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Category: Release Notes and Updates

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Classes start September 14th.

Between July 6th and then, there are 10 weeks. Here are some suggestions for how to take a little time each week to get your course ready to launch. Feel free to modify the timeline based on your availability and needs.

Week 1

  1. Do some reading. See the summer reading suggestions from DCAL/LDT.
  2. Take a look at the Remote Readiness Checklist on teachremote.dartmouth.edu.
  3. Talk with your department chair about the Spring student experience survey results.

Week 2

  1. Review your learning objectives and syllabus. Discuss with your Academic Continuity team to determine how you might approach the redesign most effectively and ensure that you have additional resources if you need them. Is there anything from your previous offering of the course that needs to be changed for the new environment?
  2. Develop a list of the technology you’d like to use, and determine where you need additional training.
  3. Create a schedule for yourself based on your own availability and needs that includes major milestones and minor to-do items as you see them.

Week 3

  1. Consider how students will engage with you and with each other. Draft ideas for office hours, study groups, and other engagement strategies for the remote environment. Students have indicated that meaningful connection to you and to each other is critical for their learning.
  2. Craft outlines for each week/module of your course including the purpose of the week/module, learning objectives, lectures, readings, other media, and a general idea of assignments.

Week 4

  1. Sketch an outline of each lecture you would like to record or deliver via Zoom.
  2. Identify resources you may need for development of these lectures, such as media, images, scripts, editing technology, etc.
  3. Refine your plan for student assignments, ensuring that you are providing multiple modes for students to demonstrate their knowledge, and that there is a chance for students to receive formative feedback as they progress through the course.

Week 5

  1. How are you doing with the schedule you developed for these 10 weeks? Check in with yourself and/or your Academic Continuity team.
  2. Design your Canvas site to match your course outline. Be sure to include all of your plans for engagement. 
  3. Review the Remote Readiness Checklist on teachremote.dartmouth.edu. 

Week 6

  1. Review each assignment to ensure that directions are clear for students and fit well into the plan you’ve developed for your course.
  2. Review your readings for accessibility.
  3. Finalize your syllabus. 
  4. Begin recording any lectures you’d like students to view asynchronously.

Week 7

  1. Will you be working with TA’s, UTA’s, LF’s or other teaching helpers? Time to bring them into the plan and get some feedback on your plan.
  2. Finish preparing your Canvas site, get feedback from a colleague if possible. Check that anything you copied from previous terms, like teaching methods and course policies, are revised with remote teaching in mind. 
  3. Continue recording if needed.

Week 8

  1. Finalize your Canvas site, ensuring that it’s clear to students how they should interact with your content, with you, and with each other.
  2. Continue recording if needed.
  3. Craft drafts of rubrics for assessing student work.
  4. Publish your Canvas site.

Week 9/10

  1. Send a survey to get to know your enrolled students.
  2. Review all the above steps for anything you’ve missed.
  3. Take a step back and appreciate all the work you've put in. Breathe. It's going to be great.

Published on

Maybe you're not heading to the beach or building your usual reading list, but instead trying to focus your reading on preparing for the upcoming term. Here are two reading list suggestions from DCAL and Learning Design and Technology (ITC) teams, depending on where you're starting.

Option 1: You taught in Spring term and survived, or are teaching now in Summer and getting through! You’re on the schedule to teach again in Fall, maybe a new preparation or perhaps re-offering a course you have some experience offering remotely. 

  1. Turns out you can build community in a Zoom classroom by Rachel Toor
  2. We are not in the same boat by Emery D. Haley
  3. Three strategies for better online discussions by Michael B. Sherry
  4. How to recover the joy of teaching after an online pivot by Flower Darby

Option 2: You are new to remote teaching. Feel free to read any of the articles from the other section too!

  1. Dartmouth Teaching Remotely Getting Started Guide by DCAL and ITC
  2. 5 ways to connect with online students by Flower Darby
  3. Effective educational videos by Cynthia J. Brame 
  4. Pandemic Teaching Prescriptions by Regan A. R. Gurung

And no matter what, review the Remote Readiness Checklist!

Published on

Beginning on Thursday, June 18, all newly scheduled Zoom meetings and webinars at Dartmouth will have a password applied by default and that password will be embedded in the meeting link. This new security precaution will be forced by Zoom later this summer so we are applying it early to preclude disruption during the term.

If you share a meeting link - for example, via Canvas for classes or by email - your participants will experience no change. When they click the link they will enter the Zoom meeting because the password is embedded. No new steps.

Later this summer Zoom will also be requiring meeting passwords for previously scheduled recurring meetings that do not already have them. We will advise as we learn more about the timing and impact of this change.

Given that Zoom will likely be implementing changes in the middle of term, if your course or regular business relies on previously scheduled recurring meetings (but not personal meeting rooms), please consider adding a password now so that you won't need to worry about responding to this later. To learn how, please visit dartgo.org/zoom-updates.

Published on

Good afternoon,

We've been continually updating the Teaching Remotely website. Here are some of the most recent changes and highlights in case you missed them:

Blog posts:

Have a great evening!

Adam Nemeroff, Learning Designer

Published on

Good afternoon,

We've continued to update numerous resources on the Teach Remotely website. The following are the highlights from the last couple of days:

Be well.

Adam Nemeroff, Learning Designer

Published on

Good afternoon,

This weekend, we've made several updates to the website as we've received feedback from users.

Changes in Guides

Upcoming Events

Stay healthy!

Adam Nemeroff, Learning Designer

Published on

Good afternoon,

We've decided to start a blog on this site to help share out relevant resources we learn of as we're made aware of them. If you have ideas that you find relevant, send it to learning.design.tech@dartmouth.edu.

Example Posts from Today

Here is a summary of other changes:

  • Our Zoom guide updated to recommend PMI meetings instead of auto-generated join information.
  • Check out our new guide on Remote Lab Activities and Experiences. Kudos to Cindy Rosalbo and Adrienne Gauthier for getting that up and running!
  • Our comprehensive guide on Remote Teaching Good Practices has a new navigation that helps to jump between sections more easily. Next up: We'll be linking recommendations to key web resources throughout.
  • Thanks to Alison, Ben, and Rolaine from Student Accessibility Services for giving feedback and adding extra info to the Accessible Remote Teaching guide.

Wishing everyone a restorative weekend!

Adam Nemeroff, Learning Designer