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I am not a master at online teaching but would like to share a thread of what I'm doing/what students told me they appreciate. I'm doing this in hopes that at least one of these tips helps someone out there and would invite others to share what's working in their class.
Students really like to take advantage of asking questions in private. This is such an amazing feature on Zoom. And I was afraid that the chat would show in the recording to reveal who said the question but the recording doesn't capture it! :)
Speaking of questions, I tell students to ask me at least 1 question before we move on. It's still early in the semester so it takes a while but students can type their question in a private message.
I also have two mandatory office hour meetings for students: once before test 1 and once after test 1. This is to show students that office hours aren't scary, to show that I'm accessible, to get to know students more, and to give a chance for students to ask ?s one-on-one.
I do a lot of chat blasts where I give a couple minutes for students to do an exercise then have them type their answer in the chat box, then on the count of 3, I tell them to press enter.
Also, to see where students are at when giving them a couple minutes doing a few problems, I tell them to show me what problem they are on by putting up 1 finger if they are on #1, 2 fingers for #2, or a fist if they are done.
Frequently after teaching a new topic, I tell my students to type in the chat a number between 1-10 how comfortable they feel with the topic, with 10 being the most comfortable. I use this to see what to do next.
I post all of my slides and session recordings on Canvas for accessibility. I actually think my materials are more accessible during online instruction so I need to think about how to make in-class instruction in the future more accessible.
I keep it simple by mostly relying on collaborative Google Slides when students are working in breakout rooms. No need to use a billion different platforms.
During the last few minutes, I ask my students to write down what they learned today in their notebooks and I ask a couple students to share what they learned.
And I always end each class session with one of my memes. Believe it or not this is the first semester I've shared my memes but this is one small way to bring more of myself into class. It's great to end with students smiling. Here are a couple that I've posted so far:
Hope at least one of these tips helped at least one person out there!
Oh, and forgot my most recent strategy: https://twitter.com/howie_hua/status/1300585141975183360
