TOPIC: student consultation on moving class online
This is the FREN 102 version; the email sent to FREN 101 students from their instructor would have had adaptations, adapting “our class” items for your class: lesson plans if meeting on different days, etc.; and changes (“I” here below = O’Brien) so that students sent their questionnaire to their instructor, as it was about your class and its specifics, not the course in general.
Dear students,
I hope you are all doing well. You may have seen UBC’s announcement on Friday evening:
March 13, 2020 announcement: UBC is transitioning to online classes effective Monday March 16, 2020 for the remainder of the term. For classes that cannot be accommodated online, we will be issuing further information through our Faculties. This will apply to UBC Vancouver, UBC Okanagan and UBC Robson Square.
UBC’s campuses will remain open and all university operations will continue as normal, as we transition. For full details of this announcement visit https://broadcastemail.ubc.ca/
Our class is “onlinising” and languages are the kind of class that don’t “translate” easily (unlike, say, simple large-lecture teaching). So here’s what’s happening next …
1) Our department is going to take this Monday 16 March off from teaching new material to prepare the rest of the semester for our “onlinised” classes and exams.
2) Test 2, which was scheduled for Monday, is postponed until Friday 20 March. It will be an open-book take-home online, and a different kind of test.
3) [FREN 102 VERSION]
Quick version of lesson plans for next week:
- Monday: work on DELF 7 (textbook p. 143) and Bilan 7 (workbook p. 100-101)
- Wednesday: short movie day!
- Friday: online test opens
For this start to online classes, you can work independently or in groups. (We’ll move on to more sophistication about online groups the week after next).
[O’BRIEN FREN 102-205 VERSION]
In our class, I’ll use Canvas > Discussion for live text-based chat during class. You can also use it among yourselves during class time and outside it, and I’ll answer any remaining unanswered questions there during office hours.
4) New Syllabus: On Monday, consulting with colleagues, I will modify the original syllabus including changes to checking the Cahier and the in-person attendance and academic concession request / absence reporting policy. (Sneak preview: I’m probably using participation in Canvas Discussions for that—subject to your replies to item (6) below—and keeping Discussions open after class, not setting any closing time or indeed day on them.) I’ll circulate the new syllabus to you by email and Canvas Announcement on Tuesday 17 March. It will also be published on Canvas.
5) Office Hours: I will be keeping the same office hours but they’ll now be online, probably (see next point) using Canvas Discussion as chat.
6) Student consultation on moving our class online: To make sure that the proposed set-up works, I’d be grateful if you could complete this questionnaire and email it back to me: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/qxv832iyase2bt1s8qdnm/19W-FREN101-102-online-class-student-consultation.docx?dl=0&rlkey=6100r2pyabzx8hj1fb4ii8cpt
Thank you all for being patient! We will get through this together, there will be hiccups but we’ll support each other along the way, as a mutual aid community.
Take care,
Dr Juliet O’Brien