Teaching Your Class

What Are the Most Important Things I Should Keep In Mind for Teaching?

Be consistent. When preparing your course and throughout the term, you should first think about what you want your students to know or be able to do after taking your class. Then, think about how you can find out if your teaching strategy was effective and design your assessment (exams, homework, presentations, etc.) accordingly. After that, think about how you will teach your class so that your students are not just “exposed” to what you want them to learn but have enough opportunities to practice and get feedback.

Communicate. Explain to your students why you are doing what you are doing, what you expect them to do, and why. You may need to repeat this information several times throughout the term. Clarifying your expectations does not mean “teaching to the test.” Still, it is important that your students understand what they are supposed to gain from the learning activities and assignments, etc. You should also communicate the standards you are aiming for, as well as provide clear statements about what you consider to be collaboration, as opposed to plagiarism.  Fanshawe’s Academic Integrity website has resources to support instructors and students in applying the values of academic integrity in course activities.

Focus. When you are teaching, focus on your students and your interaction with them. That is sometimes easier said than done when you are juggling academic deadlines and other work-related responsibilities. If you allow yourself to get distracted by issues like these, your students may think you don’t care about them, and they won’t notice your passion for the subject you are teaching. Most students are quite forgiving when it comes to a new instructor not being perfect—unless they get the feeling that the instructor doesn’t care. Being prepared for class, demonstrating your passion for your subject, and caring about your student’s learning experience will take you a long way toward having a successful first year of teaching. When teaching online, even asynchronous courses benefit from the strong social presence of the instructor (see the Establishing Online Teacher Presence QRG for some suggestions).

Know your audience. A large first-year service course may require a different approach than a small graduate or post-graduate course. You should also keep in mind that students may be different than you in their motivation, previous education, and expectations. Additionally, the student population at Fanshawe has a substantial proportion of international students. It may be much more or less diverse than what you may have experienced at other academic institutions.

Use a variety of teaching strategies. Different students learn in different ways, and different topics require different approaches. You should study the literature and learn about various teaching methods, such as learner-centered teaching, guided inquiry, active learning, lecture, group work, and online discussion. You should use what works best for your content and your students’ learning needs. You should also vary your teaching strategies to keep your students engaged and motivated.

Manage your classroom effectively. Classroom management is not only for K-12 teachers; it is also essential for college instructors. You should create a safe and respectful learning environment for your students, and establish and enforce clear rules and expectations. You should also use technology wisely, and avoid using it when it distracts or hinders learning. You should motivate your students with positive reinforcement and avoid using grades or punishments as the only incentives.

Provide feedback and support to your students. Feedback is crucial for learning, as it helps students monitor their progress, identify their strengths and weaknesses, and improve their performance. You should provide timely, specific, and constructive feedback to your students, both verbally and in writing. You should also use various assessment methods, such as quizzes, assignments, projects, and exams, to measure and evaluate your students’ learning. You should also offer support and guidance to your students and be available and approachable for consultation and assistance.

Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. EDI can help create a learning environment that is respectful, equitable, and inclusive of all people, regardless of their backgrounds, identities, or perspectives. This can foster a sense of belonging and engagement among students and instructors and reduce feelings of isolation, discrimination, or marginalization. EDI can also enrich the curriculum and the pedagogy by exposing students to different viewpoints, experiences, and cultures and by fostering critical thinking, creativity, and problem-solving skills. Considering EDI within your teaching practice can help prepare students for a diverse and globalized world of work and equip them with the skills and attitudes to work effectively and collaboratively with people from different backgrounds and contexts (Microsoft Bing, 2023).

When in doubt, ask. Fanshawe College is a large and diverse teaching institution; as a new teacher, you’re not expected to know every aspect of the college in your first few weeks! If you are unsure about anything, especially as it relates to policies and teaching procedures, don’t hesitate to ask for help. Your program manager, colleagues, LLS coordinator team, Library Learning Commons, Organizational Development and Learnings, Center of Academic Excellence, and many other people at the College are here to give you practical, technical, and pedagogical advice and support.

This section contains the following:

Can I Get Help With Designing My Assignments and Exams?

