Teaching during coronavirus

Before planning your teaching, you should examine what framework your department has set for teaching online. You can ask your programme coordinator about the framework that applies.

If you are a programme coordinator, you should familiarise yourself with the programme coordinator’s mandate where your responsibility for the teaching is defined.

When planning and/or redesigning teaching and supervisions, it can be helpful to “think backwards”:

Acquaint yourself with Constructive Alignment (Biggs). Take the learning goals as your point of departure, and “work backwards” when you are choosing appropriate forms of teaching and student activities.

Ask yourself these questions:

• What is the academic content?
• What should the teacher do?
• What should the students do?
• What should be synchronous and what should be asynchronous?
• Which tasks are to be given?
• In what order should the teaching and activities take place?
• What form should the collaboration take?
• Are the students to work in groups?
• How should it be assessed?
• How can everyone be included?

Videos with more supplementary information about the planning of teaching:

Educational design (select "cc" in the video player to turn on English subtitling)
Educational design in video lectures (select "cc" in the video player to turn on English subtitling)
Several videos about the planning, production and use of short teaching videos: videoforelesning.no

Canvas resources for the planning of teaching:

Canvas for UiA – Teaching resources about course structure, student collaboration, assessment and use of multimedia in Canvas

X – Wholly digital courses – Principles, tips and tricks, and tools for the development of netcourses

“10 tips” for planning and implementing effective digital teaching with the inclusiveness, predictability and fairness of the learning environment as the point of departure.

(Inspiration from Stanford University’s overview, which is more in-depth with details provided for each point).

1. Communicate with the students, and do so in good time. Use the notifications in Canvas or any other communication channels if the students have not yet been granted access to the course in Canvas. See the tips on UiA’s Canvas page.
2. Carry out a simple questionnaire in order to gain an idea of the students’ starting points for the learning situation.
3. Check that the course material is available and that you follow the guidelines for universal design and GDPR in your teaching. Remember that Canvas is the “starting point” and the platform for all teaching, including, for example, teaching via Zoom.
4. Provide clear information about how the teaching programmes in Canvas are organised and structured. See the tips on UiA’s Canvas page.
5. If possible and necessary: Establish direct contact 1:1 with the students during the course of the first week.
6. Establish working rules/norms for different forms of interaction together with the students.
7. Be clear about how you intend to mix synchronous and asynchronous teaching methods and activities. On this webpage, you will find more information about UiA’s services and tools for synchronous and asynchronous teaching
8. Facilitate for activities and forms of collaboration for the entire duration of the course in such a way that the students can get to know each other better
9. Ask for regular feedback from the students regarding their experiences of the teaching
10. Ensure that all students are included

On Digital teaching on Innaskjærs, you will find user guides for teaching using Canvas and teaching with video.

During the Covid-19 pandemic when many people are home alone, it is especially important to design student-centred teaching to keep students activated and engaged. 

How to increase a sense of belonging and help students stay motivated in their studies:

Facilitate interaction within the student group: Although students may have many friends, they may feel alone in their studies. In order to maintain contact within the student group, you can set up various activities where the students can interact with one another.

You can do this by:

• Beginning and ending each teaching session with a general discussion to ensure that each student becomes an active member of the student group.
• Offering an open Zoom room (at a fixed time) where the students can have contact with you and other students on the course.

Keep a good structure: This is especially important for remote teaching when it is hard for you as a teacher to sense the atmosphere in the student group. When the structure, purpose and learning objectives are thoroughly discussed with the students, it encourages them to take responsibility for their learning, the course plan and to achieve their study goals. This will increase the students’ motivation.

Break down the tasks: Create sub-tasks with clear goals and keep a short time between deadlines. That will help the student group meet more often, get more feedback, and increase their motivation. Regular feedback is important to keep in touch with each student and help them progress in their studies.

Keep in touch with colleagues: For increased motivation and better cohesion in teaching and learning, maintaining contact with colleagues is important when it comes to the planning, implementation, and evaluation of the teaching. Such collaboration is also key to avoid publishing assignments at the same time and to ensure variation in teaching practices and assignment types.