The Hybrid Teaching Exchange is where colleagues can share work in progress, learning, insights, ideas, plans and resources to support hybrid teaching.  The aim of these digests is to provide an overview of the site and highlight new and existing content that we hope will be useful and of interest to you and colleagues.

The surge in Covid cases during December and January has disrupted many of the plans made for semester 2. Staff are having to make yet more adjustments and adaptations to their plans for teaching, while many students are disappointed and anxious about the implications for them.  This digest tries to address some of these challenges and concerns, providing links to advice and support for both staff and students.

Challenge for students in structuring time and maintaining motivation

One of the themes emerging from the December student pulse survey was that “[taught] Students are finding it difficult to structure their days and maintain their motivation”. Cathy Bovill and Velda McCune from the IAD have written two blogs (one for staff and one for students) providing advice and reassurance on this topic.

• For staff: ‘Supporting students by offering signposting and prioritisation’
• This includes a link to the blog for students added to Study Hub: “Staying Engaged with your Studies in Unstructured Pandemic Times”

Advice and support for online teaching and learning

We’ve added several blogs to the exchange site addressing some of the key challenges in teaching online, along with links and a reminder of the support available from IS, IAD and other groups around the University:

• Guidance on creating safe and inclusive learning spaces. Introduction to a toolkit developed in response to feedback from colleagues that they would benefit from ideas on how to provide effective interventions when witnessing poor online behaviours.
• Digital and Online Teaching – Support to Get Started. Pointers on where to start in finding advice and support to get started with digital and online teaching.
• Designing and Structuring Discussion Forums. Straightforward suggestions about designing, structuring and facilitating discussions and including some examples of discussion activities that have resulted in engaging student discussions.
• Building Community and Presence in Digital Learning Environments. This short document provides some ideas about how you might build community and presence in the digital space to encourage student engagement.
• Learning technology training. New website from the Information Services Learning, Teaching and Web team bringing together information on specialist support, training and guidance.
• The resources section of the exchange site includes lots more advice and links, including the IS Teaching Continuity Page and IAD Support for Hybrid Teaching.

Insights on student experience and expectations

• Student Mental Health & Online Engagement. The latest podcasts from Teaching Matters examine the impact of online engagement on students’ mental health, the positive sides of online engagement, the downsides, the unintended consequences and what we can do to make things a little bit better.
• Experience & expectations. The University Students’ Association surveyed School and Programme student representatives during semester 1 to understand their experience of teaching and learning during semester 1 and hopes for semester 2.
• The Hybrid Learner Journeys section of the Exchange site includes links to several personal reflections from students of their experience to date.

And finally…

A reminder that our November/December digest  included reflections on semester 1 and links to several other resources and approaches that colleagues might find helpful in the coming months.

Please do let us know if there are other themes or topics you’d like to see included on the Exchange site, or if you’d like to contribute.  We’d love to hear from you.

All good wishes for the new semester and 2021.