In our department, your new colleagues will generously share their course materials with you if you ask them. LLS will have syllabi from previous semesters for courses already in the calendar. Whenever you would like to use material prepared by someone else (not just exams, but also assignments, etc.), make sure you obtain the author’s permission first. If you have permission to use old assessments, keep in mind that at least some of your students will likely have copies, too, possibly from a friend who took the course previously or from a website. It will be important to change the specific assessment questions used. You could also make one or more of the old assessments available to your students for practice so they will get an idea of what your assessment will look like. FOL provides methods for creating question banks and randomizing questions.  You can contact Organizational Development and Learning for workshops or resources that may exist in designing assignments, activities, and assessments.

How Creative Can I Get With My Course and Exam Design?

According to the collective agreement between Fanshawe College and the Fanshawe Faculty Union, you have academic freedom for your teaching and research endeavours. Here are a few considerations to keep in mind. Whenever you would like to do something new in your class, think carefully about where it stands in the curriculum. If you are teaching a required course that is a prerequisite for other courses, especially a first-year service course, it is important to be consistent with previous (and future) iterations of the course. That means your course content has to be largely the same, so that your students are prepared for courses building upon yours, and similarity with the assessment methods will allow for comparison between different years. If your course is not required and is not one of the core courses of your program, you have more freedom in designing and delivering it.

Do I Have to Submit the Exams? When Do They Have to Be Prepared?

Well before the end of the term, you’ll be sent an email from our schools’ academic Planner to ask if your course contains a final exam that is to be held during exam week (usually Week 15). The information you provide will be used for scheduling and you will then be notified when and where your final exam will be administered via a Final Exam departmental email. If you are holding a final exam during exam week, it will be your responsibility to provide copies of the exam and all the necessary materials to your assigned invigilator, if applicable.  An exam invigilator list will also be set out in advance, so you may coordinate with your invigilator in advance.  Keep in mind that for large multisection courses, such as WRIT, final assessments will be administered by you, and the process will be communicated by the WRIT coordinator well in advance.

What Is the Midterm Grading Policy?

By the midterm grading deadline, you should complete 30% of the final grade. You may want to consider this as you construct your Assessment Schedule/Supplementary Syllabus. For more information, refer to the Midterm Grades section of this guide.

Are There Any Restrictions on When I Can Schedule a Midterm or Test During the Semester?

Please ensure that you do NOT schedule any assessments, including tests, quizzes, or assignments, during the weeks designated for the fall or winter mid-semester break or any that fall on a statutory holiday or college-designated break. It is important that you refer to Fanshawe’s Academic Calendar when preparing your course syllabus and scheduling assessments. Academic calendars are usually set a year in advance and approved by the College Council for distribution.

Refer to the Midterm Grades section of this guide for more information.

What Do I Need to Know About the Invigilation of Exams?

Exam procedures, including information about student evaluations, are outlined in A131: Evaluation of Student Learning in the Fanshawe Colicy Policy Manual.

How Should I Inform Students About Their Grades?

Timely feedback on their grades is very important for your students so that they know how well they are doing in the course and can learn from their assignments for future assessment. Providing timely feedback prior to the deadline to withdraw from courses without academic penalty (usually Week 10) is also important for students. You can find info on current deadlines on Fanshawe’s Dates to Remember website.

When you use FanshaweOnline for your course, your students can see their marks to date at any time (unless you change the settings to hide some grades).  You can also use FOL to display midterm reporting grades.  Contact your Educational Support Technologist for help using the FOL grade book.

General information about grading systems and policies, including conversion between GPA and letter grades can be found in Policy A112: Course Grade System.

How Long Do I Have to Keep Midterms, Exams, and Records of Grades?

Professors’ records of student grades for tests, assignments, progress reports, anecdotal notes and other activities on which end-of-term grades are based must be retained for at least one year after use. If the records are accessed for an appeal, ‘I’ grade, or any other official purpose, the records must be retained for one year after the last actual use of the records. Please refer to Policy A112: Course Grade System for more retention information.

Where do I have to submit my course grades?

All grades must be entered online through FanshaweOnline’s gradebook, which interfaces with the College’s grading system. Instructions for uploading final grades will be communicated to you by the departmental Student Information Systems Designate well in advance of the final grade deadline. Remember to save a copy of your grades after uploading. Your students will be able to access their grades once they have been uploaded to FanshaweOnline and released by you.  Official final grades will appear on a student’s Webadvisor account a few days after the Academic Standing process has been completed and final grades have been varied by the Office of the Registrar.

