Volume 1: Reimagining Remote Teaching, Issue 9
Volume 8 spoke about trying to make more connections with our students in our Remote, Synchronous courses. We speak to pictures, we cannot see faces, and we cannot read body language. It is hard to know if we are connecting and engaging our students. There is a solution, though. It’s simple, as well: let’s ask them!
We need to hear directly from our students about how class is going. And, we cannot wait for our end of the semester course evaluations, either, because that is just too late to adjust in September.
This article reviews how you can interact with your students to receive important formative feedback on your hard work. Most importantly, I think you will be pleasantly surprised with the results if you take the plunge and ask your students to give you a “temperature” of the collaborative room.
Formative Feedback Template
The office of Knowledge Management and the Teaching and Learning Center collaborated to create a formative feedback Microsoft Form you can use with your individual classes. There is a total of 5 questions. The first two questions are student focused and the last three are teacher focused.
For those who attended ReImagining Remote Teaching or Active Learning, you are already familiar with the questions. For those who have not had a chance to attend, here they are for you to review:
- What grade would you give yourself so far in this course?
- Give 3 reasons for your grade.
- What grade would you give the course so far?
- Give 3 reasons for your grade
- What recommendations do you have for the class?
Question 1 and 3 are multiple choice, with A, B, C, D, and F as options. Questions 2, 4, and 5 are opened-ended to allow for self-reflection and meaningful feedback. You can access this form below:
Feel free to use this form as is, modify it with your own questions, or create your own. It doesn’t matter what your feedback from looks like. What matters is that you take the time to listen to what your students are enjoying in class so you can duplicate more of the same!
Just remember one important principal: Make sure your form is set to accept anonymous responses!
Directions
The above template is set to duplicate. Here are the directions for you to save the document and share with your students.
- Click on the Template Link
- Click on Duplicate It (top and bottom of the form)
- Sign into Microsoft (if needed) with your KCTCS credentials
- Customize the form document / title as needed
- Click “share”
- Choose the top option and the drop down for “anyone with the link can respond”
- Copy the link
- Drop the link into a chat window/announcement
- Responses will be unique to your individual class(es)
You will be the only one who sees your feedback, but I am going to make a request. Please consider sharing your feedback with your divisions, the Teaching and Learning Center, and your colleagues.
The more we share our successes, the more we can learn from each other and better our experiences in the classroom!
Upcoming Professional Development
The Teaching & Learning Center will also be hosting a PD session to process your formative feedback. The session is called:
I just got my Midterm Evaluations: Now what?
Yes. It is that time of the year. We have provided students with their midterm Starfish progress reports. And, hopefully, you took the plunge and asked your students for some real-time course feedback to improve your Fall 2020 courses. This session targets those who sought formative feedback for your own teaching. We will discuss our findings, identify our strengths, and begin making action plans for our course improvement.
The session will be held live on Friday, October 23rd from 10am – 12pm. You can register for the session through the PD Tracker. Additionally, for those of you in the classroom during the scheduled time, the session will be recorded for your review.
As always, please do not feel a need to wait until late October to process your feedback. Reach out to the Teaching & Learning Center and we can discuss your insights.
