Corona Virus Response, How to Build an Online Classroom Experience

As Coronavirus containment strategies continue, many in-person educational programs worldwide have been canceled or moved online.

Although there is no shortage of technologies that can make online learning possible - here at Nucamp, our curriculum is online and our classes preferably in-person - it’s important for educators to realize that you cannot approach online and in-person learning in the same way. You have to adapt your course material and activities in a way that works best for an online environment.

For example, Nucamp runs Saturday workshops that are both in-person and online. Although the experience is similar, we had to make several changes in order to deliver both experiences in a way that work best for the setting. 

Here are a few other tips we’ve learned along the way.

 What NOT To Do

• Don’t copy the classroom experience: Copying what you did in the classroom and pasting it online is not likely to work. For example, a one-hour lecture in person may have worked well, but this won’t translate well remotely. Instead of reproducing this over and over again, consider creating a shorter video recording of the lecture. This can be shared over and over again, but only requires the instructor to record it once, allowing them more time to plan for other curriculum activities, such as polls, whiteboarding, or other discussion-based activities. You could even have students listen to the lecture ahead of time so that classroom time is 100% interactive!
• Use recordings, but don’t rely on them: Although the point above encourages recorded video lectures, don’t let you students become reliant on these as their classroom experience. Pairing these with interactive time is crucial for students to understand how to apply these skills in the real world. Students may ask you to record an entire class, but try to encourage them to participate in activities as much as possible.
• Use quality video: In a remote environment, visuals matter. It’s tempting to just record audio, but as you might predict, this is not nearly as engaging for your students as video. Also consider investing in tools that can make your video higher quality, such as an external microphone and higher-end webcam rather than your internal computer’s microphone and camera. However, don’t go overboard with the tech - multiple cameras may be nice for TV interviews, but they’re likely to make your life more complicated and are not needed for a simple lecture recording.
• Avoid silence: Even if your students are working on an assignment, silence in an online classroom is awkward. Fill it with questions, or other activities that can engage your students. Also encourage students to interact with each other.

What To Do:

• Flip the classroom: Online learning pushes us all to think beyond the traditional lecture-at-the-student approach. Online learning encourages instructors to seek out other activities that can engage students while teaching them the skills they need to succeed. Instead of having students passively listen to a lecture, envision how that lecture could be shorter and pair it with a group project or assignment instead. Here at Nucamp, our coursework is rooted in project-based learning, meaning that our instructors and students are engaged in this approach weekly.
• Encourage video etiquette: Similarly to the point above, encourage students to turn on their camera during class. However, ask that they mute their microphone when they are not talking, as sometimes students are in a setting with background noise they can’t control, like a barking dog or an enthusiastic child. It’s important that students feel like they are together in the classroom, even if they aren’t - being on video helps mimic this.
• Don’t forget to take breaks: Just because you’ve moved your curriculum online doesn’t mean that it’s less challenging! Just like in an in-person setting, students need time for bio breaks, to take a stretch, or to give their mind a moment to unwind from everything they just learned. Ensure you’re banking in time for this in your course planning.
• Try out group activities: Consider tools that will allow you to break students into smaller groups in order to collaborate on an activity or assignment. Having all students do this on one call is obviously challenging, so technology that allows for separate call rooms can help this. As an instructor, make sure to check in on them and bring them back together near the end of the classroom workshop to collectively reflect on what they’ve learned.

Practice and adjust:

Prepare yourself! Take a lesson for a dry run one week to see what activities and approaches resonate best with your students, and adjust the remainder of your curriculum accordingly. Think of this process not as set-in-stone, but as evolving in order to prepare your students to succeed.

Ludo Fourrage
Nucamp Chief Learning Officer