Classes started this week. I have two online classes and three face to face ones and I thought I'd share how I planned and what I'm doing.
Our university built standard shells with specific outlines and requirements they loaded in all classes. Hopefully the standard layout helps students navigate. Even face to face classes are using Blackboard, students are uploading all work online, and the syllabus and basic materials are all uploaded for them.
Even though the majority of my classes are face to face, I decided to build all of my classes online so that is what I spent most of July and August doing. I figured 1) this would make the class more accessible 2) would easily allow students to still participate if they got overwhelmed or had to miss class due to illness 3) meant that everything was built if we have to make any changes.
We have 16 weeks, done before Thanksgiving, so I divided my classes into four modules, each module has a folder, and I put the resources, discussion boards, assignments, in each folder. I don't do busy work, so while we have a lot of formative assessments, each module only has one summative assessment at the end.
Students who have had me before laughed at my standard "I don't care about deadlines, grades, I care about YOU as students, and your learning, your exploration."
The accessibility, not punishing students for late work, prioritizing other things, focusing on feedback and revision and learning versus grades are all standard things in my classes but I did do things that are specific to our new reality. The first is I took my face to face classes and divided them into groups of 7-12 depending on the size, and assigned students a single day to attend (Monday, Wednesday, or Friday). They have before activities and after activities. I explained to them WHY I did this. That the foundation of my classes were discussions and workshopping and I couldn't do that in a lecture hall with 35 socially distant students. But 12 students, sitting in the first two rows and socially distant, THAT we could do.
In the past I have always used Google Slides for my lecture notes which I created but always made available to students for reference. This year I decided instead to try student created, crowd-sourced class notes. So I created the Google Doc, gave everyone editing permissions, and while I put bullet points, or a chart for class on there, they are no longer my lecture notes, they are their notes. I explained WHY I was doing this- that talking for a 50 minute class in masks was going to be hard, that there would be days we wouldn't feel like it, that we might have days we missed or didn't have the bandwidth for, and I wanted us still to be able to work together. I also explained that not everyone should feel the pressure to carry the class notes, that some people may not like to talk in class and may want to type, some might want to add video links or images hat have to do with class, another might want to organize or highlight them, but that collectively, we'd end up with class notes. I added a section for questions, which I'll check and answer before next class.
The very first day I walked students through Blackboard, I created a locked announcement like I have in the past that has the class notes, the week by week syllabus, the day they're assigned to come, all in one convenient place.
My classes always have a student lounge discussion board for them to ask any questions, but I started this semester asking about their concerns for the semester. I hope that all the things I've planned and implemented create the class culture I want, and usually have in the normal times.
First days and weeks can easily fall into a professor standing up in front of the class lecturing, pointing out boring points about minutiae.
I don't do that, but I DO walk them through where to find things, then use that as a gateway to using the course materials, actually doing the work of the class.
So the World Lit class read an article about supernatural elements in Sundiata, YA read an article about Angie Thomas, and the Intro to English Studies class read an article about periodization. Each, in class, with me walking around, accessed these materials and added to the class notes, asking questions as they needed it. Because I walk around, and am on the lookout for signs they need help, I've found students are more likely to ask questions if they need it.
On MWF I teach my three f2f classes back to back, which means the days fly by, but they're also exhausting. Teaching in mask is exhausting. I am hyper aware of trying to put faces to names (my students make name plates they use for me to use their names), and read their body language, seeing if they're getting it, need something, have a question, and this is all a LOT harder in a socially distanced classroom with masks. I'm trying hard to speak clear enough and loud enough to be heard, but not come off like I'm shouting.
This year starts my 20th year of teaching. And it's still intimidating to face that crowd of faces on the first day. Every year I feel the weight of how important what I do it. This year there seems to be so much more riding on it. We're in the middle of a global pandemic. We have nationwide social unrest. Hate speech and crimes have been steadily rising for years. A lot of our students are having to juggle illness, loss, trauma, grief. Most worked as essential workers this summer. It's all a lot. I made sure I said all this in class. I made sure I told them I designed all my classes with this in mind. I told them that there was less work this semester because I realized I could teach them when they needed and do it with less.
In fact I was thinking about this this week, and said it to some classes, that it seemed like every year I taught I let go of more and more- policing behavior, caring about deadlines, etc.
All of this is new and a lot and everyone is just doing the best that they can.
There were some questions and blips. I posted the wrong syllabus in a couple of classes. Whoops. Some students were confused by the "assigned day" schedule. Others didn't understand doing the reading before class, but I built time in the first day to account for that. Because I built the whole class online there was a bit of confusion about what we'd do in class versus submitting online, so I had to clarify about the online as available if needed but mostly backup.
Some seemed really concerned class would be scheduled Zoom hours, and seemed really relieved when I said we wouldn't be doing that. I'm on campus, in my office for office hours, and my office is big enough for socially distanced visits, but I've told them the preference is for virtual office hours which I do on Hangouts. I didn't see any of my students, but most of last week I was the only one in the building so I DID answer a lot of random student wandering around needing help questions.
All in all, I was really happy with the first week. I was glad to see that the work and planning I put in all summer worked the way I had hoped. I do love first weeks, meeting new students, new classes, new starts and chances.
I hope, most importantly, that this first week set the tone for what I want our semester to be.
I don't know what this semester will bring. I've done all the planning and anticipating I can, and I have to trust that the rest of it will sort itself out.
