How Can I Keep My Class Momentum No Matter What?

Course Planning and Contingency Preparedness

We know instructional delivery this academic year will consist of mostly online courses, with some in-person, hybrid, and Hyflex courses. All will have to be prepared with a plan to pivot quickly should the situation change.

Note that the latest expectations for faculty due to COVID-19 are listed off the faculty web page as part of the Adjustments for COVID-19 page. Please review these pages.

One of the most critical steps is to establish a strong communication channel with your students.

1. Engage and reassure your students as things evolve throughout the semester, and allow their concerns to help guide your instructional decisions.

Reference our page about Student Communication and Tools.

Depending on your selected instructional delivery modality, you may need to rethink your course content and activities, reassess how students will be able to meet your course learning objectives, and select the tools that will best fit your teaching style and Internet connectivity level, as well as the ones that suit the expectations you have from your students.

2. Review your course learning objectives and activities, and determine what changes you'll be making to deliver instruction.
3. Select the curated tool(s) that will best fit with your selected delivery mode and teaching style.

Reference our pages about Instructional Continuity Strategies and Tools and Classrooms.

Students need to know the details of how class communication will work. How should they contact you with questions/concerns? How often will you be checking in and responding to messages? Set reasonable expectations.

4. Tell students how they can reach you, and set expectations for communication parameters (appropriate channels, frequency, turn-around times, etc.).

Reference our page about Student Communication and Tools.

eCampus

As always, eCampus (or another WVU authenticated LMS) should be the hub of online course activity, and is your secure location to provide instructional materials, learning assessments, and grades to students.

Every course at WVU is provided with an eCampus course shell automatically. eCampus is now in the cloud, so you may add files to eCampus up to the 500mb course limit. We highly recommend that large files be stored off of eCampus.

Unlimited file storage in Google Drive is available as part of your university-issued MIX account and our G Suite for Education services. Every instructor and student at WVU has a MIX email address. Be sure your course materials are shared with others in your department for contingency planning purposes.

Articles, book chapters, books, and copyrighted videos should be directed to WVU Library's Course eReserves.

eCampus Template

If you have not started building your course yet, we have an  eCampus template to assist you. This is meant for empty course shells and not for courses which already have content. Instructions available when you follow the link above.

How Might I Replicate Face-To-Face Class Meetings?

There are multiple ways you can replicate your face-to-face class meetings, but for this section we're focusing on two concepts: real-time content delivery and interaction, where interaction happens during your assigned class-time, or time-flexible content delivery and interaction, where interaction can happen on the student's schedule provided it is complete by the following assigned class-time.

Real-Time Interaction (Synchronous)

WVU is supporting two tools for real-time interaction: Collaborate (Ultra or Original) and Zoom. You may want to invest in a headset microphone and a webcam before using these services. Limited supplies are available for checkout from the WVU Library.

Any live meetings you have with your students via one of these options should be scheduled during regular class meeting times to avoid conflicts, and archived for students with poor connectivity.

Both Collaborate and Zoom are online meeting software for real-time interaction and engagement with students.

5. Archive any real-time video conferencing and interactions for students who couldn't participate.

Reference our page about Collaborate.

Reference our page about Zoom.

Time-Flexible Interaction (Asynchronous)

There are also two tools we are supporting to deliver time-flexible interaction to students: VoiceThread and Mediasite.

To be considerate of student internet connectivity concerns, we recommend making short videos of 10 minutes or less. One guideline to follow would be to only cover one topic per video.

Reference our page about VoiceThread.

Reference our page about Mediasite.

How Else Can I Communicate and Engage with Students?

Regular and substantive interaction with your students is required as part of moving your courses online, even if only temporarily.

The four tools above, Collaborate, Zoom, VoiceThread, and Mediasite, can provide communication and engagement with your students, but not all students will have an easy time accessing those services.

Other possible ways of communication and engagement include announcements, discussion boards, feedback on assignments, feedback on assessments, email, and telephone.

6. Provide varied interactive opportunities for students who may have poor connectivity, including options that don't require them to be present in real-time.

Reference our page about Instructional Continuity Strategies and Tools.

Reference our page about Student Communication and Tools.

How Do I Assess Student Learning?

Assessment of student learning doesn't have to mean a big final exam. Think about each of your course objectives and how students may be able to demonstrate whether or not they've met each objective. Any of the tools listed above might be a vehicle for students to demonstrate their mastery.

7. Capture whether students have met course goals through at least one substantive assessment.

Reference our page about Assessing Student Learning.

Finally...

As this situation evolves, we will be updating this website with new information.

8. Check this page regularly for updates.

Planning Tips Recap

In the sections above we enumerate important planning tips:

1. Engage and reassure your students as things evolve throughout the semester, and allow their concerns to help guide your instructional decisions.
2. Review your course learning objectives and activities, and determine what changes you'll be making.
3. Select from the curated tools on this page the ones that will best fit with your teaching style.
4. Tell students how they can reach you, and set expectations for communication turn-around times.
5. Use eCampus (or another WVU-authenticated LMS), Google Drive (connected to your university-issued MIX account), and cloud services to store instructional content which is too large for eCampus.
6. Establish your eCampus (or other WVU-authenticated LMS) shell as the hub with links to your materials, and use eCampus for your course assignments, assessments, and student grades.
7. If possible, archive any real-time video conferencing and interactions for students who cannot participate.
8. Provide varied interactive opportunities for students who may have poor connectivity, including options that don't require them to be present in real-time.
9. Capture whether students have met course goals through at least one substantive assessment.
10. Check this page regularly for updates.

Here's a downloadable 10 Tips infographic to help you along the way.

Is Your Course at WVU Health Sciences?

If you are at WVU Health Sciences Center and not using eCampus, visit SOLE Support's HSC Contingency Planning and Preparedness information.