Greeting Students
Is it ok to send everything out to the students all at once on the first day? How can we eliminate overwhelming the students with info. overload on the first day?
Denise,
I don't have a problem with going paperless with many of the items we have our students read and use. On the other hand our culture is based upon a lot of concrete aspects of communication such as a handout. Even though a lot of what we share with students is online I still develop a handout with critical information on it. By handing it out and discussing it during the first class the students leave with a tangible object (the handout). Mentally this helps them to connect with the class and me the instructor because they are involved through touch by having held the outline during our discussion.
Gary
Gary Meers, Ed.D.
I am a tactile personlity and try to always incorporate something that students feel they can take with them from class. I have incorporated both and seem to have a positive response from my core students. Do you think going paperless across campuses is beneficial to students. It has positive environmental impacts and is beneficial for campus productivity, but I worrry students will feel as though they are not able to look at something in front of them for class.
Denise,
We use an electronic format but I still give out a handout the first class meeting. The reason is that mentally students like to have a take away and the handout is that. In addition, they like to have the highlights before them which my handout gives. Something tactile and visual (holding the handout in their hands and reading it.) goes a long way in getting the settled into the class.
Gary
Gary Meers, Ed.D.
This was a great question. Our campus is attempting to go completely electronic and I have been reluctant in the complete transition from fear of overwhelming them. I can see that with some organization and restructuring of the electronic documents it can be a successful transition to paperless class starts but I think I still will be including a handout for students on the first day as well.
Andrew,
You can send everything out to them in one batch if you have a clear and graphic way the information is separated into sections for their use. I prefer to give them a handout in additional to the syllabus that gives them the big picture along with the first assignment. This way they see where we are going and the first project they are going to work on. This keeps from overwhelming them. I use the example of asking them "How do you eat an elephant? Answer: One bite at a time." They get the picture this way.
Gary
Gary Meers, Ed.D.
