The number of best practices for technology implementation, the scaffolding of skills, practice opportunities, inclusivity, and collaboration can be overwhelming when considering adjustments to a course design. The list is long, but as always these ideas are meant to be part of a large interwoven tapestry rather than isolated practices. There are methods for integrating efforts across these best practices to get as much use out of a single course interaction as possible, thereby reducing the burden on you and your students (and bloating your assignment list or syllabus). One of my favorite areas of the course to apply this concept to is in the first week of school during course introductions.
Providing a safe place for students to provide their names and their pronouns is one way to facilitate an inclusive environment for LGBTQ+ students (Cooper et al, 2020). Investing in learning student names and creating an opportunity for students to learn each other's names also affects the ways students feel about the course. More importantly, introductions help create a feeling of caring and belonging and a comfort level when asking for help (Cooper et al, 2017).
What do students do later on in your course? Do they record video presentations or design posters in Powerpoint or Google Slides? Use YellowDig to share research with peers? Use Slack to collaborate on a group project? Respond to lectures with video and prompts in VoiceThread? Build a website portfolio in Google Sites? You may consider what technology or skill will be the most challenging and impactful on their grade and how you can make a small, exciting version of it for an introduction activity. In doing so can you create a supportive environment for students to comfortably share about themselves with the instructor and their peers?
It is a kindness to allow students to practice technology skills they will need later on in the course upfront so that they can gain experience with the tool before it counts for a large portion of their graded work. When we ask a student to demonstrate their content knowledge with a new tool without having ever used the tool before, we risk students spending more time on mastering the basic technology than they do on applying their knowledge of the content from class. In a 2017 dissertation, Dr. Peggy Weimar discusses the importance of scaffolding technology usage for completing project tasks just as we scaffold in other pieces of content or skills. This helps avoid cognitive overload and allows students to focus on demonstrating content mastery, rather than working on technology mastery at the same time.
These initial technology-enhanced introduction experiences should be low-stakes assignments (not counting for a large portion of graded work) and have a more flexible deadline than normal and/or multiple attempts. This allows students to connect with an instructor or TA if they need help with technical troubleshooting, and time to revise or resubmit their responses without penalty on their grades. The flexibility of this assignment for the instructor is that it should not cover content awareness, and as you assist students who need help, you do not have to worry about cutting time from your other course content. Then by the time students need to use this same tool for their assignments about content, they will have gotten all of their basic worries and fears out of the way!
Lenora Ott is an instructional designer in the School of Life Sciences Teaching Innovation Center at Arizona State University. Lenora assists faculty with developing and launching their online courses and provides long term evaluation, redesign, and support for online coursework. Her passion is empowering faculty to create meaningful learning experiences for their students and themselves online. She has worked in higher education for 8 years and has a Master of Science in Global Technology and Development from Arizona State University and a Graduate Certificate in Educational Technology from Northern Arizona University.
Photo by Karolina Grabowska from Pexels
Why Introductions?
I’ve spoken about course introductions and first day of school activities before in the blog posts ““Ice Breakers” and Community Makers: The Importance of the Introduction in Online and Face-to-Face Classrooms” and “More than “Syllabus Day”: How the First Day of Class is an Opportunity to Connect”. Establishing a community of learning is a large portion of my own work as an instructor and instructional designer, which is why I consider this topic regularly.Providing a safe place for students to provide their names and their pronouns is one way to facilitate an inclusive environment for LGBTQ+ students (Cooper et al, 2020). Investing in learning student names and creating an opportunity for students to learn each other's names also affects the ways students feel about the course. More importantly, introductions help create a feeling of caring and belonging and a comfort level when asking for help (Cooper et al, 2017).
Why Add New Technology or Skills?
