11 Step 1: Student engagement preparation
This step refers to information and activities given to the students before their initial synchronous meeting with the entire group of students and instructors. This could potentially include 3 components:
1. Access to a formal collaboration space, such as an LMS, with details on the Virtual Exchange. These details may include what the students will be doing together, what is expected of them, and what the assessments and due dates are. Although there is a myriad of possible applications that may be used for this purpose, we recommend platforms and applications that allow open communication between students, instructors, and support personnel from both institutions.
2. Provide opportunities for students to meet everyone involved in the Virtual Exchange. This can be done through asynchronous icebreaker activities where students and the instructional team introduce themselves. One application that worked well for us is Microsoft’s Flip, where everyone is invited to create and share a video about themselves (and perhaps about their geographical area!). In our collaboration, for example, some students from McMaster University shared a video about the snow in Canada (which was filmed during a snowstorm) and a student from USFQ filmed a video of herself walking past a volcano!
3. Depending upon your assessments and how you decided to ask students to reflect on the collaboration, students could also complete a pre-Virtual Exchange survey or reflection as a comparative basis for their post-Virtual Exchange survey or reflection.