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We're now 1/2way through the semester at Vandy with some students fully remote & most taking some courses online only and others in a hybrid in-person and remote format.
Yesterday I asked my 1st years what's working and what isn't in their courses
Summary of their responses
Yesterday I asked my 1st years what's working and what isn't in their courses
Summary of their responses
They love breakout rooms!!! Benefits - community building (esp for remote students to meet others), chance for shy students to speak, helps provide variety and breakup class time
Most of them also liked having short prerecorded lectures to watch on their own time. They enjoyed being able to pause & rewind when they didn't catch something (and occasionally fast-forward). They also liked the flexibility of watching in small chunks when they had time.
Trying to recreate live lectures synchronously over zoom doesn't work well. Students vastly preferred lectures to be either in person or asynchronous. It's really easy to be distracted when watching live lecture remotely.
They didn't hate their online classes as much as they thought they would. For smaller classes it's really nice to be able to see everyone's faces and they enjoyed the lack of prep time (can roll out of bed and sign on)
But, it can be exhausting to have everything be on the computer all day everyday. It was a good reminder to me that they're not just on the computer for class time but also for homework and lots of social activities. It's a lot.
Clear organization is really helpful. A predictable schedule and clear LMS site is extremely useful. Students are struggling with time management and remembering what's in-person/remote and when everything is due across all their courses.
Group work outside of class is harder than normal. Requires working across time zones and can't just hop in a study room together.
Relatedly, students in different time zones (e.g. Asia) are struggling with really wacky sleep patterns.
Relatedly, students in different time zones (e.g. Asia) are struggling with really wacky sleep patterns.
It's hard to deal with both in-person and virtual students at the same time. Instructors either ignored the remote students or spent too much time fiddling with the tech. @derekbruff's Voice of the Chat might help here - one student helps alert T when remote Ss have questions
The biggest things they missed were the small social interactions and a sense of community. Students often lacked a way to contact other students with small questions - esp if they were remote and/or with mostly upperclassman. GroupMe can be a great solution here (h/t @jfrickuga)
Overall, I learned a lot about how to structure courses this spring and I think the students benefited from hearing that others were struggling with similar issues. #WereAllInThisTogether #AnchorDownStepUp
