Humanized Online Teaching Showcase
Maggi Dorsett, Butte College
This site provides examples of instructional resources created in the Humanizing Online Teaching Academy, a professional development program at Butte College, funded by the Culturally Responsive Pedagogy & Practices grant from the California Community College Chancellor's Office.
Reflections
Where I was
Basically, I have been in a rut. I have taught online for quite a while but since I have been balancing many different roles over the past five years, so I haven't been as progressive as I should have been regarding using new more personalizing technology. My biggest challenge in making changes is that I feel I have to be perfect which freezes me when I try to try something new. Plus my summer has been jammed packed with teaching and lots of personal things, so I'm concerned that I won't have enough time to be as engaged and present as I wanted to be in this course.
Where I am
I am excited about the new skills I have learned and how I can improve my online classes. I appreciate being pushed to go outside my comfort zone to record videos of myself. I'm also glad to have learned to use technology that I haven't yet used but which will add a lot of humanizing value to my classes!
Where I am going
I'm going to focus on using technology to add myself more to my classes. I have always used technology pretty well but I now understand that my use of technology probably has gotten between me establishing a real connection to my students. After my Orientation and Intro modules, I really wasn't very personally present in my classes.
I need to continue to expand my warm demandedI plan to use more quick imperfect video clips of me to introduce modules and content in my classes. I also want to increase the video and audio component of my feedback as well as create more non-text-based assignments!
Liquid Syllabus
I plan to email students a link to my liquid syllabus the week before the semester begins. I really like the visual nature of this site, as I think it is much more welcoming than my typical written welcome email.
I provide information about the specific course, my own teaching, the expectations I have for the class, and many helpful links to Butte College services that they can utilize before and during our time together. I feel this liquid syllabus is an interesting, visual way to welcome students and get them excited about the class before the semester starts!
Course Card
I opted to have the image on the course card emphasize the diversity found in the nursing field. There are males and females depicted as well as multiple POC (people of color) and ethnicities. Showing diversity in the course card will be a way to welcome learners into the course.
Homepage
I think it is important to create a supportive and welcoming online environment for students to feel valued and part of a learning community. I use a warm greeting to encourage a sense of connection from the very beginning. I also use diverse images that reflect our students, ensuring everyone feels represented.
My home page is simple and non-cluttered. If too much information is placed on this page, students get overwhelmed and are nervous about starting! I have a video overview of the class that visually walks them through the Orientation module. I finish with an overview of how the class is paced each week and my contact information.
Getting to Know You Survey
My survey provides kindness cues as it ask for information that will help me to support each student. The questions show the students that I really care about their success in this class and that we will be working together to make a collaborative learning environment.
Ice Breaker
The purpose of this ice breaker is two-fold. One is to learn how to use Flip as this is a more interactive way for students to communicate with each other and I want to use it for other discussion assignments throughout the semester. The second is for all of us to learn a little bit more about each other.
All of the ice breakers in class help me to learn more about my students as people and for them to learn about me. When a student knows something about their instructor, it increases the likelihood they will reach out when they need help.
Bumper Video
In the chapter on digestion, students often don't completely understand absorption and that nutrients aren't always 100% absorbed. The concept of bioavailability is introduced in this video and highlights that there are big differences between vitamin and mineral absorption.
I especially want students to understand that there are things they can do in their diet that can improve their absorption of minerals, especially iron as iron-deficiency anemia is the most common nutrition illness worldwide!
Microlecture
The learning objective that I am covering in this microlecture is " demonstrate knowledge of nutrient digestion, absorption, and metabolism" which is an overview of the Week 3 module.
This 7-minute video gives a pretty complete overview of the functioning of the GI tract and focuses on the material that is the most important for the students to learn for their quiz and digestion/absorption activity.