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Here are methods by which you can communicate with students in a circumstance where your classroom is no longer available.
Email
Email
Email is obviously crucial, especially in the early stages of modifying your course (the ASAP Announcement and perhaps Modified Syllabus). But attempting to use Email to operate an online course can quickly get out of hand. Consider D2L your core toolset for course content, assignments, and learning interaction between course members.
Efficiently email your class using D2L or Exchange Faculty Email Accounts.
News Feed in D2L
News Feed in D2L
Every course in D2L has a News Feed. This can be more efficient for you and students than relying on email.
Asynchronous Discussions in D2L
Asynchronous Discussions in D2L
For many disciplines, message boards (Asynchronous Discussions) in D2L can be a quick way to move interaction online. Students can discuss something without specific dates and times that may no longer be practical. (And you may find quiet students in your face-to-face class have more to say in text discussion!)
- Quick Start: Basics of Creating a Discussion Topic in Content - Transcript
- Organization and Management of Discussions in the Discussions Area - Transcript
- Building Discussion Forums and Topics in the Discussions Area - Transcript
- Creating Threads and Replies in Discussion Topics - Transcript
- Subscribe to Receive Email Notifications When a Class Member Contributes to a Discussion
- COLI's Pedagogy Primer Podcast has two episodes dedicated to creative and efficient use of Asynchronous/Message Board Discussions
- Spend time on building great discussion prompts based on the substance of your course. Meanwhile, COLI can supply some boilerplate guidelines for good discussions, so you don't have to write these yourself. Use and modify them as you need to.
- See the full list of D2L video tutorials for more on D2L Discussions.
Dr. Jennifer Stowe has assembled a great set of variations on student discussion activities. These will get students creating, and thinking about how they learn.
Alternatives to Discussion Boards
Alternatives to Discussion Boards
Asynchronous discussions are often a default method in online education. But you can achieve social learning and teaching presence in your courses with a variety of other tools. Any of these methods may better serve your learning objectives, provide students with creative opportunities, and foster a sense of community within your courses.
Chat!
Chat!
D2L has a simple (elegant, even) chat system that allows realtime text communication among class members. It's easy to install and quick for your students to learn. It's perfect when you want to discuss something at a real-time pace but video web conference is more than what's needed.
Quick Video
Quick Video
Short videos, even just screencasts where students hear your voice, can reassure them them that you are engaged in their learning, despite circumstances.
Record Screencast Videos for your students.
Record Webcam Videos to Communicate with Students - Transcript Short webcam videos can be great for quick announcements, short concepts, and in general reminding your students that you are engaged in course, despite circumstances.
Web Conferencing, Web Meeting, Live-Remote
Web Conferencing, Web Meeting, Live-Remote
This is an option, but consider carefully whether live online classes are the best option.
- Depending on how widespread the event is, internet traffic can be quite high, and there may not be sufficient bandwidth for reliable web-conferencing.
- You and your students lives may be impacted such that scheduled meetings may no longer be realistic, and asynchronous interaction may be more manageable for them.
- Whenever possible, please try for asynchronous delivery of content to respect that not all students may be available at your traditional course time.
- When you do need to have interactive, live, or timed activities these should take place during the original scheduled class meeting time (e.g. 9:05-10am MWF).
- If an alternate time needs to be scheduled for an individual student, please ensure that this does not conflict with an existing scheduled event from another class.
- When posting any sort of time of day that your students must be aware of, such as the scheduled time for a synchronous class meeting, remember to include "Eastern Standard Time" or "EST." Some of your students are now living in other time zones, so this helps them keep track of important times.
- If you plan to use web-conferencing, be sure that you have a PC, laptop, or mobile device with reliable microphone and speakers. Test these beforehand with your chosen web-conferencing application.
Google Hangouts Meet. Simple and easy to use.
Zoom. Allows recording of meetings. Make sure to protect yourself from "Zoombombing"!
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