Course Continuation
In the event of a campus closure, Abington will endeavor to maintain its current course schedules. Wherever possible, classes will meet at their regularly scheduled times via Zoom, which will have been enabled for all online courses.
OIT staff will be on-hand to offer support for Zoom/Lectures, Canvas configuration and troubleshooting, and instruction in the use of the Assignments and Announcements features.
Planning For Campus Closure
While very rare, extended campus closures are possible. Inclement weather, facility issues, sickness, environmental hazards, etc. can impact our ability to deliver courses in a traditional manner. Therefore, it is a good idea to be prepared to teach using alternative delivery methods. This list outlines what you might consider while thinking about how to plan your course in the event of a prolonged closure.
- Make sure that your Canvas courses are published.
- Consider uploading essential course material to Canvas and leaving these items unpublished until required. At the very least, make sure you have electronic copies of course materials that are easily accessible to you in case it is necessary to share them electronically later.
- Think about how you will deliver course material in the event of a prolonged campus closure:
- Will you hold class face to face virtually using Zoom or record class in advance using either Kaltura or Zoom?
- Will you make use of Canvas features to deliver and communicate course material?
- Decide how you will collect assignments:
- Will you collect assignments via email, Google Drive, Box, or One Drive?
- Will you have students submit assignments via Canvas?
- Determine how you will administer exams:
- Will you upload paper exams to Canvas or send them out via email?
- Will you create exams in Canvas using the quiz feature?
- Decide how you will communicate with students:
- Will you make frequent use of the Canvas Announcements feature?
- Will you correspond regularly via email?
Communicating Your Plan to Students
Be clear in your communication with students. Let them know how you plan to communicate with them and how they should communicate with you. Tell them how you plan to deliver class material and how they can submit assignments, quizzes, discussions, and other course material to you.
Below are two sample messages that can be copied and tailored to your plans and communicated with students via Canvas announcements or through any communication tool you decide to use to reach students. Click on the picture to make it bigger.
Dear Students,
Many of you may be wondering what is going to happen regarding COVID-19 and campus closures. I wanted to communicate our class plan since we are unable to continue our regularly scheduled in-person class meetings.
Our class will continue to meet, but virtually, and we will meet at our regularly scheduled time via Zoom. You will notice we have enabled Zoom in the Canvas course. During scheduled course meetings, click Zoom in the navigation menu, and then click join meeting. Recordings will be available for those unable to join, and your participation will be measured using an alternate assignment. In addition to meeting virtually, please continue to complete assignments posted on Canvas. Instructions for joining Zoom meetings can be found at https://sites.psu.edu/abit. Note that Canvas is our main mode of communicating and is the vehicle for continuing our course.
Course content can be interacted with, and assignments can be completed, using a home computer, iPad/tablet, or smartphone. If you do not have access to a home computer/internet connection or a tablet or smartphone, please reach out to me as soon as possible, so that a plan to help you finish the course can be developed.
Please feel free to reach out to me if you have any questions or concerns.
Enjoy the rest of your spring break and see you soon!
Preparing to Teach Class Remotely
If the campus closes for a prolonged period of time, you will need to implement your plans. You might consider following the checklists below.
- Get course material online and enable distance learning tools that will help you deliver your courses:
- Upload course syllabus, PowerPoint slides, and other course materials to their Canvas Course (should be done each semester).
- Create Canvas Assignments for grade tracking (should be done each semester).
- Enable Online Submissions for Canvas Assignments.
- Enable Zoom in Canvas and configure Zoom Account.
- Create Exams in Canvas & determine whether Examity proctoring service will be utilized.
- Meet with an Instructional Designer, or submit Canvas page to ID team for review to ensure course is properly configured for an extended campus closure (ID team will adopt QA method that accounts for this going forward).
- Check out university resources and suggestions for non-traditional course adaptation (Pottery, Yoga, science Labs, etc) for the distance environment:
- For science labs, consider sharing sample data for students to analyze as if they had completed the lab.
- Build a repository of videos and other digital resources that can help meet course objectives in the absence of physical presence.
- Search PSU’s Open Education Resources (OER) website and the Openly Available Sources Integrated Search (OASIS) for potential online lab simulations that may fit with the curriculum.
Exams/Assessments
Course assessments, including final exams, can be built in Canvas, employing proctoring software to ensure academic integrity, if necessary. Creating exams can be time-consuming and it would be prudent to build all exams into Canvas at the beginning of a semester, which would be offered virtually, should the need arise.
Test integrity may be addressed by the use of question pools and randomized answer choices that essentially build a custom exam unique to each student. Instructional designers and OIT staff can assist with building exams for instructors who may be unable to do it for themselves through use of a tool such as Respondus 4.0.
While more time and labor-intensive for instructors to grade, alternative exam methods could be used that include student essays uploaded via Canvas, or hand-written exams that are photographed and submitted to instructors using Canvas.
Faculty/Staff Technology & Preparedness
Faculty with university-issued laptops would work remotely using their office laptops. Faculty with desktops may a) be issued a loaner laptop or b) use their personal home computer to work remotely or c) teach remotely from their office or a classroom computer on campus, if campus remains open to faculty. Please contact OIT at abit@psu.edu for further details.
A “lecturing via Zoom” quick-start guide for faculty is available by clicking the “Zoom” tab above, and remote Zoom training sessions are offered by Abington Instructional Design staff in groups or one-on-one.
In advance of closures, Abington Instructional Designers will work directly with faculty without active Canvas sites to provide training and support in preparing their spaces for potential distance teaching.
Student Technology
Students will continue to attend classes as scheduled, with class meetings occurring via Zoom, and all assignments would be submitted via Canvas, including online exams.
In the event that students do not have laptop/desktop/internet technology access at home, a smartphone quick-start guide is available here for students who wish to use a smartphone for course completion.
OIT Training & Support
The Instructional Design team will train OIT staff to support faculty with the following at a minimum:
- Uploading materials to Canvas
- Using Zoom for live lectures at a distance
- Building quizzes/tests in Canvas
In the event of all courses being transferred to an online format, OIT staff will be assigned to serve as admins for courses in Canvas, as needed, under the direction of the Instructional Design staff, in order to provide broad support, and thereby to leverage resources as efficiently as possible.