Grade submission deadlines: Our SIS designate will communicate the due date for the submission of final grades well in advance by faculty email. It is important that you follow the final grading deadline as your individual course grades play a part in a larger time-sensitive process of Academic Standing and grade verification by the College.

Refer to the Final Grades section of this guide for more information.

What Do I Have to Know About Privacy Regarding Student Grades, Etc.?

Since Fanshawe College is subject to the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FOIPP), it is important to ensure that your treatment of student data is in agreement with this legislation. All faculty have an obligation to protect students’ personal information. This includes not collecting personal information unnecessarily, informing students how their personal information will be used, using the information you have access to only as authorized, sharing information internally on a need-to-know basis only, and not releasing information externally without student consent or other legal authority.  Please refer to policy C304: Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy for more details.

What Should I Do When a Student Misses a Final Exam?

Students should contact you if they have missed a midterm test or final examination.  There are procedures in place to accommodate a student through the testing center for missed evaluations. It is always best to reach out to your students if they have missed a major evaluation. If a student misses a final exam and doesn’t contact you even after you have reached out to them, the student will receive a final grade based on performance and weighting of all graded work (including an exam with a grade of 0) as outlined in the course syllabus.

What Should I Do When a Student Misses an Assignment?

There are no strict policies for missed assignments. If a student has a valid doctor’s or counsellor’s note, instructors can decide whether they will grant the student an extension or require them to make up the assignment. Sometimes, students would like to make up missed term work, for example, to improve their grades. You are not obligated to create another assignment for them, but if you can spare the time, your student would probably be grateful. You should determine your course policy on missed assignments in advance and communicate this to your students both in person and in your supplementary syllabus, as well as posting the information within FOL. Having a clear set of guidelines in advance can help avoid potential problems with missed assignments.  You should talk to your colleagues to find out what the departmental culture around this practice is in your subject area, especially if you are teaching a multi-section course.  Consistency across sections of the same course is a wise practice.

In some cases, you may get a request from a Fanshawe student-athlete to adjust deadlines for an assignment because they are playing in a competition or from students who are participating in a competition related to their studies (e.g., a business case competition or industry-specific event planned by their program). You are strongly encouraged to support these students by allowing them to make up the missed assignments or mid-term exams. Student-athletes are asked to inform their instructors about any scheduled absences at the beginning of the term.

Early in your course, you may wish to reach out to students as a whole to encourage them to let you know if they require academic accommodations. If a student who is receiving academic accommodations has missed an assignment, you may wish to contact Accessibility Services for advice. See the Accommodations section in Teaching Policies and Practices for more details.

How Will the Student Evaluations of My Classes Be Done?

Student Feedback Surveys are required student evaluations of the course conducted at the end of classes.  The college administers them, and students complete them online for each of their program courses. Once complete, faculty will be notified of the results of their feedback surveys within Fanhsweonline.

In addition to the formal end-of-semester student survey, faculty members are encouraged to check in with their students and get some formative feedback partway through the semester. You can request feedback from students using paper forms in class, a Google form, and the Survey tool in FOL.

What Do I Need to Do if I Get Sick and Cannot Teach or if I Cannot Get to the Campus?

If you are unable to teach your scheduled class, notify your students by email through FanshaweOnline as soon as possible and advise the department and the front-line support staff so that a notice of class cancellation can be posted on the classroom door if you have a campus-based class.

References

The following has been adapted from “7. Teaching your class” in  Teaching and Learning Guide for UPEI Instructors Copyright © 2022 by Teaching and Learning Centre – UPEI and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.

Change log: This version contains stylistic, organizational and branding changes that differ from the above source. In addition, changes in wording and references to other institutions and external resources have been either updated or removed. Fanshawe College-specific information has been added to reflect our teaching and technology ecosystem.

Microsoft (2023). Bing Chat Enterprise (Nov 23 version) [Large language model]. https://www.bing.com/search?q=Bing+AI&showconv=1&FORM=hpcodx 

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School of Language and Liberal Studies Copyright © 2023 by Fanshawe College is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.

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