So, You Have to Move Your Classes Online. Now What?
“Cynthia, I can’t run my toaster oven. How am I going to run an online class? I don’t want to be an online professor. You have to help me.”
Teaching in the time of COVID-19, many of my faculty colleagues feel this way. It’s not so much that we’re being asked to suddenly become online professors. It’s more like we’re being asked to build a lifeboat—even as we’re clambering into it—to steer our students through the end of the semester.
In early March, my administration notified faculty to start preparing to move our classes online. For many of my colleagues, this is a new challenge, and one that can be a little overwhelming to consider. But I’ve taught at least one class online every semester since 1998. I’ve also been a union officer for 13 years and, for nearly a decade, ran our college’s Teaching and Learning Center.
I raised my hand to help.
Since then, I’ve been teaching dozens of my colleagues the basics of Blackboard, our college’s online course management system (CMS). Listening to their concerns, here is some advice for others who are building a lifeboat.
Stick to the basics.
No matter your discipline, in any course a professor has to do three primary things:
- Deliver content, information, materials, experiences to students;
- Receive assignments, information, ideas from students;
- Communicate with students.
Use this framework to help you focus on what you need to accomplish in an online CONTINUE READING: So, You Have to Move Your Classes Online. Now What? - NEA Today