Post-pandemic Teaching Practices

Presenter: Celeste McLaughlin and Neil Lent

Session Description

Since March 2020 we have adapted our teaching and learning practices because of Covid related restrictions Some reflections about this from colleagues can be found below:

Most of my teaching is about building relationships and supportive environments. My way of being an educator is to form positive relationships with students, to be a trusted member of staff, with an open door policy. The real challenge for me has been on how to build these relationships and create these environments without any face to face contact. 

Deborah Holt (2020) Spotlight on Practice Worth Sharing: Staff identity and wellbeing in changing times. Teaching Matters, University of Edinburgh.

….contact hours are important, and this year they have become an even more precious commodity, as many of us had to reduce the time spent on synchronous teaching to make more room for asynchronous activity. In fact, we’ve learned to design courses where all Learning Outcomes can be met even without contact hours, in order to accommodate students studying in different time zones. So why do most students and staff crave contact time? Is it simply due to the need for social interaction, the joy (and validation) that comes from being together with other people who are interested in the same things? What do we even mean by contact time anyway, contact with whom? 

Sabine Rolle (2021) On Contact Time. Teaching Matters, University of Edinburgh.

This session offers you the opportunity to share your experiences and perspectives as you adapted your teaching during the last year or so What impact did these changes have on your students? What would you like to continue and build on as we move beyond the current crisis, and what will post pandemic teaching practices look like?  

This session will run asynchronously across the three days of the conference so you can participate when you have time and are feeling inspired. All contributions are anonymous and we hope this will offer us an opportunity to share what has worked well and less well, and importantly what we have learned from this experience.   

Activity 1: Snapshot of your experience of teaching and learning during the pandemic

Activity 2: Comments and reflections on changing teaching practices

This activity will gather your insights and reflections about changing teaching practices during the pandemic.

Please follow the appropriate link:

Conference guest (external participant)  – https://edin.ac/3tZ0zvQ.

University of Edinburgh member of staff or student –  https://edin.ac/3x3aZwG 

**It will be useful for us to know which contributions are external and internal to the University of Edinburgh so please use the appropriate link. You will be able to access both links to view the responses.  **

These activities will remain open during the conference. The contributions will then be archived and shared. If you would like a copy of the collated responses please leave your details here – https://edin.ac/3zaJHpO.