Shifting Instructional Delivery

It is helpful to know what approach to alternative delivery will work best for you, your students, and your course. Instructors have the option of determining whether to meet synchronously during the regularly scheduled class time or to give students equivalent work that they can do asynchronously. It is helpful to have a sense of whether a synchronous or asynchronous class meeting will work best given the nature of your course and the type of work that students typically do in a class meeting. Be certain, also, to consider the circumstances in which you will likely be working in the case of a shift to remote teaching (e.g., whether you will be responsible for elder care or child care, what kind of technology you will have access to, whether you will have a quiet space to facilitate a synchronous class meeting, etc.).

Students will be more likely to engage in any work you ask them to do remotely and be successful in that work if they know what to expect. It is ideal to communicate these emergency plans in your syllabus, but in a course that is already underway, you can communicate this to students by posting information on Brightspace or sending a class email. Be sure to call students’ attention to this plan in class as well and give them the opportunity to ask any questions they may have.

When the university has to shift to alternative instructional delivery, it’s important that students know exactly what is expected of them including how they will attend class (if you are holding a synchronous meeting); where they will access the resources they need to complete the work they need to do; how, where, and when they will submit required work; and how they should communicate with you if they run into any problems. 

Situations that require a shift in instructional delivery may come with other problems, e.g., loss of power and/or internet in the case of severe weather, child or elder care challenges, travel problems, etc. Students may struggle to attend synchronous classes or may not be able to access asynchronous work at class time. It is important that you hold students to the standards of your course, but keep lines of communications open so that students can tell you if they are struggling to meet the expectations for the class. Be prepared to give students parameters to work within rather than simply holding them to strict deadlines. For example, if you are planning an asynchronous class meeting, don’t make all work due during or at the end of your scheduled class time but instead give a larger window that students can work within. 

Many instructors have had experience teaching in a variety of modalities in the past several years, and you likely already have strategies that work well for students in your courses. Take some time to reflect on the work you’ve previously done and use those experiences to help you make plans.  

It’s important that remote class meetings don’t feel like an interruption in your course, but instead that they are a similar learning experience that just takes place in a different setting. Consider what a typical class meeting looks like in your in-person class, and aim to replicate those activities as much as possible if you meet remotely. For example, if your typical class meeting is a mix of lecture and Q&A, replicate that structure as best you can in a remote class. If students frequently do group work in your classes, have them do well-structured work together in a synchronous or asynchronous remote class. The strategies described below can help you consider ways that you can align an alternative class meeting with your typical pedagogical approach.

If your in-person class meetings include student discussion, you can use Zoom to replicate that experience. Synchronous remote discussions will be most successful if they are carefully structured and if students know exactly how they are expected to participate and contribute. Below is an example of an effective plan for a synchronous remote class focused on class discussion.

1. Share a challenging prompt or question that you would have used in your in-person class meeting to drive discussion or debate. It is helpful to make this prompt visible by sharing it on a slide or in a document.
2. Ask students to respond to the question or prompt on their own, and ask them to commit to an answer by writing it down, along with an explanation of how they used concepts they have been learning in the course to arrive at that answer. 
3. Ask all students to share their response (or some part of their response) in the Zoom Chat. Ask students to read other students’ responses as they come in and consider where they see points of emerging agreement and/or disagreement about the question. 
4. Take some time to read the responses yourself, note the patterns of responses you see, and articulate these patterns for students. Now you are ready to call on students and ask them to share their thinking about each of the options. 
5. After you have heard several answers, offer a recap that helps students trace the trajectory of the discussion, and then offer additional insight about which responses were more on target than others. You may, at this point, want to offer some additional concepts that might shape their thinking in a focused, 10-minute mini-lecture, as you would in an in-person class meeting.
6. At the end of class, have students write a 1-minute reflection describing what they learned from the discussion. You may ask students to submit this work along with the other writing they have completed during the class meeting.

If your in-person class meetings include group work, you can use Zoom to replicate that experience. Synchronous remote group work will be most successful if it is carefully structured and if students know exactly how they are expected to participate and contribute. Below is an example of an effective plan for a synchronous remote class focused on group work.

