Humanizing Online STEM Showcase

Arun N Nambiar, Professor, California State University Fresno

Reflections

Where I was

Before this course, I was keenly aware of the demographic of my students. My university is situated in an agriculture-dominated area where most of the students are first-generation students. The students are also non-traditional in the sense that they are much older, have multiple jobs to support their family. Many of the students have young kids too. Hence, I was acutely sensitive to their needs for flexibility, accommodation, direction, and interaction. I was already using course cards, welcoming canvas homepage, learner surveys, Introduction videos, and micro-lectures.

Where I am

This course has given me numerous ideas on how to improve upon what I was already doing and has helped me go even further in helping my students succeed. Specifically, the ideas of liquid syllabus, and wisdom wall really resonate with me. This course has also taught me the importance of even the little things like choosing the appropriate image for the course card, or thumbnails of videos and how they set the stage for a humanized course.

Where I am going

I am planning to take a deep dive and incorporate these ideas into my other course - both face-to-face and online. I feel that these ideas are useful even in face-to-face classes since Canvas (LMS) is so integral to all courses these days.

Liquid Syllabus

The liquid syllabus sets the tone for the course. It is intended to convey my personal philosophy of teaching: genuine care and compassion for students and their success.

View my Liquid Syllabus

Course Card

This scorecard is meant to be a reflection of what the course is all about - energy, and its different sources.

The intent of this picture is to make the course more welcoming by setting a more colorful and positive mood.

Homepage

I have created links to the various modules on my homepage. The start here module is where students begin. In that module, I have posted introduction video, course tour video, syllabus quiz, getting to know you survey, etc.

I have also created a FAQ section where I try to address some of the more commonly asked questions.

Organizing the modules into different sections on the home page allows students to quickly navigate to the appropriate module.

Getting to Know You Survey

I was already using a Learner Survey prior to this course. That however was geared primarily towards understanding their level of preparedness for the course and their motivation for taking the course.

After this course, I was able to change that survey to include more humanizing elements such as details about their fears, challenges, etc.

I believe this will show the students that I genuinely care about them and will also allow me to fine tune my course to address some of their needs.

Wisdom Wall

In this video, I explain the Wisdom Wall assignment. This is an optional assignment (and I clarify that multiple times in the video) where students post either audio or video feedback to future students in the class.

This will allow future students to be better prepared as they begin the course.

Bumper Video

In this bumper video, I explain the deliverables and due-date for submissions of these deliverables for a major assignment in my course.

This will give students a better picture of the timeline of deliverables since there are 5 deliverables spread over a month and a half.

Microlecture

This microlecture introduces Learning Objective 3: Develop an understanding of sustainable development.

In this microlecture, I give a high-level overview of what sustainable development is. This will help students have a big picture in mind as we dive deeper into the different aspects of sustainable development.

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