This site provides examples of instructional resources created in the Humanizing Online STEM Academy, a professional development program funded by the California Education Learning Lab and administered by the Foothill DeAnza Community College District.
Having taught online a few times, I found myself grappling with the task of translating my in-person teaching style to the digital realm. It was disheartening to realize that something was missing from the online experience. The process felt mechanical and detached, lacking the vibrant energy and lively interactions that I had become accustomed to in traditional classrooms. The absence of physical presence made it challenging to establish a genuine connection with my students. As I have shifted to being online for about 40% of my teaching load post-pandemic, I have encountered new obstacles in effectively engaging students and fostering the same level of connection I was used to in face-to-face settings. The limitations of the online platform became evident as I struggled to read the room and gauge students' reactions. It was a humbling experience that required me to rethink my strategies and adapt to the virtual landscape.
This experience has been incredibly valuable, as it has made me acutely aware of many of the barriers that hinder students in online courses. I am eager to embrace what I have learned in this course and delve deeper into providing a more connected online classroom. I aspire to cultivate a sense of excitement and engagement among my students, and one significant shift I have made as a result of this course is recognizing the importance of creating more videos and inserting myself into them. Although I have hesitated in the past to include myself into the course content, I now understand that establishing relationships with my learners necessitates my active presence for the students to see me as a person rather than a faceless grader of their work.
Following the completion of the Humanizing Academy, my focus for my online courses will shift towards implementing the high-impact strategies learned in the course and refining the course material I created throughout the program. The practices learned in this course can be adapted in numerous ways to align with student learning objectives for various classes, and I am excited to implement them into both future online and in-person courses. I have always prided myself as being a teacher that connected with students and had felt a disconnect when teaching online, and this course has equipped me with many strategies to enhance my toolkit in order to reconnect with students in a different medium and foster better learning in the online space.
Before the course begins, I recognize the importance of establishing trust and demonstrating my genuine care for my students' learning journey. One powerful tool that I will utilize for this purpose is the implementation of a Liquid Syllabus. This dynamic and interactive syllabus goes beyond a static document and serves as a platform to foster a sense of connection and engagement right from the start. Through the Liquid Syllabus, I will provide a clear overview of the course objectives, expectations, and assignments, while also incorporating elements that humanize the learning experience. I will include personalized welcome messages, videos, and images that showcase my enthusiasm for the subject matter and my dedication to supporting my students' success.
Here are the course cards that I am currently using for the summer session of the GEOG100 course I am teaching. My intention with this course card is to have an inviting and compelling graphic that allows my students to easily find the course within their Canvas homepage, and to feel like going into the course will be exciting and not boring or burdensome.
I enjoyed creating a this course homepage, which I believe is a nice entry point to the Canvas platform side of the course. Unlike my previous Canvas landing pages, which primarily displayed pending assignments and work that needed to be done, this new design provides a more inviting and engaging experience for students that welcomes them to the course and doesn't make them feel like they are immediately at a deficit or have multiple pending things due.
For this student information survey I used the questions that were provided in the template, and then added a few that I thought were relevant to our campus, including a question designed to identify students with housing, food, transportation, or computer access barriers, all of which are issues our students encounter more often than we assume. The final question I have is reiterating the statement of inclusion I have on the syllabus, and specifically asking students whether they agree with the expectation for respectful and inclusive behavior and language within the discussion forums.
My self-affirming ice breaker assignment I largely followed the given prompt and asked students to reflect on the word bank and then find an object to share that helps capture something about themselves. I created an instructional video to guide students through the process, a second video as an example. In the second video I shared an object and discussed how the item both brought me joy and stirred memories of a different time in my life.
This bumper video was made to help clarify the instructions for a skillshop about the citation management software Zotero. The skillshop has a badge awarding process administered by the Library for a student portfolio, and the submission process is a little confusing. This video provides a brief description of the software, and then discusses the process for submission for both the badge and to the course canvas page for a grade.
For my micro-lecture I discuss the historical context for public misinformation campaigns, including examples from Ancient Greece, 20th Century America, and the contemporary fake news era. I then discuss various terminology students will encounter in the weekly readings including confirmation bias, filter bubble, data void, and post-truth. As is often the case, academic readings, even those that are relatively accessible for 100-level students, can be alienating. I think that having a good intro on the terminology of article going in can helps students better comprehend the material and be able to better translate it for the module assignments.
