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Building Community is Essential


Building Community Is Essential 
As you start to deliver your courses online, I want to encourage you to keep it simple. Pick tools and approaches acclimated to both you and your students. Your students will appreciate it if you rely on technology and routines that are familiar. Introduce new tools only when absolutely necessary. With all the unknowns, your students’ emotional and mental energy may already be drained; therefore, introducing new tools and approaches may leave less energy and attention for learning. Focus on what is necessary for your students to learn to complete the objectives of your course. Recommended tools you can use to deliver and to engage your students in your online classrooms can be found at icc.edu/tlc.


Building a community online within your classroom is an opportunity to connect with your students in a new way. Over the past few weeks, the word that keeps coming to my mind is perseverance. Helen Keller wrote, “We can do anything we want to if we stick to it long enough.” You are showing perseverance as you continue to complete the semester with your students. You may be learning a new skill set or you may be refining your skill set. Take advantage of this opportunity, and be sure to see it through your students’ eyes. 

Take time to outline the behaviors and responsibilities you expect from your students and what they can expect from you. Some students will need to develop a new set of skills as they transition from face to face instruction to online instruction. You may want to include guidelines for your classroom on time management, organization, and reading strategies. You can help students by incorporating instructional tools and strategies that increase student engagement and faculty-student interactions. As ICC has gone fully online, there are several resources available for your students:
●     Virtual Services
●      Navigating Online Courses
●      Chat feature on the Library Home Page

I am confident that you will have meaningful conversations with your students over the next few weeks. Just remember, they will be adapting alongside you.

The Teaching and Learning Center is here to support you. Over the next eight weeks, I plan to post weekly sharing simple tips and best practices for building community within your online classrooms. Topics will include:
●     keys to communicating
●     how to facilitate a discussion
●     how to give feedback
●     video captioning & accessibility 

I want to encourage you to continue to engage your students and let them know you are attentive and available. Your presence matters!

Written by Janelle Reeb
Online Learning Coordinator
Feel free to leave comments below
For additional resources, visit icc.edu/tlc webpage 

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