Recommended teaching activities

In terms of supporting your students online in the forthcoming period, we are recommending that each module and unit in Brightspace implements three specific interventions to allow you to support your students (and them to support each other) in a manageable and sustainable way while we deal with the disruption caused by coronavirus. Each of the interventions is easy to implement, and we have provided suggested text you can use with your students.

The activities we recommend you implement as a priority in your module or unit space are:

Questions Forum

Create a discussion board titled ‘Questions Forum’ in your unit or module space, which your students can use to ask any general questions about their studies, coursework or the online teaching arrangements for your unit or module. We suggest using a variation on the text below to as the introductory message to your Questions Forum:

During the period when our teaching and learning activities will be online, please use this Questions Forum to post any general questions you have about your studies, coursework or the online teaching and learning arrangements in place while we respond to the disruptions caused coronavirus. By using the Questions Forum for any general questions you have, the answers and guidance [I/the module team/the unit team] provide will be there for the entire group to see. This Questions Forum will be checked regularly on (insert days/times when forum will be checked). Please also respond to each other’s questions and queries where you feel you can.

Social Announcements

Create a discussion board titled ‘Social Announcements’ and which your students can use to communicate with one another. We suggest using a variation on the text below to as the introductory message to the Social Announcements discussion board:

During the period when our teaching and learning activities will be online, please use the Social Announcements discussion board to share social announcements or updates with your fellow students. This could include general social discussion, but please also post announcements relating to the social media spaces or platforms (e.g. Facebook groups, WhatsApp) where you can be found or are gathering while teaching and learning is taking place online.

Open Office Hours

We recommend establishing at least one Open Office Hours drop-in session for your unit or module each week, using whichever real-time technology you prefer to use to engage with your students, see Synchronous technologies. You may want to have a single one-hour session each week, perhaps two for larger groups, or to have two 30 minute sessions each week. We suggest using a variation on the text below:

While our teaching and learning activities are taking place fully online, we will be running a weekly Open Office Hours session at the following day(s) and time(s) [insert day(s) and time(s)]. Open Office Hours is a drop-in session during which [I / a member of the unit/module team] will be available to discuss any questions or issues relating to your studies or coursework that you would like to explore. To access the Open Office Hours, please [insert instructions and link for accessing whatever technology you are using to run the Open Office Hours].