Another group of useful tips for S2020 instructors

This message was originally sent to instructors in the Faculty of Engineering by Daniel Davison, associate dean, undergraduate studies.

I have no doubt you are getting many tips about online teaching, which is new for almost all of us. The university has collected resources and they will be providing more resources in the near future.

In the meanwhile, here is another collection of practical tips that may help you prepare...

1. S2020 is numerical grading: In case there was any doubt, grading for S2020 will be back to normal, with numerical final grades. Students' ability to elect CR/NCR grades applies only to W2020 courses.

2. Practical tips for making videos from home: See the short video. Practical tips include:

• don't sit with a bright window behind you
• close/lock the door to keep kids and pets from barging in
• remove phones and other distractions.

A Cambridge Professor doing a live BBC interview could have used some of these tips!

3. CTE/CEL/ITMS/Library help for teaching strategies: They now have a centralized email (remoteteaching@uwaterloo.ca). I already tried it and they responded in 15 minutes. For technical support, use learnhelp@uwaterloo.ca.

4. Don't forget about AccessAbility concerns when preparing your online materials and tests. They have information on the AccessAbility website and Keep Learning website.

5. A big concern with online courses is academic integrity for testing. We must face it: no tool exists to eliminate cheating in on-line courses. But there are some techniques that can help. For example...

(a) Have students commit to follow the test regulations (in a LEARN quiz this can easily be done by putting a statement about the test rules in the quiz's introductory paragraph, then add something like "By clicking Start Quiz you are agreeing to this statement.")

(b) Use open-ended questions and questions that require deep understanding of material instead of simple recall of facts.

(c) Use randomized questions taken from a large question pool.

(d) Use delayed feedback so that students can see their score until after everyone has completed the test.

(e) Put only one question on the screen at a time to discourage students from sharing questions in bulk.

(f) Use multiple smaller assessments instead of one or two large ones. This provides a hurdle for students to overcome if they are trying to coordinate cheating.

(g) Remind students that cheating on a test or exam is a serious academic offence: the standard penalty for a first occurrence of premeditated cheating is a score of zero, a failure in the course, and a suspension (see https://uwaterloo.ca/secretariat/guidelines/guidelines-assessment-penalties). You don't even want to ask what the penalty is for a second occurrence. As the person who oversees academic penalties in Engineering, rest assured I will treat these cases especially seriously.

(h) If offered at some point, consider using "proctored" on-line testing. The Faculty of Math, in particular, is investigating if any of the proctoring software tools are suitable for our use. There are a host of technical and financial hurdles to overcome. I question the effectiveness of any of these tools, however, since there appear to be simple and obvious ways around them. Many resources can be found online that help students get around measures and countermeasures that these software tools use. I have no plan to use proctored on-line testing for my course.

(i) See Centre for Teaching Excellence website for more.

6. Tip of the day (from Gordon Stubley): Especially in first or second year, help students plan out their on-line academic term. It will be as new to them as it is to you. See the attached resource that you may want to share with students.