Collecting assignments during a campus closure is fairly straightforward, since many instructors already collect work electronically. The main challenge during a campus disruption is whether students have access to computers, as anyone needing a campus computer lab may be unable to access necessary technologies. Here are a few things to keep in mind:
Key Takeaways
- Require only common software.
- Avoid emailed attachments.
- State expectations, but be ready to allow extensions.
- Require specific filenames.
- Require only common software. Students may not have access to specialty software that they usually access in on-campus computer labs. Be ready with a backup plan for such students.
- Avoid emailed attachments. It may be easy to collect assignments in small classes via email, but doing so for online classes can swamp your email inbox. It’s recommended that you use the Laulima Assignments tool to collect assignments instead.
- State expectations, but be ready to allow extensions. In the case of a campus closure or other crisis, some students will undoubtedly have difficulties meeting deadlines. Make expectations clear, but be ready to provide more flexibility than you normally would in your class.
- Require specific filenames. It may sound trivial, but anyone who collects papers electronically knows the pain of getting 20 files named Essay1.docx. Give your students a simple file naming convention, for example, FirstnameLastname-Essay1.docx.
Tests and Quizzes
UH Exams in Distance Courses - Flowchart
The flowchart below highlights options and alternatives to administering traditional face to face exams.
Key takeaways
- Assess if an exam is necessary.
- Change your exam format.
- Modify your exam parameters.
Online Exams
- Consider focusing on question types like essay or short answer.
- Use the Tests and Quizzes tool to randomize question order and distractor sequence.
- Make the exam available for a shorter window of time.
- Set at time limit on the exam attempt.
Possible Redesigning Your Exam (Alternatives)
- Cumulative written paper
- Reflection paper
- Portfolio
- Recorded student presentation
’This work, "UH Exams in Distance Courses," is a derivative of "So...You Need to Put Your Exam Online" by @Giulia Forsythe (2020), used under CC BY. "UH Exams in Distance Courses" is licensed under CC BY by Patrick A. Smith.’ Original work: https://twitter.com/giuliaforsythe/status/1239371142206496770
Updated 4/3/2020
Assess student learning
With our campus closure alternative approaches will be necessary. Here are a few things to keep in mind:
- First, consider non-exam options. Consider whether you could assess student learning outcomes for your course without an exam. For example, by using a paper, journal, or a cumulative project.
- Look at alternate exam formats. For small classes, you might consider conducting oral exams in Zoom or Google Meet, or have students deliver presentations online to demonstrate their learning.
- Laulima provides online exam options. If a traditional exam is the only option, you can use Laulima’s Tests & Quizzes (T&Q) tool. The T&Q tool supports many question types. Allow time to assess the different question types and determine how best to configure your exam in Laulima before the continuity plan needs to be implemented. There are many security options available in Laulima to help ensure the integrity of your exams, such as limiting time, randomizing questions, and using question sets so each student receives a unique test.
Remote Delivery Alternatives
- If your students and/or you cannot access the internet – you can still hold meetings and discussions via phone conferences. You can use Zoom to set up an audio-only conference. You can use Zoom to set up an audio-only conference .
- Assign supplemental writing prompts to be completed by students either individually or in groups (students can use any platform they are comfortable with to complete the work).
- Assign supplemental problem sets and case studies to be completed by students either individually or in groups (students can use any platform they are comfortable with to complete the work).
- Have students listen to podcasts that apply course content to novel or contemporary applications. Have students create podcasts (perhaps recording on their mobile phones and uploading to Laulima) explaining course content to lay audiences or to members of their academic community.
- Assign supplemental readings and have students apply them to cases or writing prompts (either individually or in groups).
- Send out your slide deck to the class and ask them to annotate the slides to show their understanding of the content. This can be done individually or in groups.
- Send out your slide deck and ask students to video themselves teaching the content to their peers. These videos can be uploaded to Laulima so all students in the class can watch.
- Have students create TED talks applying course content to a new application. If the primary objective is to practice presenting to peers, students can film themselves speaking and upload the videos to Laulima. If the primary objective is writing the application, students can write the script for the TED talk but not actually perform it.
- Send out discussion prompts and students can have discussions in online chat spaces of their choosing.
- Assign students to take exams at home in open-note/open-book formats to mitigate potential academic misconduct.
- Use “exit ticket” activities (aka formative assessment) for Retrieval Practice: low-stakes tasks asking learners to remember facts, conceptual connections, a process etc. Examples:
- Two things you have learned this week + one muddiest point
- Five highlights: five important things you have learned this week.
- Using an “assignment” activity such as having students write a 5-min. essay on “Write about what you learned this week” or it can be more directive in that you ask students to write about what X and Y are, and how they connect with each other.
Updated 4/3/2020