Online Teaching Reflections.

Today we had short, 30 minute classes with our students to introduce them to our system. As stated here I will be asking students to work through three steps daily asynchronously (1. Check-In, 2. Lesson 3. Check-Out) that include pre-recorded videos and assignments WITHIN a synchronous time frame.

As you can see above, if students need extra help during this time, they can can go to a Zoom room or a Google Doc where I have set up a table for a live Q & A. Ideally, students will go to the Google Doc and if they need extra, more personalized help, the can join the Zoom room (using the same link for all my classes all the time so I don't have to update).

I have received a lot of questions about the Q & A document and it's efficacy. Essentially it is a document where all students have editing privileges, can ask questions, I can answer them, and so can their peers. I like this format rather than any other form of quick, live, Q & A, for the following reasons:

• You can have "meta" side conversations from questions with students using comments.
• The barrier to entry is LOW.
• You can use revision history to analyze use.
• A catalog of questions is created that can be exported as PDF later.
• Works on any device.
• More stuff I not thinking about.

Below is a video of the Q&A document in action during today's mini class. Note: students are just asking random questions so that they know how to work the system.