In December 2014, the National Associate of Colleges and Employers (NACE) Career Readiness Committee surveyed 606 representatives from organizations that hire through a university relations and recruiting effort. The committee identified 8 main competencies as priorities through respondents. These competencies are what employers are most looking for when hiring new employees. One of these areas is “Digital Technology”. It is defined as “Leverage existing digital technologies ethically and efficiently to solve problems, complete tasks, and accomplish goals. The individual demonstrates effective adaptability to new and emerging technologies (NACE, 2021).” The School of Life Sciences (SOLS) seeks to integrate the necessary skills and competencies for success in the workforce throughout their degree curriculums. It, therefore, becomes important that we not only teach content awareness but also skill demonstration and the ability to wield technologies. Other competencies also highly center around communication and task completion including “Critical thinking/Problem solving” and “Oral/Written communications” which are often heavily assisted by computer technology in the modern workforce.Practice and Scaffolding of Technologies and Skills
When you are deciding the technology you’d like to use during an introduction activity, it’s important to consider how it overlaps with other opportunities or assessments that occur later in your course. You do not want to only use the technology for this assessment. With successful integration, the use of technology becomes “Routine and transparent, accessible and readily available for the task at hand… [and helps] students to effectively reach their goals (Shaffner, 2007).” You want to be consistent.What do students do later on in your course? Do they record video presentations or design posters in Powerpoint or Google Slides? Use YellowDig to share research with peers? Use Slack to collaborate on a group project? Respond to lectures with video and prompts in VoiceThread? Build a website portfolio in Google Sites? You may consider what technology or skill will be the most challenging and impactful on their grade and how you can make a small, exciting version of it for an introduction activity. In doing so can you create a supportive environment for students to comfortably share about themselves with the instructor and their peers?
It is a kindness to allow students to practice technology skills they will need later on in the course upfront so that they can gain experience with the tool before it counts for a large portion of their graded work. When we ask a student to demonstrate their content knowledge with a new tool without having ever used the tool before, we risk students spending more time on mastering the basic technology than they do on applying their knowledge of the content from class. In a 2017 dissertation, Dr. Peggy Weimar discusses the importance of scaffolding technology usage for completing project tasks just as we scaffold in other pieces of content or skills. This helps avoid cognitive overload and allows students to focus on demonstrating content mastery, rather than working on technology mastery at the same time.
These initial technology-enhanced introduction experiences should be low-stakes assignments (not counting for a large portion of graded work) and have a more flexible deadline than normal and/or multiple attempts. This allows students to connect with an instructor or TA if they need help with technical troubleshooting, and time to revise or resubmit their responses without penalty on their grades. The flexibility of this assignment for the instructor is that it should not cover content awareness, and as you assist students who need help, you do not have to worry about cutting time from your other course content. Then by the time students need to use this same tool for their assignments about content, they will have gotten all of their basic worries and fears out of the way!
Pro Tips
- If you have a small to mid-sized classroom you could certainly default to in-person introductions. In online synchronous or hybrid classes, you could use zoom breakout rooms for students to meet a subset of their peers. But for high enrollment in-person classes, and online synchronous or asynchronous classrooms digital introductions still work and provide a space for the community of learning that happens outside of lecture. For very large classes, consider dividing the class into quarters or even smaller groups so students can focus on getting to know a subset of their peers more closely.
- Get creative in what you ask students about themselves. Have them share fun facts about themselves (If you were a hot sauce, what kind would you be?), and long-term goals or dreams. They could also share what they are most looking forward to in the course, and even what they worry will be the most challenging.
References:
- Cooper, K. M., Auerbach, A. J. J., Bader, J. D., Beadles-Bohling, A. S., Brashears, J. A., Cline, E., ... & Brownell, S. E. (2020). Fourteen recommendations to create a more inclusive environment for LGBTQ+ individuals in academic biology. CBE—Life Sciences Education, 19(3), es6. https://www.lifescied.org/doi/full/10.1187/cbe.20-04-0062
- Cooper, K. M., Haney, B., Krieg, A., & Brownell, S. E. (2017). What's in a Name? The Importance of Students Perceiving That an Instructor Knows Their Names in a High-Enrollment Biology Classroom. CBE life sciences education, 16(1), ar8. https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.16-08-0265
- National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE). Career Readiness Defined.
- Shaffner, M. (2007, November 06). What is successful technology integration? Retrieved April 28, 2021, from https://www.edutopia.org/technology-integration-guide-description
- Weimer, P. D. (2017). Choose to use: Scaffolding for technology learning needs in a project-based learning environment (Order No. 10263051). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (1934361162). Retrieved from http://login.ezproxy1.lib.asu.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy1.lib.asu.edu/dissertations-theses/choose-use-scaffolding-technology-learning-needs/docview/1934361162/se-2?accountid=4485
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