1. Share a challenging prompt or question that you would have used in your in-person class meeting to drive discussion or debate. It is helpful to make this prompt visible by sharing it on a slide or in a document.
2. Ask students to respond to the question or prompt on their own, and ask them to commit to an answer by writing it down, along with an explanation of how they used concepts they have been learning in the course to arrive at that answer. 
3. Give students instructions to work together in small groups. Make sure you clearly explain that their task is to share and explain their individual answers and then to work together to come to a single answer that they will share and defend when they come back to the whole-class meeting. Tell them to also decide who will share their group’s answer when the class comes back together after working in groups.
4. Put students into small groups using Breakout Rooms in Zoom.
5. Bring students out of Breakout Rooms. When you bring students out of Breakout Rooms, have a representative from the team share their choice using the Chat function of Zoom (for a large class with 4 or more groups) or by calling on groups (for a smaller class with 2 or 3 groups).
6. Note the patterns of responses you see and articulate this for students. Now you are ready to call on the groups and ask them to share their thinking about each of the options.
7. After you have heard answers, offer a recap that helps students trace the trajectory of the discussion, and then offer additional insight about which responses were more on target than others. You may, at this point, want to offer some additional concepts that might shape their thinking in a focused, 10-minute mini-lecture.
8. At the end of class, have students write a 1-minute reflection describing what they learned from the discussion. You may ask students to submit this work along with the other writing they have completed during the class meeting.

If your in-person classes include lecture and interaction with students, you can use Zoom to replicate that experience. When you lecture remotely, it’s important to ensure that students are engaging in meaningful work during that lecture. Below is an example of an effective plan for a synchronous remote class focused on lecture.

1. Before the lecture begins, ask students to write down their response to one of these questions:
   • What is the most important thing I learned from the reading or homework for today’s class?
   • What are the three muddiest (i.e., most confusing) points from the reading or homework you completed for today’s class?
   • What are three questions from the reading or homework that you would like to have answered in today’s class?
     You might ask students to share some of their ideas verbally or in a chat. 
2. During the lecture, take at least one or two pauses in which you ask students to re-read their initial responses and make notes on the same paper about the most important things they have learned so far in the lecture and how that connects with what they learned from the reading. In a synchronous class, you might ask students to share some of their ideas verbally or in a chat. In an asynchronous class, you might ask students to put their responses in a Brightspace assignment that they submit after they have watched the lecture. 
3. At the end of the lecture, have students reflect back on all their notes and write down their response to these questions: 
   • What is the most important thing I learned in today’s class? 
   • How does what I learned in class connect to the important things I learned from the reading? 
   • How will I use what I’ve learned to help me on the upcoming class assignment/test/project?
4. Have students submit their responses (in Brightspace or by email) after class has ended. 

You may have recordings from past asynchronous classes, or you may have time to record a short lecture that you can post in your Brightspace course. Below is an effective sequence for having students do asynchronous class work with the content of a recorded lecture. 

1. Students complete assigned reading. 
2. Students watch the recorded lecture.
3. Students write short responses to the following questions:
   • What is the most important thing I learned from the assigned reading?
   • What is the most important thing I learned from the lecture I watched? 
   • How does what I learned from the lecture connect to the important things I learned from the reading? 
   • How will I use what I’ve learned to help me on the upcoming class assignment/test/project?
4. Students submit this work to you in Brightspace, by email, or by some other means. 
5. You read these written responses and use them to help determine where students may have struggled in working with the content on their own.

If you don’t have access to a recorded lecture, you can share class materials with students by other means. You might, for example, provide students with the lecture notes you would have used in class or give them detailed PowerPoint slides. Below is an effective sequence for having students do asynchronous class work with lecture notes.

1. Students complete assigned reading.
2. Students read your lecture notes. 
3. Students write short responses to the following questions:
   • What is the most important thing I learned from the assigned reading?
   • What is the most important thing I learned from the lecture notes I read/reviewed? 
   • How does what I learned from the lecture connect to the important things I learned from the reading? 
   • How will I use what I’ve learned to help me on the upcoming class assignment/test/project?
4. Students submit this work to you in Brightspace, by email, or by some other means. 
5. You read these written responses and use them to help determine where students may have struggled in working with the content on their own.

If you are teaching a course where students have used discussion boards or some other tool for interaction outside of class meetings, you may make the asynchronous work students do as part of those ongoing interactions. Below is an effective sequence for having students do asynchronous class work that is part of ongoing interactions with other students.

1. Students complete assigned reading and/or watch a recorded lecture.
2. Each student writes two important questions that came up for them in the reading and/or lecture.
3. Students post their questions to a class or group discussion board (or other forum that you use regularly in the class). If you are using Brightspace Discussions, it’s a good idea to require students to make their own post before they can see others’ questions.
4. Students attempt to respond to at least one other student’s question on the discussion board, citing the course materials they used to come up with their answers.